Spiraling Spying: Suspected Double Agent Further Strains German-US Ties

[unhappycamper]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/arrest-of-bnd-employee-strains-ties-between-germany-and-us-a-979738.html



A year after revelations of the NSA's wide scale spying activities first emerged, the arrest of an employee at the German foreign intelligence service, suspected of being a double agent, is testing the limits of Berlin's patience with Washington.

Spiraling Spying: Suspected Double Agent Further Strains German-US Ties
By SPIEGEL Staff
July 09, 2014 – 03:08 PM

The Russian Embassy is one of the most interesting buildings in Berlin, at least from the perspective of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BFV), the German agency responsible for counterintelligence. To the well-trained eye, there's constantly something new to see. Not too long ago, wooden sheds suddenly popped up on the rooftop of the white complex. BFV staff took to referring to them, mockingly, as Russia's "wooden huts." They suspected they were being used to hide listening antennae.

~snip~

Their efforts helped to uncover an email sent a few weeks ago to a Russian diplomatic outpost in Germany that might otherwise have gone unnoticed. The sender had sought to offer his services as an informant to the Russians. To prove he wasn't setting a trap, the man also used Gmail to enclose classified documents from his employer, Germany's foreign intelligence service, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND). If needed, he wrote, he'd be happy to deliver even more. The letter sent shockwaves through the BFV as it became apparent that, once again, the country had been struck by another wave of spying, this time involving Russia.

The German intelligence agencies prepared a trap to snag the suspect. Under a forged Russian email address, they made it look like they were taking him up on the deal and offered a meeting with him. He refused, forcing them to come up with another idea. In their desperation, they even turned to US agencies to ask if the Gmail account was familiar to them. They didn't get any response. Instead the secretive informant closed his email account a short time later. Investigators smelled something fishy.

Brazen

German authorities first succeeded in detaining the man last Wednesday. And if what the 31-year-old BND employee told investigators is true, it's actually the Americans, not the Russians, who are at the center of the latest spying scandal to strike Germany. And it would further demonstrate the Americans' sheer brazenness in spying on what is supposedly one of Washington's closest partners.