The Federal Intelligence Service is Germany’s foreign intelligence service.Image: dpa / Kay Nietfeld
Politics
The case of treason by the suspected Russian spy Carsten L. at the Federal Intelligence Service (BND), which became known last year, had already revealed deficiencies in the work of the secret service months ago.
Despite lying, Carsten L. was able to switch from the Bundeswehr to the BND in 2007 and thus also passed the security check.
He has been in custody since December 2022. Among other things, he is accused of having delivered numerous internal documents to Russia. Internal security measures of the BND had failed several times.
As a result, there was now a security check by the secret service body of the Bundestag, which is headed by the Green politician Konstantin von Notz. Not only serious shortcomings were found. It also came to a procedure with real rarity value.
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Result with real rarity value
Because the parliamentary control committee actually meets in secret. However, the members published their “information” on the server of the Bundestag. Such a public demand by the body does not actually occur. It is also considered a binding work order for the federal government.
According to the report, as early as April last year, the parliamentarians “extensively examined the work processes, staffing, quality standards and legal framework for security checks in the federal intelligence services”.
Above all, the affair surrounding Carsten L. pointed to an “urgent need for action to reform the existing procedures for security checks”.
BND avoids embarrassing personnel breakdown
Carsten L. of all people was supposed to be responsible for those security checks as part of a promotion.
This is actually intended to uncover suspicious trips abroad or indications of espionage activity in one’s own country. But L’s successor, of all people, became an embarrassment for the BND: she lost her new job immediately after she had turned up at work with her mobile phone without permission.
The deputies themselves described the fact that they now spoke publicly about their security check of the BND as a “remarkable event” that “documents the seriousness of the situation”, such as the “Spiegel” writes.
The magazine quotes the chairman of Notz as saying: “The turning point must finally reach the secret services.” He calls for a “rapid change in self-security and counter-espionage, in the BND and all security-related authorities.”
Von Notz was also surprised that the BND had not strengthened its security measures much earlier. After all, the spy Markus R. was already exposed in 2014 for passing on secret BND documents to the US secret service CIA.
Konstantin von Notz is the chairman of the control committee.Bild: IMAGO/Christian Spicker
BND wants to implement immediate measures
The committee is now calling for appropriate measures. Among other things, vacancies are to be filled and a change in the law is required to enable “early detection and prevention of security risks”.
In addition: “One could think about a kind of license for employees of the intelligence services,” quoted the “Spiegel” as the SPD MP Ralf Stegner.
The BND wants to introduce the first measures quickly. Among other things, a scanner at the entrances. This is to prevent employees from bringing their private cell phones to the workplace.
