Switzerland ponders fate of its aging fortresses

GSTAAD, Switzerland - The mountain didn't look quite right. Up close, its rock face was the giveaway, with its fading makeup of camouflage paint that seemed not to have been retouched since the cold war. The guard seemed out of place, too, standing sentry over a quiet clearing near this Swiss ski resort better known for its free-range billionaires.

The oddness was just beginning. The guard punched a few buttons, and a weathered hatch in the mountain opened. Inside, at the end of a narrow cavern of a hallway, there was a second thick door that led to yet another door, this one 3.2 metric tons and looking as if it should be guarding a bank vault.

Christoph Oschwald was giving a tour of what he called the Swiss Fort Knox, one of two former military bunkers in the bowels of the Alps that companies run by Mr. Oschwald and his business partner, Hanspeter Baumann, have leased from the Swiss military. Where officers once prepared to defend their country, Mr. Oschwald and Mr. Baumann now claim to operate some of the world's most secure computer server farms.