[COMMUNITY] Generate a Canada Security of Information Act handling plan — Special Operational Information (SOI) register, marking and handling matrix, transmission channels, compartments and need-to-know, destruction and sanitisation, CSIS Act §16 and §19 coordination, RCMP NSP liaison, breach response, personnel reliability prerequisites.
[COMMUNITY] Generate a Canada Security of Information Act handling plan — Special Operational Information (SOI) register, marking and handling matrix, transmission channels, compartments and need-to-know, destruction and sanitisation, CSIS Act §16 and §19 coordination, RCMP NSP liaison, breach response, personnel reliability prerequisites.
⚠️ Community-contributed command — not part of the officially-maintained ArcKit baseline.
Output should be reviewed by qualified Canadian counsel, your departmental ATIP coordinator,
ITSEC officer, and (for FITAA matters) the Office of the Commissioner of Foreign Influence
Transparency before reliance.
Statutory currency: FITAA was enacted June 2024 with regulations still emerging through 2025–2026.
The Commissioner's office is newly stood up and operational guidance will evolve. Verify all
citations against the current Justice Laws Website text and Commissioner's published guidance
before relying on this output.
User Request
$ARGUMENTS
You are an enterprise architect generating a Canada Security of Information Act handling plan for a federal information system that processes Special Operational Information or other classified material.
Process
Read prerequisites:
projects/000-global/ARC-000-PRIN-*.md (federal principles, if present)
The project's REQ artefact (if present)
The project's ITSG-33 Statement of Applicability (ARC-<id>-ITSG-*.md) if present — its categorisation drives the handling envelope
The project's FITAA assessment (ARC-<id>-FITAA-*.md) if present — the protected investigative dataset overlaps with SOI
Use scripts/bash/generate-document-id.sh <PROJECT_ID> SOIA --filename for the artefact filename.
Resolve the <!-- DOC-CONTROL-HEADER --> marker per RENDERING.md. Use the Canadian classification scheme (UNCLASSIFIED / Protected A / Protected B / Protected C / CONFIDENTIAL / SECRET / TOP SECRET) — replace the standard UK line in the header. Note that the artefact itself will frequently warrant a SECRET or higher classification.
Generate the following sections (the template provides skeletons for each):
SOI Inventory — every dataset, document, or artefact that meets the Security of Information Act s.8 definition of Special Operational Information. Include intelligence reporting, source-protective material, foreign-government-shared product, methods and techniques, and identities subject to s.8. SOI is a statutory category — material qualifies by meeting the s.8 definition, and departmental designation cannot create or remove SOI status.
Marking Matrix — per asset, list classification level (UNCLASSIFIED through TOP SECRET), caveats (CANADIAN EYES ONLY (CEO), NOFORN, Five Eyes (FVEY), specific releasability tags), and special compartments where applicable. Foreign-shared product carries originator caveats — the Third-Party Rule applies and redistribution requires originator consent.
Handling Rules per categorisation — at rest (storage approval, encryption to CMVP / CSE-approved standard), in transit (transmission channels), and in use (clean-desk, screen viewing, printing, USB / removable media rules). Tier the rules per classification level.
Transmission Channel Matrix — a true matrix of allowed channels per categorisation (e.g. SECRET via XNet / IRRINET / designated dark fibre / approved courier; TOP SECRET via Mandrake / SCIF-to-SCIF / dedicated channels). Capture unencrypted-link prohibitions and any caveat-driven channel restrictions (CEO and NOFORN material is not transmissible over allied-shared infrastructure).
Compartment / Need-to-Know Register — every compartment, its owner, the access-list size, the indoctrination requirements, and the audit-log rotation cadence. Compartmentation defaults to deny — every access decision is an explicit need-to-know determination, and default-allow on a compartment is the highest-impact failure mode.
Destruction and Sanitisation — approved destruction routes (CSE / RCMP-approved shredders, degaussers, incineration), media sanitisation per CSE ITSP.40.006 IT Media Sanitization across the media lifecycle.
CSIS Act §16 / §19 Coordination — §16 foreign intelligence requests (received from the Minister of Foreign Affairs or the Minister of National Defence and authorised by the Federal Court); §19 disclosure framework (the purposes for which CSIS may disclose information). Identify the system's role in §16 collection, §19 disclosure receipt, or both, and the coordinating contact and artefact for each.
RCMP National Security Programme Liaison (where applicable) — INSET (Integrated National Security Enforcement Team) or SI&IS (Sensitive Investigations and Intelligence Services) interface, evidence-handling for criminal disclosure under the Stinchcombe and McNeil obligations.
Breach Response — suspected unauthorised disclosure runbook: containment within minutes (revoke access, isolate the affected system, suspend the implicated account), notification (departmental security officer → CSE incident response → CSIS / RCMP as warranted), investigation, and reporting to the Privy Council Office where Cabinet-level confidence is implicated. Breach-response timing matters more than completeness — initial containment within minutes, with forensic completeness following.
Personnel Reliability — clearance prerequisites (Reliability, Secret, Top Secret, Top Secret SCI), update cycle, briefing and debriefing protocol, and indoctrination for compartments. Clearance is per-task, not per-role.
Open Items — explicit list of statutory currency caveats: which CSIS Act amendments under Bill C-26 / Bill C-70 are still settling, which Ministerial Directives are pending, which compartment MOUs with CSIS or RCMP are still in negotiation, and a reminder that the artefact itself is likely classified and must be stored, marked, and handled accordingly.
Populate the External References section per .arckit/references/citation-instructions.md. The Security of Information Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. O-5) and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. C-23) MUST appear in the Document Register with their primary URLs (Justice Laws Website) and the verification date.
Write the artefact via the Write tool to projects/<project-id>/<filename>.
Show only a summary to the user (one paragraph plus the headline SOI inventory count, compartment count, and any open statutory-currency or MOU items). Remind the user that the artefact may itself be classified.
Authoritative anchor
Security of Information Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. O-5); Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. C-23); TBS Standard on Security Screening; CSE ITSP-series guidance (ITSP.40.006 media sanitisation, ITSP.30.031 v3 user authentication, etc.). Authority: CSIS, CSE / Cyber Centre, RCMP, TBS. Primary URLs: https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/O-5/ (SOIA) and https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-23/ (CSIS Act).
CSIS Act amendments via Bill C-26 (cyber security) and Bill C-70 (foreign interference) are still settling — flag the consolidated Justice Laws text date in the External References section.
Important notes
SOI is a statutory category — material qualifies as Special Operational Information by meeting the Security of Information Act s.8 definition. Departmental designation cannot create or remove SOI status; a departmental "we treat this as SOI" label without a s.8 hook is a finding by inspection.
Compartmentation defaults to deny — every access decision is an explicit need-to-know determination. Default-allow on a compartment is the highest-impact failure mode of the handling plan; review the access-list size and audit cadence with the same rigour as the marking matrix.
Breach response timing matters more than completeness — initial containment must occur within minutes (revoke access, isolate the affected system, suspend the implicated account). Forensic completeness can follow; waiting for a complete picture before containment is the second-highest-impact failure mode.
Foreign-shared product carries originator caveats — the Third-Party Rule applies. CANADIAN EYES ONLY, NOFORN, and FVEY-restricted material can only be redistributed with the originator's consent. The marking matrix and the transmission channel matrix must both enforce this; an unrestricted internal share of caveated foreign product is a reportable breach.
The artefact produced is itself often classified — treat the SOIA handling plan as a SECRET document by default, store it in a TBS-approved system, and apply the same marking and handling rules to it as to the SOI it describes.
Suggested Next Steps
After completing this command, consider running:
$arckit-ca-itsg-33 -- SOIA handling rules sit on top of the ITSG-33 security baseline; categorisation and control profile are the prerequisite layer.
