Cyberattack hits Dutch government login DigiD, blocking access to many services
A large-scale outage has affected DigiD, the Netherlands' government authentication system, preventing thousands from accessing critical services. The disruption, caused by a series of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, began at 9:08 a.m. Monday, severely impacting access to tax filings, municipal services, and medical portals.
The biggest issue with the greatest impact is DigiD, which residents use to access a wide variety of government websites, but also a wide range of other services, which can include health insurers, paying traffic tickets, and using medical care provider portals. The problem is also affecting access to the government information portal, MijnOverheid.
Well over a thousand people mentioned their inability to access DigiD on downtime monitoring website AlleStoringen within the first hour of the problem surfacing. Roughly 45,000 complaints were logged on the website by 11:30 a.m.
Several thousand individuals also separately complained about their inability to access the website of the Belastingdienst, the country’s Tax and Customs Office. Monday marked the first full working day where people could file their annual income tax returns, and it was also the first workday for employers to digitally file payroll information.
By 9:50 a.m., the disruptions had extended beyond DigiD, impacting several digital government services. Among the affected systems were the BSNk (Burger Service Nummer-koppelregister), which links citizen service numbers; DigiD Machtigen, the authorization system for DigiD users; and various Digipoort services, including Digipoort Financieel (WUS and FTP), Digipoort SBR Belastingdienst (WUS), and Digipoort Sociaal en Financieel (WUS). Additionally, the disruptions affected Machtigen en Mededelen, which handles authorization and notification services, as well as MijnOverheid, the platform for citizens to access government correspondence and personal records.
According to Logius, the Dutch government's digital service provider, the disruption is under investigation, and authorities are working to mitigate the attacks. "DigiD, DigiD Machtigen, BSNk, Digipoort, and MijnOverheid are partially available due to recurring DDoS attacks. We are working hard on a solution," Logius stated in an official update.
This is not the first time DigiD has faced such an issue. Six weeks ago, a similar outage was attributed to a DDoS attack, causing network overload. The latest disruption follows a weekend where heavy traffic had already strained access to the Belastingdienst’s tax filing system for 2024 income declarations.
