Dutch police order all 60,000 officers to tackle cybercrime daily
The Dutch national police are rolling out a major overhaul that will make combating online crime a daily duty for all 60,000 officers, officials said.
Stan Duijf, who heads the national police’s cybercrime strategy, told AD that the change is essential because more than half of all crime in the Netherlands now occurs online through fraud, threats, theft, and extortion.
“Online criminality was first only something for highly specialized teams within the police. That can no longer be,” Duijf said. “The fight against online criminality is simply police work. It must become a daily part of the work for all 60,000 agents in the coming years.”
The shift is already underway. New recruits in basic police training now receive digital skills instruction, including how to properly take reports of internet fraud and detect online crime. Digitally trained officers are being placed in local teams across the country.
Many online crime reports have previously been shelved by local detectives told there was no capacity, little chance of arrest, or that the cases were too complex.
In the major sextortion case against Mark S. from Borculo, some victims had reported the crimes years earlier—in some cases as long as 15 years ago—only to be turned away without help. Police in Oost-Nederland have since apologized.
Cyber specialists in national and regional teams remain "the cream of the crop" and will continue handling major, complex investigations, Duijf said. International cooperation with Germany, France, England, and the United States is strong.
Online fraud alone caused victims 100 million euros in losses in 2023. The total damage from all cyber incidents in the Netherlands, including to businesses, is estimated at 10 billion euros according to a Ministry of Economic Affairs study. Victims often suffer psychological harm, feeling ashamed and losing trust in others.
The police will invest more centrally in analysis so investigators can spot patterns and link related cases instead of treating each report in isolation. “As police, we often still look too singularly at reports. We must not look at those cases individually. Often many more people have become victims,” Duijf said. “The art becomes looking at the bigger picture. At patterns, at clusters. And tackle that. That is why every report is so important.”
The nationwide shift is drawing international interest. “We get questions, for example, from Germany and England about how we are going to change the focus at a complete police organization for an entire country,” Duijf said.
