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HISTORY

On August 4, 1941, the Industrial Security Branch was established under the Department of Munitions and Supply, one of the predecessors of Public Works and Government Services Canada. E.J. Johnson was the first Director General. Its existence came after a few years of efforts from the Government to make sure that the contractors of Canadian plants engaged in war supplies met the security requirements of their contract relating to the protection of their plants against espionage and sabotage. Since there was no branch equipped to do this work, as a temporary measure, the Legal Branch undertook the work with the assistance of R.L. Anderson, who was appointed as the Senior Security Officer on November 1, 1940. The Branch worked closely with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Department of National Defence. By the middle of 1941, an increase in the volume of work resulted in the creation of a separate Branch, so became the existence of the Industrial Security Branch.

The majority of the work undertaken by the Industrial Security Branch consisted of establishing and monitoring the protective measures to provide the best security for a total of 500 war plants. The main security requirements were as follows: (1) appointment of a full time security officer; (2) proper physical security; (3) rotating guard system; (4) adequate fire fighting system; (5) fingerprinting and photographing of employees; and (6) employee identification system. It is interesting to note that some commonality exists, such as listed above, between the security requirements that the war plants had to implement and the physical security standards of today’s Industrial Security Program, however, today over 5,800 companies are registered.

Throughout the years, the mandate of the Industrial Security Branch evolved and embraced a broader range of service and today, ISS continues to play a vital role in protecting the national security interests of Canada and its allies. The ISP currently protects sensitive and controlled government information, assets and goods in approximately 8,000 private sector organizations that comprise some 340,000 security screened employees, all of which support Canada's National Security Policy framework. This is carried out by the following four directorates.

1. the Canadian Industrial Security Directorate (CISD) has existed since the beginning in one form or another. It is comprised of four different divisions involved with personnel security screening, organization screening, contract security and related inspections and investigations;
   
   
2. the International Industrial Security was separated from CISD in 2007 and given Directorate status due to an increase focus on the international stage. The objective of this newest Directorate is to negotiate Industrial Security Memoranda of Understanding (MOU) with foreign countries on behalf of the Government of Canada and to administer the safeguarding measures of all contracts with foreign countries including the exchange of classified information and the assessment of Visit Clearance Requests.
   
   
3. the Controlled Goods Directorate (CGD) was created in 2001 and its objective is to safeguard controlled goods and/or controlled technology within Canada and prevent controlled goods and/or controlled technology from being accessed by unauthorized persons;
   
   
4. the Program Harmonization and Services Directorate (PHSD) was created in 2004 with an objective to provide strategic advice to all levels of management within the Sector. PHSD directs the development, implementation and management of the framework, policies, directives and processes required in the areas of business planning, policy, management information services, financial management, training, performance measurement, quality management, information technology and administrative/human resource services;

In 2006, the Industrial Security Program (ISP) commemorated its 65th anniversary.