Data leak Zurich reaches the Federal Palace

Leah Hartman and Pascal Tischhauser

The scandal surrounding the Zurich data breach is spreading widely – even in the Federal Palace. The subcommittee of the Business Audit Commission (GPK), responsible for the judiciary, will investigate the judicial scandal in Zurich. Chairman Alfred Heer (61) confirms this to Blick.

People want to know how badly the Federal Ministry of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Police (Fedpol) have been affected by the data breach, says the SVP National Councilor of Zurich.

The Zurich Ministry of Justice is said to have been careless in throwing away computers for years. Hard drives containing unencrypted, highly sensitive data found their way into the Zurich environment.

The scale of the scandal surprised Zurich

There is also a great need for clarification in Zurich. Beat Habegger (47), chairman of the GPK of the cantonal council, wants to propose that the Commission re-examine the matter. The GPK was informed by the Ministry of Justice that there was a suspicion of data misuse.

“Until now, however, I was not aware that such sensitive data had fallen into the hands of third parties,” he says.

“It’s really bad,” says René Isler (63). Until recently, the cantonal council of the SVP of Zurich itself was a police officer in Winterthur. He is stunned that apparently all the cell phone numbers of the canton police officers have been leaked. “I don’t understand how the Justice Department is supposed to be so careless as to hand over their old computers to someone without an employment contract or performance mandate. No one would do that in private!”

“The public must be informed quickly”

He does not take seriously the attempt by the cantonal judiciary led by SP council member Jacqueline Fehr (59) that a story is 15 years old: “It’s crazy, it doesn’t matter when it was!” Isler demands: “The public must be informed as soon as possible if and what kind of data is still in circulation and what is being done to stop the spread.”

And criticism even comes from his own party: “If the accusations are well-founded, then the former management seems, to put it diplomatically, to have acted clumsily”, says SP cantonal councilor Nicola Siegrist (25), member of the Judiciary Committee. The former director of justice Markus Notter (62), during whose term of office the data breach took place, was also a member of the government council of the SP. Siegrist makes it clear: data that deserves protection should not fall into the hands of third parties. “The Public Prosecution Service and the judiciary must now create clarity and transparency.”

Who assigns these assignments?

Central cantonal councilor Jean-Philippe Pinto (56) also demands this. He especially wants to ensure that such a case does not occur again and is therefore scrutinizing the granting of such decisions.

These are tough jobs. “The danger is that a company will look for the cheapest way – with the risk that the data ends up somewhere.” Pinto also points out that this topic concerns all governments – federal, cantons and municipalities. “I think it’s important to solve this problem.”