The International Press Institute (IPI) today expresses alarm over the recent criminal investigation and police raids targeted against Swiss finance journalist Lukas Haessig under the country’s draconian banking secrecy law, which represents one of the most serious attacks on media freedom in the country in many years.
Haessig is a well-known freelance economic journalist who runs the independent financial blog Inside Paradeplatz, which was previously nominated for the European Press Prize.
On 3 June, half a dozen police officers raided the offices of his media outlet and then his home, confiscating a laptop, a cell phone and several documents, according to Haessig. This came after he was put under criminal investigation by the Zurich public prosecutor’s office.
The criminal probe stems from the journalist’s alleged use of confidential banking data to report on controversial deals made by the former CEO of the bank Raiffeisen, who was jailed by the Zurich District Court in 2022 on multiple counts of embezzlement, forgery and fraud – a conviction which has since been appealed.
While in many counties journalists and whistleblowers have legal protections when exposing sensitive or confidential information from banks if it is in the public interest, Switzerland’s draconian banking secrecy laws criminalise such disclosures, even when they accurately expose crime or corruption.
Under Article 47 of the Swiss Banking Act, passed a decade ago in July 2015, anyone who discloses confidential banking data, publishes information from a whistleblower, or even reveals that an individual has an account at a Swiss bank, can face up to five years in prison and a fine of CHF 250,000 (€266,000).
As IPI previously documented, under this law journalists and media outlets who publish leaked information about topics such as tax evasion or money laundering of corrupt oligarchs, dictators or shady financial firms risk facing criminal charges and potential jail time, even if the information reveals illegal activity, is accurate and is in the public interest.
Whistleblowers who hand over confidential information also risk prison sentences. As IPI has warned, this law has a major impact on watchdog journalism in Switzerland, and those around the world reporting on corruption stemming from the financial sector in Switzerland.
While Swiss banks have previously made legal complaints against media, and journalists have been threatened with legal action by private companies, this marks the first time that a Swiss court has officially ordered criminal proceedings against a journalist under Article 47 of the Swiss Banking Act.
This represents a worrying confirmation of the warnings that IPI, other media freedom groups and journalists, and the UN Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression, have made in recent years about the significant threat posed to the press and watchdog journalism by Article 47.
The repeated failure to amend the law to include legal protections for the press means that a professional journalist who published factual information about a matter of clear public interest now faces a potential prison sentence.
In order to address this serious attack on media freedom, IPI calls on the Zurich public prosecutor’s office to reassess and withdraw the criminal investigation against Lukas Haessig and to return any confiscated devices.
Moving forward, Article 47 of the Swiss Banking Act must be amended by the Federal Council to include strong public interest protections for journalists and whistleblowers who shed light on wrongdoing, which is crucial in a democratic society. IPI will be contacting the Zurich public prosecutor’s office to outline our concerns on this issue.
Switzerland: Reform draconian banking secrecy laws to protect public-interest journalism