Amsterdam court left confidential docs behind for construction workers to find: report

The court in Amsterdam left thousands of pages of confidential documents behind when it left the building for major renovations, the Telegraaf reports. Construction workers brought these documents to the newspaper.

The construction workers found the documents while working on the court's renovation. According to the newspaper, it involves thousands of pages that contain, among other things, information on pending criminal cases, recently launched police investigations and names and address details of witnesses and defendants.

The documents also include information about internal personnel issues and show that a "culture of fear" prevails in court, the newspaper writes.

The Telegraaf returned the documents to the court.

A spokesperson for the court denies that the documents involved any sensitive information. According to him, they are "old papers" which were probably taken out of containers.

A number of lawyers told the newspaper that the leak is scandalous, even if it involved old papers. Old papers should have been shredded, the lawyers said. Privacy law professor Gerrti-Jan Zwenne called it "a data breach of unprecedented proportions."

"This is very serious. I'm going to ask for clarification from the court", lawyer Emad El Assrouti said to the newspaper. "You need to be confident that the privacy of your client is guaranteed."