Espionage affair in the election year: The traces lead to Russia and the FPÖ. In an initial assessment, experts see particular problems in counter-espionage.
CIA is said to have warned about Ott, specific data leaks and possible connections to Russia in 2017. The situation put a strain on cooperation in the so-called “Berner Club”, an unofficial exchange body of European intelligence services, to such an extent that the BVT left after the house search and was dissolved soon afterwards. In Austria, counterintelligence was “neglectfully treated in terms of criminal law and criminal law,” said Paul Schliefsteiner, a lawyer and director of the Austrian Center for Intelligence, Propaganda and Security Studies (ACIPSS), a research center in Graz. The DSN was created in response to the “BVT affair” and must continue to prove its reliability to its European partners, said Schliefensteiner. The agency is suffering from “a noticeable staff fluctuation”