Arne Schönbohm. /
Arne Schönbohm is suspected of acting negligently towards the Kremlin Intelligence services
The Federal Minister of the Interior of Germany, Nancy Faeser, has dismissed Arne Schönbohm, president of the Federal Office for the Security of Information Technologies (BSI), on Tuesday for his alleged contacts with the Russian intelligence services through the controversial association Cyber-Sicherheitsrat Deutschland (CSRD), a self-styled German Cyber Security Council. A spokesman for the federal Ministry of the Interior announced the immediate dismissal and the opening of a disciplinary file against the senior official, until now the head of computer security for the Berlin Executive. Schönbohm is suspected of a negligent lack of distance towards Russian espionage due to his relationship with the aforementioned association, which officially advises companies, politicians and authorities on issues related to cyber security.
The scandal around Schönbohm broke out ten days ago after the satirical television program ‘ZDF Magazin Royale’ uncovered his contacts with the CSRD, which triggered government security alarms and provoked a barrage of criticism from all political sectors. . The Cyber-Sicherheitsrat Deutschland association includes the Berlin cybersecurity company Protelion, which until the end of March was registered as Infotecs GmbH. This in turn is a subsidiary of the Russian cybersecurity firm OAO Infotecs, which, according to the Policy Networks Analytics research network, was founded by a former KGB member. The dismissed senior official was a co-founding member of the association in 2012 and recently participated in the celebrations for the anniversary of the controversial security council, which in some acts made believe that it is an official institution. Already in 2019, his president, Hans Wilhelm Dünn, acknowledged to the press his close relationship with the Russian intelligence services.
critical infrastructures
On the other hand, Faeser has announced the creation of a critical infrastructure coordination office and the drafting of a law that will establish minimum requirements for the managers of the latter in the face of the threat of attacks and sabotage in the hybrid war that Russia is carrying out since the invasion of Ukraine. “It is the most appropriate in these times,” said the federal head of the Interior, whose ministry will organize and direct this new institution in coordination with other affected portfolios. It is that those who are responsible for the operation of critical infrastructures such as electrical or communications networks, but also hospitals, transport or fuel or water supply services, make their facilities “resistant to attacks” of all kinds, said Faeser, who commented that since the beginning of the war last February these professionals have been sensitized.
That is also the reason for the elaboration of a bill baptized as Kritis that will affect all critical infrastructures and will establish specific minimum requirements for their operation. “We will establish the standards that they must meet. And I think it is important and correct to establish it by law,” Faeser told Reuters. Regarding the alleged sabotage in the waters of the Baltic Sea against the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines, which directly communicate Russia with Germany, the minister said that she did not yet have new data, although she assured that the investigations continue “to find out who is behind”. The same happens with the sabotage of the German railways two weeks ago that paralyzed train traffic for more than half a day in the entire north of the country. The minister stressed in this sense that she thinks it is correct that the Federal Prosecutor’s Office and the Federal Criminal Investigation Office, responsible for the fight against terrorism, handle the two cases.
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