before also refer to fields of threat to the Federal Republic of Germany. According to
the Federal Minister of the Interior, increasingly discernible threats to the state's safety and ability to function emanate from international terrorism, from illegal trade in the
weapons of war, the drug trade to Germany and international money laundering.
Since 1990, the provisions in the fields of the Außenwirtschaftsgesetz (Foreign
Trade and Payments Act) and of the Kriegswaffenkontrollgesetz (Act on the Control
of Weapons of War) have been drastically tightened and control procedures have
been expanded in order to be able to timely counteract rearmament abroad that proceeds with the help of German companies. In the opinion of the Federal Minister of
the Interior, the Federal Intelligence Service's expanded authority in the area of
telecommunications monitoring is necessary to fulfil its statutory mandate to monitor
the field of weapons proliferation and in particular to provide the responsible German
agencies with the relevant intelligence that is obtained.
106
As concerns weapons proliferation, the Federal Intelligence Service already engaged in telecommunications monitoring before the 1994 Fight against Crime Act
came into force; monitoring precluded, however, telecommunications traffic which involved participants protected by Article 10 of the Basic Law. The Federal Minister of
the Interior explained that it is an elementary foreign policy interest of the Federal Republic of Germany and also an elementary interest of its policy as a NATO member to
be in a position to engage in its own monitoring of weapons proliferation activities.
Otherwise, the Federal Republic of Germany might be reproached for deliberately
turning a blind eye on such activities to facilitate lucrative export deals to German
companies, for example.
107
The Federal Minister of the Interior argued that expanded strategic surveillance is, in
its entirety as well as in its individual stages of procedure, suitable and necessary to
achieve the aim of recognising and counteracting threats to the Federal Republic of
Germany. Expanded strategic surveillance is also proportional.
108
The Federal Minister of the Interior noted that, due to the requirements placed on
the search concepts and due to their selection and design, there is only a limited
probability of becoming the subject of a restriction on the right to telecommunications
privacy. To the extent that telecommunications traffic is temporarily recorded before
the term base comparison, or the comparison with the search concepts cannot be
performed automatically, the intensity of the encroachment upon fundamental rights
is low. On the other hand, expanded strategic surveillance serves to avert threats to
the Federal Republic of Germany that have an international aspect. The Federal Minister of the Interior took the position that the new aims of monitoring are similar to the
ones pursued by conventional strategic surveillance. Certainly, expanded strategic
surveillance is, to a greater extent than before, aimed at combating crime. This is only
true, in the opinion of the Federal Minister of the Interior, with respect to threats to internal security if those threats first meet the standard that the Federal Republic of
Germany is also confronted with them from outside.
109
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