The discovery of approximately 2,000 classified or potentially sensitive documents belonging to Germany’s foreign intelligence service has placed former intelligence chief August Hanning at the centre of a national security crisis. Investigators seized the material from his home in September last year, alongside computers and hard drives, after searching the property in connection with a separate investigation involving a high-profile family dispute. According to information reported by the German newspaper Die Zeit, the documents included intelligence about individuals in the European Union and other regions. Prosecutors suspect that Hanning obtained confidential information from a former aide over 12 years and may have used it in private consultancy work. His lawyer rejects the allegation that he passed on confidential information to the detriment of Germany.
Hanning, who headed the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), Germany’s foreign intelligence service, from 1998 to 2005, is suspected by the Federal Public Prosecutor General of espionage-related offences, including the attempted betrayal of state secrets and intelligence-agent activity. Investigators are examining whether information derived from classified material reached foreign contacts and whether Hanning exchanged intelligence with individuals connected to foreign services. One suspected recipient was a contact in Azerbaijan who may have worked for the country’s intelligence service. Hanning allegedly prepared an analysis for him using secret information, although it remains unclear whether the document was ever sent. Prosecutors also suspect that Hanning maintained extensive contact with a former Chinese military attaché. His former aide, Manfred D., is suspected of aiding the alleged attempted betrayal of state secrets and the unlawful acquisition of classified information.
Hanning’s lawyer, Leon Kruse, strongly disputes the accusations. In a statement to Die Zeit, he described as “inaccurate” the claim that his client had passed on confidential information to Germany’s detriment and for financial gain. He maintained that Hanning was being wrongly prosecuted. The lawyer representing Manfred D. declined to comment on the allegations against her client. The investigations must establish whether the information allegedly shared amounted to state secrets and whether its disclosure meets the legal threshold for attempted treason.
The case has raised concerns within Germany’s intelligence establishment because of the length of time during which the suspected disclosures may have occurred. According to the investigation, Manfred D. allegedly supplied Hanning with BND information between 2010 and 2022, after Hanning had left government service. Investigators are now examining what material may have been transferred, how much was involved and whether any of it reached foreign intelligence services. Current BND president Martin Jäger is reported to have felt compelled to assure partner intelligence agencies personally that the matter would be investigated.
Hanning’s career had brought him into contact with sensitive intelligence long before he became head of the BND. A qualified lawyer with a doctorate, he was appointed security officer at the West German Permanent Mission in East Berlin in 1986, with responsibility for counter-intelligence and detecting surveillance attempts by East Germany’s Ministry for State Security. After German reunification, he moved to the Chancellery, where he became head of intelligence co-ordination in 1996 under Chancellor Helmut Kohl. Two years later, aged 52, he took over the BND.
Following the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, Hanning advocated expanded surveillance powers for the agency and acquired the nickname “Mr Security”. His tenure also included controversies, among them the surveillance of journalists by the BND and the case of Murat Kurnaz, who was imprisoned by the Americans despite being innocent. Neither episode derailed his career. Former colleagues have described him as a disciplined, dependable official who insisted on order and reliability. Bernd Schmidbauer, a former intelligence co-ordinator regarded as one of Hanning’s patrons, called him a “very good, trustworthy, reliable and committed employee”. Others viewed him as ambitious and keen to retain the status associated with being an intelligence insider.
Manfred D. occupied a central position in that relationship. Sixteen years younger than Hanning, he became his office manager and a trusted intermediary responsible for appointments and handling confidential reports. When Hanning moved to the Interior Ministry as a civil servant state secretary in 2005 under Wolfgang Schäuble, D. followed him as an assistant. Hanning was sent into early retirement in November 2009 by Schäuble’s successor, Thomas de Maizière, but D. returned to the BND. According to Die Zeit, D. registered a secondary employment arrangement with the agency in 2010 to work for his former chief. The BND declined to explain why the arrangement had apparently been approved, saying it did not comment publicly on personnel matters.
Investigators believe the arrangement may have enabled Hanning to obtain briefings prepared for the Chancellery’s confidential weekly security meetings. Such reports summarise the BND’s latest assessments of important regions and threats. D., who returned to the position of office manager in 2012 under BND president Gerhard Schindler, allegedly continued supplying documents until June 2022. He was transferred to another department only later and retired in March this year, in his early sixties.
During his years outside government, Hanning established a network of private commercial activities that investigators are examining for possible links to the alleged misuse of intelligence. In July 2010, shortly after leaving public service, he joined Prevent AG, a corporate investigations firm, and founded the consultancy Hanning Consult with his wife. He later became a supervisory board member of the Swiss company System 360 AG, which undertook investigations in cases where police lacked the capacity to act. The company assisted German energy executive Bernhard Günther after he was attacked with acid, with leads pointing, among others, towards a criminal figure in Serbia.
Hanning also worked for controversial international clients. In 2012, he prepared an expert assessment for Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska in London court proceedings. The following year, he became a board member of the German-Azerbaijani Forum, a lobbying organisation associated with Azerbaijan’s authoritarian government. In 2017, he joined the supervisory board of a Latvian bank and was subsequently accused of allowing a wealthy Russian to strip assets worth €32 million from it. A Latvian court ordered part of his pension to be seized. Former business contacts told Die Zeit that Hanning appeared strongly motivated by money and showed little interest in the moral standing of his clients. A former British intelligence officer said he was known in London particularly for his love of money.
Yet the classified documents were not discovered through investigations into Hanning’s commercial contacts, alleged Russian connections or banking activities. They emerged from a probe into the Block family dispute. Christina Block, heiress to a German steakhouse business, is suspected of arranging the abduction of her children from Denmark on New Year’s Eve 2023. Block had hired System 360 and Hanning to assist with her custody dispute. Hanning’s lawyer insists that his client was not involved in the alleged abduction. System 360 did not respond to questions about the case.
In September last year, investigators searching Hanning’s home over suspicions connected to the dispute discovered the BND material. The find transformed an investigation into a private family conflict into a national security affair, leaving prosecutors to determine whether a former intelligence chief had merely traded on privileged access or crossed the legal boundary into the attempted betrayal of state secrets.
