| Agency Name: | Federal Intelligence Service |
| Native Name: | Nachrichtendienst des Bundes Service de renseignement de la Confédération Servizio delle attività informative della Confederazione Servetsch d'infurmaziun da la Confederaziun |
| Jurisdiction: | Federal administration of Switzerland |
| Employees: | 303 |
| Minister1 Name: | Viola Amherd |
| Minister1 Pfo: | Federal Councillor |
| Parent Agency: | Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sports |
| Website: | www.fis.admin.ch |
The Swiss intelligence community is a group of agencies with responsibilities to protect the interests and infrastructure of Switzerland.[1]
The Federal Intelligence Service (FIS), the country's main intelligence agency, is governed by the Intelligence Service Act.
The first federal military secret service was established in 1937-1939 as Büro Ha by Hans Hausamann[2] a few years before the outbreak of the Second World War. Up to that point, the responsibility for intelligence gathering was left to the police.[3]
Not much is known about the Swiss intelligence agencies; however, case files from the Swiss Federal Police have been recently uncovered showing information regarding Swiss intelligence dealing with the People's Republic of China. During this time period of approximately 1960-1980 Switzerland's main goal regarding intelligence was the threat of communism within the country. What was found in the case files, and one way they would combat communism is through the system of fiches. Fiches was a system of index cards that tracked any sort of anti-patriotic actions performed by anyone in Switzerland. The system seemed to be successful with a recorded 900,000 cards made during the Cold War, and about 25,000 cards made for people of Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese descent. The ultimate goal of fiches was to ward off any potential communist threats that might cause harm to Switzerland.[4]
As of 1 January 2010, there is a new security policy instrument in Switzerland, the Federal Intelligence Service (FIS) (German: Nachrichtendienst des Bundes, NDB; French: Service de renseignement de la Confédération, SRC; Italian: Servizio delle attività informative della Confederazione, SIC; Romansh: Servetsch da las activitads infurmativs da la Confederaziun, SIC). The new service was created by merging the Service for Analysis and Prevention (DAP) with the Strategic Intelligence Service (SND). Through the use of synergies and consistent adjustment to the needs of the service recipients a powerful intelligence service was created which is adapted to meet modern requirements and which forms the future contact for all levels of the Confederation and the cantons.
The partners and service recipients of the FIS are the political and military leaders, the federal administration,in particular the departments:
Abroad the FIS maintains contacts to more than 100 intelligence, police and security services throughout the world. These bilateral and multilateral contacts have all been authorised by the Federal Council.
The FIS's activities and mandate were defined by statute in the Federal Civil Intelligence Act 1997[5]
And according to the Federal Civil Intelligence Act[6]
The thematic and geographic areas of interest are:
The Federal Intelligence Service produces an annual report called Switzerland's Security, available for download on the FIS website.[7]
For instance, in September 2020, about the China–Switzerland relations, the report said that:[8] [9]
In 2017, the FIS' budget was CHF75.6 million.
The Military Intelligence Service (German: Militärischer Nachrichtendienst; French: Service de renseignement militaire; Italian: Servizio informazioni militare) is the military intelligence branch of the Armed Forces.
The Postal Service and Telecommunications Surveillance (French: Surveillance de la correspondance par poste et télécommunication, SCPT; German: Überwachung Post- und Fernmeldeverkehr, ÜPF; Italian: Sorveglianza della corrispondenza postale e del traffico delle telecomunicazioni, SCPT; Romansh: surveglianza dal traffic da posta e da telecommunicaziun, STPT) is a service within the Federal Department of Justice and Police (since 1 January 2008) charged with coordinating wiretapping requests of the criminal investigation authorities.
FIS has collaborated with over 100 foreign intelligence agencies.[10] In 2017, the FIS received approximately 12,500 notifications from foreign intelligence agencies, and sent out 6,000.[10]
In 2012, a senior IT technician stole crucial intelligence documents.[11]
In 2014, an agent of the Federal Intelligence Services is involved in a hacking case against journalists[12] acting for, a Swiss winemaker.