Repression against Zündlumpen

2019 - ?
Germany
Contents

No Trace Project > Threat Library > Repressive operations > Repression against Zündlumpen

Contents

In April 2022,[1] October 2022,[2] and February 2025[3] several raids took place as part of an investigation into the editors of the German anarchist newspaper Zündlumpen, published from 2019 to 2021. In February 2025 two people, N. and M., were arrested: they were accused of being editors of Zündlumpen and suspected of having committed arson.[4]

In April 2022 a raid on a print shop took place in which police seized thousands of books, zines, and newspapers, as well as all printing equipment and materials, apparently in an attempt to disrupt the printing capacity of local anarchists.

N. and M. are currently imprisoned pending trial.

Techniques used

NameDescription
Detection dogs

In some of the raids, police used detection dogs to locate electronic devices.[3]

In the February 2025 arrests of N. and M., scent samples were collected from their necks and presented to a detection dog.[4]

Forensics
DNA

In some of the raids, DNA traces were collected from a cigarette butt,[5] zines,[6] books, doors, cups, and printing machines.

Linguistics

Investigators compared texts from the newspaper Zündlumpen with private letters found in house raids, hoping to prove that people had written in the newspaper.[6]

Physical surveillance
Covert

Investigators followed N. for 15 days.[6]

Police patrols

Investigators sent a police patrol outside a N.'s apartment every night at irregular times to check if she was at her apartment.[6]

Service provider collaboration
Other

Investigators used the collaboration of banks to:[6]

  • Analyze the bank records of a suspected editor of the newspaper, including bank records as old as 8 years, to determine if the person had purchased printing equipment.
  • Obtain, in real time, the locations of cash withdrawals made by N. When a cash withdrawal took place, investigators would send a patrol to the withdrawal location to try to locate N. However, this did not work, seemingly because the patrol always arrived too late.
  • Reduce the maximum cash withdrawal limit of N. in order to force her to make more withdrawals and increase the opportunities of locating her.

Investigators asked several companies to provide information about N.:

  • Mail order companies were asked to provide the shipping addresses she used.
  • PayPal, Ebay, and similar companies were asked if she had an account with them and, if so, which addresses were associated with the account.
  • The German national railway company (Deutsche Bahn) and the bus operator FlixBus were asked to provide information about her travels.
  • Her former vocational school was asked to provide the list of participants in the school's courses, presumably to identify her possible contacts.
Targeted digital surveillance
Authentication bypass

In some of the raids, police seized smartphones immediately after entering and plugged them into power banks, presumably to prevent them from shutting down and reverting to an encrypted state.[1]

The February arrests of N. and M. took place in a public library, while N. and M. were using a computer.[4] Police officers wearing civilian clothes waited until N. and M. had unlocked the computer to reveal themselves and make the arrest, presumably to access the computer while it was unlocked.

IMSI-catcher

Investigators used an IMSI-catcher to identify the phone number of N.'s mother. They used it both at the mother's home and at her workplace: the correlation of the two uses allowed them to identify the phone number.[6]