AUSTRIA Law and Practice Contributed by: Martin Schiefer and Christian Richter-Schöller, Schiefer Rechtsanwälte GmbH
custody and, under the circumvention prohibition, to corresponding materials seized at the premises or home of the client; the sealing procedure with judicial review secures contested items. In-house counsel do not enjoy attorney privilege in Austria. There is no national-security exception abolishing privilege. Classified information in counsel’s hands remains, however, subject to the Information Security Act regime, and security clearances may be required for work on classified defence files. In EU competi - tion investigations, the narrower EU privilege stand - ards apply. 7.6 Debarment and Exclusion From Future Procurement Final convictions for catalogue offences (ie, the offenc - es exhaustively listed in the statute, such as corruption, fraud, money laundering and participation in a criminal organisation) trigger mandatory exclusion from pro - curement procedures, in general for five years from the conviction; discretionary grounds such as grave professional misconduct, including established com - petition or export control violations, support exclusion for up to three years following the relevant event. There is no central debarment list; each contracting authority assesses eligibility in its own procedure. Self-cleaning is expressly recognised and can be dem - onstrated by means of compensation of the damage caused, active co-operation in clarifying the facts, and concrete technical, organisational and personnel meas - ures. The adequacy of the measures is assessed in pro - portion to the misconduct, and successful self-cleaning restores eligibility even within the exclusion periods. 7.7 Civil Litigation and Dispute Resolution There are no specialist forums for the resolution of disputes arising from defence contracts. Contract dis - putes go to the ordinary civil courts, in Vienna typically the Commercial Court; the state can and does agree arbitration in major defence contracts, with Vienna as an established seat and the Vienna International Arbitral Centre as an established forum, which also facilitates confidentiality. Procurement review lies with the Federal Administrative Court.
Classified information in litigation is handled through the exclusion of the public, restrictions on file access and careful drafting of submissions; Austria has no statute comparable to classified-procedures legis - lation in other jurisdictions, which makes protective case management agreements important. Settle - ments are common where a dispute would otherwise force the disclosure of sensitive programme details. 7.8 Whistleblower Protections The Whistleblower Protection Act ( HinweisgeberInnen- schutzgesetz ), in force since 2023, implements the EU Whistleblowing Directive (Directive (EU) 2019/1937). Companies with 50 or more employees must oper - ate internal reporting channels; external reports can be made to the Federal Bureau of Anti-Corruption as the central external channel or to sectoral regulators. Protections include the prohibition of retaliation and a shifted burden of proof in retaliation disputes. Defence-specific caveats apply: information covered by classification rules and by national security, and procurement falling within the defence and security exclusions of the Directive, are outside the protected scope, and official secrecy and intelligence offences continue to apply. Reporters of corruption in defence procurement remain protected where no classified information is disclosed. 7.9 Corporate Criminal Liability Under the Corporate Criminal Liability Act, legal enti - ties are responsible for criminal offences, including export control, sanctions and bribery offences, com - mitted by decision-makers, or by employees where the offence was made possible or substantially facili - tated by a failure of supervision or organisation. The sanctions for such offences are corporate fines structured in daily rates, up to 180 daily rates with the rate determined by the entity’s earnings situation, alongside the skimming of proceeds and, in procure - ment, exclusion consequences. Prosecutors have discretion whether to pursue an entity; effective com - pliance programmes, self-reporting and remediation weigh against prosecution and reduce the fine. The individual liability of managers runs in parallel.
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