arne Schönbohm was the target for several weeks of strong criticisms against the backdrop of indirect links with a Russian company.
Le Monde
The head of the German cybersecurity agency was dismissed Tuesday, October 18, after revelations in media reporting his lack of distance from Russia, in a context of concerns in Berlin of possible acts of sabotage from Moscow.
“The Minister of the Interior [Nancy] FaeSer decided today to dismiss his functions with immediate effect the president of the German Cybersecurity Agency (BSI), Arne Schönbohm,” said a spokesperson From the ministry in an email to AFP.
For more than a week, Mr. Schönbohm has been on the hot seat after press articles on his proximity to a cybersecurity consulting association, herself suspected of contacts with Russian intelligence services.
These allegations “definitively damaged the necessary confidence of the public in the neutrality and impartiality” of the president of the most important cybersecurity authority in Germany, said the ministry spokesman.
A Russian “influence” not fully established
53 years old, Mr. Schönbohm, in office since February 2016, had been chosen by the government of former Chancellor Angela Merkel. The appointment of this former manager of the Franco-German aeronautical group EADS was then the subject of criticism, in particular by the Greens today in the government.
For more than a week, Arne Schönbohm has been implicated because of her links with an association called “Cyber-Sicherheitsrat Deutschland” (German cybersecurity or CSRD), which he co-founded in 2012. She advises Companies, government agencies and politicians on cybersecurity issues. Among its members, it has the company Protelion, a subsidiary of the Russian cybersecurity company O.A.O. InfoTecs which, according to information from the Policy Network Analytics research network, was founded by a former employee of the Russian intelligence services KGB.
m. Schönbohm assured Der Spiegel magazine on Tuesday that he did not know “what the ministry checked and what are the concrete allegations” targeting it. He claims to have, for this reason, himself asked to be the subject of a disciplinary procedure.
In a previous article, the Spiegel had judged “to say the least that Protelion really plays an important role in the architecture of German cybersecurity”, wondering if the criticisms targeting the manager were not “a welcome opportunity for The government “to change the direction of BSI.