The German secret services BND and MAD as well as the Office for the Protection of the Constitution are to have access to the so-called state trojan in the future, in order to also read the encrypted communication of suspicious persons within the framework of the so-called source telecommunications surveillance (Quellen-TKÜ) to be able to.
Receive intelligence services from State Trojans
This is supposed to help the Federal Intelligence Service, the Military shielding service and the protection of the constitution will in future be able to read conversations via messengers such as WhatsApp, Signal, Threema or Telegram. The federal government made up of the CDU, CSU and SPD in Berlin decided on these further powers to monitor encrypted communication.
In First and foremost, it is about eavesdropping on ongoing conversations, which is made more difficult for the secret services by the increasing spread of encrypted communication, but not about an actual online search, i.e. viewing stored data on a smartphone or computer previously hacked by a state trojan.
The encryption of the services is not broken, but only bypassed, as the state trojan is used to gain access to the device. According to Paragraph 100a and 100b of the Code of Criminal Procedure, law enforcement authorities such as the police are allowed to make use of both of these options.
Costly tool without any success
So far, however, the state Trojan has only been an expensive tool without any success. The Federal Criminal Police Office is said to have not successfully used the state Trojan between 2017 and 2020 in a single investigation.
Nevertheless, Federal Interior Minister Horst Seehofer in particular is of the benefit of the state Trojan and of the extended powers for secret services convinced.
The law is an overdue step in the fight against terrorists and militant extremists. We need a protection of the constitution that can see and hear even in the digital age.
Horst Seehofer (CSU), Federal Minister of the Interior
As early as February of this year, the federal government had to answer questions from the Bündnis 90/Die Grünen parliamentary group and admit that the state trojan has so far not played a role in the current prosecution despite its high costs.
As the news broadcaster Welt reported, citing information from the parties involved, the Military Counterintelligence Service (MAD) will in future also be allowed to enter its information in the Intelligence Information System (NADIS) so that the exchange between the authorities is better succeed. The so-called “Verfassungsschutznovelle” also enables all German secret services to access the source, server and email TKÜ.
G 10 commission monitors the monitoring
Accordingly, the application of the new powers is to be checked by the G 10 commission. The body, which consists of persons with judicial qualifications, is an independent body that is already examining and approving interventions in telecommunications secrecy, which is anchored in Article 10 of the Basic Law.