20260127 BND soll fast alles dürfen

Outside or inside?

Our worldview used to be so beautifully simple: the Office for the Protection of the Constitution (VS) spies domestically, the Federal Intelligence Service (BND) spies abroad, and the Military Counter-Intelligence Service (MAD) spies on the armed forces. Now things are set to change. Even Ms. Merkel's sophistry that the airspace above Germany already belongs to foreign countries and that the BND is therefore allowed to read our communications was borderline. But now the government wants to completely remove the restrictions on the BND.

BND to become operational in the future

This is supposedly intended to reduce dependence on US intelligence agencies, and according to Deutschlandfunk, the BND will be given the following additional areas of responsibility:

Internet surveillance and facial recognition,

The intelligence service will be allowed to legally hack foreign Internet providers such as Google or X in the future,

In the event of cyberattacks, it will be allowed to actively strike back and, for example, redirect data streams,

The BND will be able to use "appropriate means" to ward off drones over its properties.

BND employees will be allowed to enter homes to install spy technology and secretly manipulate equipment.

Spies will be allowed to commit certain crimes abroad, such as burglary or theft, if this is necessary for their work.

The prerequisite for this is a recognized "special intelligence situation", which is determined by the newly created National Security Council (NSR). Once again, we are seeing a watering down of the separation between the police and the intelligence service. The separation was imposed on the FRG by the Allies in 1948 after their experiences with the Gestapo.