Political surveillance

German chancellor's computer infected with a virus

Spy passions in Germany: the media reported that the computer of Angela Merkel in her parliamentary office was allegedly infected with a virus

Spy passions, now almost fading, now flaring up with renewed vigor, continue to excite the political and social life of Germany. The controversy around the possible illegal tapping of the German chancellor's mobile phone by Americans had not subsided yet, when the newspaper Bild am Sonntag threw up a new sensation: Merkel's computer in her parliamentary office was allegedly infected with a virus.

The Trojan was identified, writes Bild am Sonntag, due to the fact that a number of Bundestag deputies received an email invitation from the chancellor's computer to take part in a conference call. This message aroused suspicion.

A subsequent check showed that about a dozen deputy computers were infected with a virus, and illegal data downloads were detected on five of them.

We can talk about both confidential parliamentary information and information constituting a state secret.

On this occasion, the Minister of the Interior of Germany, Thomas de Maizière, said that there is every reason to assume the participation of a foreign intelligence service in a hacker attack. However, he did not specify which country he had in mind. Security experts behind the scenes and anonymously believe that either Russia or China could be behind Merkel's computer hack. They do not provide any concrete evidence.

When, in 2013, Edward Snowden made public the facts of total electronic espionage around the world by the American National Security Agency (NSA), the German public and politicians were shocked by the scope of surveillance. At the peak of the scandal, the German Prosecutor General’s Office opened a criminal case on wiretapping of the Federal Chancellor’s mobile phone, the Bundestag deputies created a special parliamentary committee to investigate the illegal activities of the NSA, the leftists demanded that Snowden be invited to Berlin to testify and ensure his extraterritoriality. And then, back in the summer of 2014, a “mole” of the American intelligence services was revealed in the German Federal Foreign Intelligence Service (BND).

Against the backdrop of the growing Ukrainian crisis, it was extremely unprofitable for the ruling parties in Germany to spoil relations with an overseas partner.

But it was also impossible to ignore public opinion in one's own country. Leading functionaries of the grand coalition showed the highest aerobatics of political manoeuvring. The President of the BND personally arranged an excursion for journalists to a top-secret electronic intelligence facility, and the American diplomat was pointedly declared persona non grata and expelled from Berlin. Merkel, during her visit to Washington, accepted Obama's assurances that the United States would no longer allow allies to be spied on.

More or less the situation has been discharged. Meetings of the special committee of the Bundestag to investigate the activities of the NSA, having become a routine, left the top news. The prosecutor's office, due to the inability to identify the suspects, closed the case on wiretapping of the chancellor's mobile phone. In addition, sociological services found that only about 20 percent of Germans are really concerned about the topic of illegal wiretapping of mobile conversations and the collection of their personal data by special services, for more than 70% of citizens, the fight against terrorist threats is more important.

It seemed that the scandalous story about the total surveillance of the NSA in Germany could be archived a little more. However, information leaked to the press that the requests of the Americans are far from being limited to the fight against terrorism - they are actively collecting information about the German economy and industry, its ties with European partners. As early as in 2008, the BND allegedly informed the office of the Federal Chancellor about this. In addition, information surfaced that the negotiations between Germany and the United States on an agreement on the mutual refusal to spy against each other, which Merkel's party presented as one of the trump cards of the 2013 election campaign, were simply a fiction.

Sharp statements were made not only by the opposition parties of the Greens and the Left, the Social Democrats - partners of the CDU / CSU in the grand coalition - demanded that Merkel personally testify in this regard to the parliamentary committee investigating the activities of the NSA, and the Chancellor's Office disclosed to the Bundestag deputies all the search words , which Americans use in electronic tracking of terrorist activities.

Such an attack on the part of the SPD is quite understandable: the next elections of 2017 are just around the corner and it is time to increase the falling authority of the party in the eyes of the voter.

Representatives of the CDU / CSU took an evasive position regarding search words - there is a list of such words, but it cannot be disclosed without agreement with the American partners. Another argument concerned the specifics of the German Bundestag, which also includes representatives of opposition parties who sharply criticize the activities of the special services. This circumstance, they say, does not guarantee the leakage of secret information, which terrorist organizations can take advantage of.

The discussion about the list of keywords subsided during the G7 in Germany, but remained on the agenda of domestic political discussion. And here is the sensation about the virus in Merkel's computer. One of the conclusions suggests itself: if unknown hackers easily penetrated the computer network of the Bundestag, then how can top-secret information on the fight against international terrorism be kept in it?

In this regard, accusations against the leadership of the weak security of the internal electronic network have already been heard in the German parliament itself. The fact is that at one time the deputies of the Bundestag, in contrast to the upper house of the Bundesrat, decided not to enter the network that unites the office of the chancellor, ministries and other federal institutions. Thus, they seemed to emphasize their parliamentary independence and immunity, fearing that officials would be able to get free access to information about their activities.

The investigation of the sources of the hacker attack and its damage, according to experts in the field of computer security, will not be soon. In any case, in their opinion, a complete replacement of all electronic equipment of the Bundestag will be necessary, which may take from one to two years. So the keyword list problem actually fades into the background.