Abstract
The U.S. and Canadian governments have long engaged in the surveillance of Indigenous peoples. Such practices have garnered public attention in light of recent events. This chapter reflects on two examples: protests against the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline that crossed over the lands of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in the United States and the release of details regarding Project SITKA—a Canadian Royal Mounted Police “dataveillance” operation identifying and tracking Indigenous activists. It examines them to illuminate the strategic use of information, particularly disinformation and misinformation, by government actors, media, private security personnel, and protesters. In particular, the analysis highlights how settler colonialism informs the asymmetrical power dynamics at work, illustrating connections between Project SITKA and the Standing Rock protests.
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Notes
- 1.
Indigenous peoples often refer to the political and legal jurisdictions of Canada and the United States as Turtle Island (Newcomb 2011).
- 2.
- 3.
Actors employed non-lethal weapons, including rubber bullets and water cannons, as well as militarised weapons and personnel typically used in counterinsurgency operations (Brown et al. 2017b, d). ETP also launched a US$300-million racketeering and defamation lawsuit against pipeline resistance groups, alleging that they intentionally enflamed protests to increase viewer interest (Brown et al. 2017c).
- 4.
Nonviolent activities included attending public commentary hearings, gathering signatures for valid requests for environmental impact statements, participating in civil disobedience, hunger strikes, marches and rallies, boycotts, and encampments (Brown et al. 2017c).
- 5.
Project SITKA was organised after two extensively publicised Indigenous-led social movements in Canada: Idle No More (November 2012 to April 2013) and Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women (early 2014 to the present).
- 6.
The report was compiled by gathering information from tracking individual persons, “all RCMP divisions, data contained within law enforcement data bank holdings, and open [publicly available] information” like social media (Project SITKA 2015, 7, 11). It focused on protests, “speaking tours, disruption of political proceedings, and direct action training camps” (2015, 10).
- 7.
Threat profiles included information on their height, age, weight, phone number, personalities, tactics, vehicles, mobility, “category of protester,” “notable files,” etc. (Project SITKA 2015, xiv, xv).
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Harb, J., Henne, K. (2019). Disinformation and Resistance in the Surveillance of Indigenous Protesters. In: Haggart, B., Henne, K., Tusikov, N. (eds) Information, Technology and Control in a Changing World. International Political Economy Series. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-14540-8_9
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