House of the German Pirate Party spokesman raided by Police

By EDRi · September 24, 2008

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar)

The Bavarian Police searched the house of the German Pirate Party spokesman
on the 11 September 2008, searching for information on some leaked plans
regarding a Skype wire tap project, that were published by the Party.

The Pirate Party published some documents received from an anonymous
whistleblower that show the Bavarian government plans to develop a Trojan
horse able to eavesdrop on Skype conversations. Police wanted to find out
the source of that information and they searched the house of the spokesman
and took away a server, but this was fully encrypted, so there are little
chances to discover the source.

The search seems to be related to the two documents leaked on January 2008
that were present on the Internet and then posted on Wikileaks website. The
first document is a communication by the Bavarian Ministry of Justice to the
prosecutors’ office, relating to cost distribution for the interception
licenses between the police and the prosecution. The second document
allegedly presents the offer made by Digitask, the German company developing
the technology, holding information on pricing and the license model,
high-level technology descriptions and other details.

The recent action by the police has little chances to find the
whistleblower, but confirm the authenticity of the documents. “A brave
person leaks documents to the Pirate Party, to inform the public about a
procedure of the Bavarian Government, which is highly likely to violate the
constitution. Now this persons is hunted like a criminal. Private rooms are
raided, servers get seized.” stated Andreas Popp, the Chairman of the
Bavarian Pirate Party.

German cyberplods raid Pirate Party on Skype Trojan mole hunt (18.09.2008)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/09/18/german_police_raid_pirate_party/

Pirate Party Official Raided after Uncovering State Trojan (17.09.2008)
http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-party-official-raided-after-uncovering-state-trojan-080917/

Chairman of the Koln Pirate Party condemned house search (only in German,
18.09.2008)
http://pressemitteilung.ws/node/136096

Skype and SSL interception letters (24.01.2008)
http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Skype_and_SSL_Interception_letters_-_Bavaria_-_Digitask