Before the Berlin Wall was built - The Stasi mostly focused on rooting out any class enemies, surveillance, and intelligence gathering.

After the Berlin Wall was built - Their main focus was making the wall impenetrable. There was only a couple entrances which were manned by Stasi police members at all times. Anyone leaving or coming in was under surveillance and were watched heavily. They constructed tunnels of their own below the wall to insure there was total control over East Berlin. The wall was their control over their citizens of East Berlin, cutting off mostly all access from West Berlin.

They used a cold steam known as "Cellophan 83" since hot steam could damage things like photos. It used a special film that stretched over a tray oif distilled water, then they will place up to as many as 25 letters on the tray so that when the water was heated to 50 degrees Celsius the cold steam diffused the film and dissolved the glue on the envelopes.

After opening letters, the workers would copy each letter or photo, put them back in the envelope, seal it back up, and send it to the person.

"Scent chair" In interrogation they had a yellow clothed chair that the target would sit in during interrogation. With interrogation the target would begin sweating to which the cloth would collect. At the end when the target is gone, they collected parts of the cloth and put them in a sealed jar.

Of the Informants 10,000 of them were under the age of 18, mostly spying on parents.

During the 1970s they became concerned with maintaining a positive image internationally. This meant they needed to repress the activism. This is when they adopted the Zersetzung which goal was to severely limit the ability of individuals and groups to carry out their activities hoping to make them stop entirely.

Since the Stasi had so much information on everyone they were able to use it to their advantage in causing friction between members to render the group ineffective, they also sabotaged groups with using infiltrators who will agree to accomplish tasks but never do to slow down production, another way was to just separate the organizations by spreading rumors about them.

They had three stages in this:

Stage one: was to do thorough examinations of public data and info collected from searches done of the home. With this they looked for any social, emotional, or physical flaw that could be used to add pressure to the target. They wanted to socially isolate them.

Stage two: In this stage they will make contact with the target to let the target know they were interested in them. They would do repeated stop and searches and questioning to instill a sense of fear and anxiety.

Stage three: The final stage was about physical and verbal abuse. They would do things to purposely make the target loose there mind further such as moving furniture, changing times on the alarm clock, damaging cars or bikes, spreading rumors, etc.

“Erich Mielke – Master of Fear.” Walled In Berlin, 27 Nov. 2021, walled-in-berlin.com/j-elke-ertle/erich-mielke-master-of-fear/.

“The Last Day of the Stasi – DW – 01/15/2005.” Dw.Com, Deutsche Welle, 15 Jan. 2005, www.dw.com/en/the-last-day-of-the-stasi/a-1459519.

Manufacuting, Sparrows. “The Stasi Secret Police and Secret Tools: A Chapter in Cold War Intrigue and Lock Picking.” SPARROWS Lock Picks, SPARROWS Lock Picks, 15 Nov. 2023, www.sparrowslockpicks.com/blogs/news/the-stasi-secret-police-and-secret-tools-a-chapter-in-cold-war-intrigue-and-lock-picking?srsltid=AfmBOor09dY6sTlJ0rwdEsr9NHkM4rtjRtRagoaz6Xrsrj6CPu6iA25T.

Max Hertzberg. “Stasi Tactics – Zersetzung.” Max Hertzberg, 9 June 2022, www.maxhertzberg.co.uk/background/politics/stasi-tactics/.

ow3n. “Stasi / Facebook / Big Data DAAD Day 24 – Automation in Stasi Postal Surveillance: Opening Letters with Sensitive Materials Using Cold Steam.” Owen Mundy, 14 June 2017, owenmundy.com/blog/2017/06/stasi-facebook-big-data-daad-day-24-automation-in-stasi-postal-surveillance-opening-letters-with-sensitive-materials-using-cold-steam/.

Spyscape. “How the Stasi Hunted Dissenters by ‘Scent Profiling.’” SPYSCAPE, spyscape.com/article/the-nose-knows-how-the-stasi-hunted-dissenters-by-tracking-their-scent. Accessed 25 Nov. 2024.

“Stasi East German Ministry of State Security.” Stasi East German Ministry of State Security – Subterranea Britannica, www.subbrit.org.uk/features/stasi-east-german-ministry-of-state-security/. Accessed 25 Nov. 2024.

“Stasi.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, inc., 3 Nov. 2024, www.britannica.com/topic/Stasi.