German intelligence workers have reluctantly admitted they are running fake accounts on social media and are now unwilling to go into detail about their purpose.
287 such accounts are run by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution in Brandenburg alone, according to the response to a parliamentary question from the AfD. Party official Hans-Christoph Berndt said this suggests there could be “10,000 such disguised provocateurs” across the whole of Germany, joking that Erich Mielke—the Stasi boss whose tactics earned him the nickname “The Master of Fear”—“is back.”
