Canada spy agency says India is using cyber tech to track Sikh separatists

A Canadian spy agency has warned that India is using cyber technology to track separatists abroad, a day after the country’s government accused a top Indian official of authorizing violence that included the killing of a Sikh activist in Vancouver.

In a report, Canada’s Communications Security Establishment (CSE) said India was using cyber capabilities “to track and surveil activists and dissidents living abroad” as well as stepping up cyber-attacks against Canadian government networks.

Ottawa has accused India of orchestrating the 2023 killing in Vancouver of the 45-year-old naturalized Canadian citizen Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a prominent campaigner for “Khalistan”, the fringe separatist movement for an independent Sikh homeland in India’s Punjab state.

“It is clear that we are seeing India being an emerging [cyber] threat actor,” the CSE chief, Caroline Xavier, told a news conference.

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