Switzerland Approves Governmental Spying on Citizens

Although Switzerland is renowned for its secretive banking establishments and strict personal privacy rights, a national referendum held on September 25 promises to increase national surveillance operations. 66 percent of voters approved the new law, which will allow the Swiss Intelligence Agency (SRC) to spy on and collect emails, phone calls, messages and pictures from any Swiss citizen.

In the past, the Swiss population has been opposed to surveillance, even going so far as to restrict Google Street View due to Swiss privacy laws. However, recent terrorist attacks in France and Belgium have sparked a national desire for more security.

Activist groups such as Amnesty International voiced concerns in the days following the amendment, stating that the “disproportionate” level of surveillance poses “a threat… to freedom of expression.” Another clause in the new law calls for increased collaboration and partnership with foreign intelligence agencies in order to ensure communication in providing maximum security. The group Non à LRens violently opposes this clause, arguing that such partnerships would abolish Switzerland’s neutrality, and that cooperating with foreign intelligence services is the equivalent of establishing military alliances.

The new law also stipulates that the Swiss government must notify any Swiss citizen on whom it has spied. The government must report to the individual the reason why they were flagged as suspicious and then surveilled, the length of the surveillance, and the information gathered.

This stipulation is unprecedented, and no other country in Europe or around the world has made transparency a legal part of its national surveillance system. Lukasz Olejnik, a security and privacy consultant at University College London, commented on his blog on September 26 that "in most (if not all) of law-enforcement legislations around the world, such a strong legal obligation is difficult to find."

Switzerland is not the first European country to have revamped its surveillance program due to the threat of terrorist attacks. Since 2015, France, England, and Germany have upgraded their surveillance of citizens in the hope of preventing attacks. However, Bruce Schneier, a Harvard Law School fellow, The Guardian contributor, and expert cryptographer who specializes in computer security claims that the implications to civil liberties aside, mass surveillance will not stop terrorist attacks. He explains that, statistically speaking, mass surveillance is unreliable and has not been proven to be truly effective in foiling attacks. For example, the perpetrators of the November 2015 Paris attacks lived two blocks from a police station and in a Muslim neighborhood that had been under increased monitoring.

Regardless, the new Swiss law will go into effect later this year, and its future legal implications remain to be seen.