While Germans are a little sensitive about online privacy, it appears that the government has no problems with spying on them, TechEye reports.

The German government revealed that its police monitor Skype, Google Mail, MSN Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Facebook chat "as and when necessary" but very precisely.

The information was released as part of a move towards financial transparency. The government released figures of expenses incurred by the Federal Ministry of the Interior following a parliamentary inquiry.

On page 34 and page 37 of the report the cost for decoding software for Google Mail, MSN Hotmail, Yahoo Mail for prevention and investigation was listed, TechEye says.

A monitoring system for Skype was mentioned later. The Ministry spent a bit of money on Trojan viruses and IMSI catchers which are used for "man-in-the-middle" attacks on mobile phones used by German police.