Dick Schoof, the new prime minister of the Netherlands, was head of the country’s intelligence services before heading the new technocratic government.
Dick Schoof, the new Dutch Prime Minister, has banned mobile phones and other devices at his weekly cabinet meetingsin a measure aimed at addressing the possible risk of digital eavesdropping by spies.
“The threat of espionage is eternal. Electronic devices, a telephoneand iPadthey are all small microphones and the countries are interested in decision-making also in Holland and one wants to avoid it. It’s a very simple measure: all phones in a safe,” Schoof said, former head of the national intelligence agencyto reporters on Friday.
Telephones were not banned under Schoof’s predecessor, Mark Ruttewho left Dutch politics after the November general elections, won by the radical right Party for Freedom (PVV), led by Geert Wilders.
Schoof, whose technocrat government took office in July, said he was taking a different approach based on his former work in the intelligence community.
“A completely natural measure”
“Maybe I have a little more experience with that kind of thing,” he said. “So For me it was a completely natural measure. And it seemed to me that all the members of the cabinet agreed immediately.”
Erik Akerboom, current head of the General Intelligence and Security Service that Schoof once directed, warned the last year of China’s espionage in the Netherlands and, in particular, to your technology sector. “We see every day they try to steal it from the Netherlands,” Akerboom told The Associated Press.
The Schoof Government is holding a series of meetings to prepare a detailed political project which will be announced next month.
