NU.nl, 6 Nov 2013: 'Lawsuit against Plasterk over NSA spying'

“A group of citizens and organisations is demanding that the Dutch state stop using data obtained by the intelligence agency NSA.

The group is therefore taking the State to court. Interior Minister Ronald Plasterk is due to defend the Dutch government's policies in court in The Hague on 27 November.

According to the group, named Citizens against Plasterk, the NSA collects data in violation of Dutch law. That data then ends up with the Dutch intelligence agency AIVD. The group demands that citizens be informed if their data was shared in this way.

The plaintiffs include well-known hacker Rop Gonggrijp and ICT journalist Brenno de Winter, who also works for NU.nl. In addition, the Dutch Association for Criminal Lawyers, the Dutch Association for Journalists (NvJ), the Internet Society Netherlands and the Privacy First Foundation have joined the lawsuit.

Source protection

The NvJ says that spying by intelligence agencies compromises source protection in journalism.

"Our interest is not so much the privacy interest, but we are very much concerned with ensuring source protection, which this puts under pressure," said general secretary Thomas Bruning. "This may discourage whistleblowers from disclosing wrongdoing."

That is also the reason for De Winter to participate. "You see that it is becoming increasingly difficult to protect sources," he says. "A government monitoring everything actually makes journalism impossible."

Money laundering

According to lawyer Christiaan Alberdingk Thijm, who represents the group, illegally obtained data is being "laundered" by Plasterk and the intelligence services. "This case should put an end to that," he said.

Minister Plasterk defended Dutch spying policy before the House of Representatives on Wednesday.

It was recently revealed that the NSA allegedly stored "metadata" of 1.8 million Dutch phone calls. During the debate, Plasterk said these were phone calls to foreign numbers. (...)"

Source: http://nutech.nl/internet/3621417/rechtszaak-plasterk-nsa-spionage.html, 6 November 2013.