The Netherlands, a stable parliamentary democracy, happens to be one of the most surveilled societies, in terms of the extent to which police and security services monitor private communications. In May 2008 the Ministry of Justice released figures that stated the number of telephone taps in the second half of 2007 reached 12491 in total. That is 1681 per day. 84% of this tapping concerned mobile phones. Compare this with the news that there were 2208 taps in the United States in the whole of 2007. And the Dutch figures concerned only the police – the security services fall outside of this assessment.

Remarkably, apart from long-running demands for openness from the Left, this activity is largely accepted in Dutch politics. But recently pressure has been building to make a breach in the secrecy wall surrounding the security services. The 2009 revelations of the AIVD tapping the phones of journalists at the Telegraaf [see 'Reflections on Davids: An Intelligence Affair,' The Holland Bureau, 31 January 2010 and thereafter] brought it into the public domain in a blaze of publicity. On 27 January 2010 three members of parliament submitted a motion demanding details on the extent of telephone and internet tapping by the Security and Intelligence Service (AIVD) and its military cousin, the MIVD. The response on 18 February was like seeing the tip of an iceberg – Minister for Home Affairs Guusje ter Horst, responsible for the security services, announced that the activities of the AIVD and the MIVD only represent a fraction of the total number of taps that are sanctioned by the Ministry of Justice. She also stated that while she indeed must declare information relevant for explaining certain policies, this could be refused should it damage the interests of the state.

Needless to say, giving away the details of telephone and internet taps by the security services would give away too much on their methods, and therefore falls squarely under the heading ‘national security’.

As a result, the parliament should trust in the workings of the respective oversight bodies, the Commission for the Intelligence and Security Services (CIVD) and the Review Committee for the Intelligence and Security Services (CTIVD). The CIVD is the parliamentary oversight committee for the services, which consists only of the respective leaders of the parties in parliament and is of course restricted in the information it can make public. As of 2010 the CIVD receives a review of security service activities every three months. The CTIVD (which has an English website) is an independent body established in 2002 to ensure that the activities of the security services fall within the bounds of European law (specifically to do with the protection of human rights). The Services can overcome European legal restrictions if they argue successfully to the CTIVD that they must do so in the interests of national security.

Of course, ter Horst insisted that questions of such a sensitive nature as tapping should be dealt with by these established channels and not announced for everyone to hear in parliament.

But information on security service activities can reach the public realm by a variety of channels, especially when their activities necessarily touch on the legitimate activities of businesses and other relevant parties. At the beginning of March the the National Management Organisation for Internet Providers (NBIP) released figures for 2009 that showed the AIVD and the Ministry of Justice tapped 335 times an internet or VoIP (Voice over internet Protocol) connection, involving in total more than 1.5 million end-users.  These 335 taps stretched for a total of 8920 ‘tap-days’ in 2009. This information was released via Webwereld.

NBIP was set up in 2002 in order to spread the costs of investments required for internet surveillance across participating Internet Service Providers (ISPs). The state requires that ISPs fulfill this task, and its costly. NBIP currently offers its services to 79 ISPs, among them Tele2 and BBeyond.

NBIP itself was involved in the tapping of 59 internet providers. But it can’t go any further than this – releasing details of which providers were tapped, or what the AIVD was after, would cross the line of state secrecy. But NBIP’s figures already give quite an insight into what is going on. Since the Organisation represents less than 10% of the landline and mobile provider market, these numbers can be multiplied by a factor of ten for a (very conservative) estimate of the national situation. That means a total of 3350 internet taps, stretching for 90,450 ‘tap-days’.

And these figures are on the rise. 2006 saw 69 taps on internet connections, covering 1.5 million end-users. From 69 to 335 in four years is a rise of 385%.

The Ministry of Justice announced in November 2009 that the national police corps will keep a record of all internet taps from 1 january 2010 onwards, and this information will be periodically released, as now occurs with details of telephone tapping. The first official report on internet tapping will be published this autumn. Once again, no details of AIVD or MIVD activity in this field will be made available.

Does all this surveillance lead to a reduction in criminality or subversive activities? The Ministry of Justice obviously thinks so. But ever-increasing surveillance also means ever-increasing amounts of information to be monitored. What is more interesting here is that, in a period when the German Constitutional Court ruled against a law that demands the retention of all telephone and email traffic for 6 months, and the European Parliament once again showed concerns about the transfer of Passenger Name Record (PNR) data for air passengers to the US and Australia, surveillance in the Netherlands carries on largely undisturbed. In a time when trust in the state is meant to be at an all-time low, this particular field of activity is yet to be fully challenged.