Dutch police want to expand data mining capabilities to protect public order: report

The police want to broaden its capabilities to gather and keep information on Netherlands residents in the interest of public order. The Ministry of Justice and Security is investigating whether the police can get more powers on this front, RTL Nieuws reports based on answers from the Ministry and its own investigation.

Internal police documents show that the police have asked for its public order intelligence team - Team Openbare Orde Inlichtingen (TOOI) - to get more powers multiple times in the past decade. Each time the Ministry considered it unnecessary, according to the broadcaster.

It is unclear why the Ministry is now investigating expanding the TOOI’s powers, but it confirmed the investigation to RTL. The Ministry did not say what extension of powers the police asked for. But according to the broadcaster, it involves things like secretly following people, infiltrating groups, working with informants, and wiretaps.

The TOOI is responsible for collecting information about public order, for example, at demonstrations and football matches. An investigation by RTL into internal police documents found that the service has been crossing its boundaries in intelligence gathering for years. The team has monitored, followed, and kept files on innocent citizens, which is not regulated by the law and therefore goes largely unsupervised.

Both the Ministry and National Police denied that the TOOI is violating the law with its current practices. They told RTL that only “minor infringements on personal life” are happening at the moment.

The Ministry added that if the police get more powers, supervision of the use of those powers would also increase.