German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser is advocating for criminal police to be given the power to conduct covert house searches in certain cases, a draft bill showed on Wednesday.
The bill, which is under discussion by the German government, would allow officers from Germany’s Criminal Police Office (BKA) to search houses covertly in the case of a “concrete threat of a terrorist attack.”
The BKA search would require a court order and only be permitted if it were the only method of averting an imminent danger without seriously jeopardizing the success of a criminal investigation, the bill says.
It also includes new authorizations for the evaluation and comparison of images, including with the help of artificial intelligence (AI).
An Interior Ministry spokeswoman said that the bill does not allow for “real-time surveillance and real-time facial recognition in public spaces.”
The draft said that covert operations could help to forestall crimes, for instance by exchanging ammunition for blanks or replacing material used in the production of explosives.
It also said that physical access to IT devices is the “safest and fastest way to implement the software necessary to access information technology systems.” The measure would be used “solely for the purpose of combating the dangers of international terrorism.”
