Against Putin: German spy agencies get stronger tools
The German government is giving the country's intelligence services new powers to carry out covert operations and strike against foreign threats.
For decades, the German intelligence service BND and the domestic security service BFV have worked with strict restrictions that make it difficult to carry out covert operations of the kind carried out by the US CIA or the Israeli Mossad. But the German government has now submitted legislation that will change that.
The new order gives the intelligence services the ability to carry out cyberattacks themselves, for example by knocking out foreign IT systems used by hostile actors or blocking payment flows.
Hybrid campaign
Chancellor Friedrich Merz's coalition government has argued that more powerful intelligence services are needed to counter threats from hostile powers, cybercriminals and terrorist groups.
Germany accuses Vladimir Putin's Russian regime of waging a "hybrid campaign" of sabotage, espionage and disinformation against the country, which is one of Ukraine's biggest military backers in the war against Russia.
Record amount
Germany has invested record amounts in building up its defenses after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and the government believes that an expansion of the intelligence services is also needed.
The restrictions on the work of the intelligence services were introduced partly because of the brutal abuses committed by the Nazi dictatorship and communist East Germany, but also because personal privacy is a particularly cherished right in Germany.
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