And technology, it grew on ...

In the current technocratic society more and more functions of human beings are performed by machines, with as a result a shift from human to human relations to human-machine rela- tions. Of information, which arises as an (end)product, it is not always clear who has access to it and what is done with it.

In the book 'Het baat niet, maar het schaadt wel', published in the beginning of 1993, Jan Holvast and Andr‚ Mosshammer give an outline of the technocratic information-society. "When looking for solutions, it is primarily directed to technical solutions. Not the problem is in focus, but the (fake)sol- ution, by which the impression arises that problems are sought, for the solution." Holvast and Mosshammer observe 'a return to the situation of a nightwatch-state, in which the activities of the state are primarily limited to public order, security, peace and taxing, in short the sectors where the emphasis is on control and supervision instead of on human dignity.' This development has only strengthened in the last three years. More than ever, registration and control are presented as the solutions for fraud, criminality and misuse of welfare facilities. The government and Trade and Industry want back the overview on the lives of the citizens. Controls on income, registration of spending, limiting the mobility and insight in the daily lives and consumption patterns are the magic words for an all-knowing government.

The integration of modern technology in the whole of the government apparatus has opened a world of registration, linking and control, of which the biggest bureaucrats had not dared dreaming of. The implementation of these mechanisms for control and exclusion coincide with a retracting government. Limitation of social security benefit, stripping of health insurance, the new Act on health insurance for employees, limitation of the Act on disability insurance, a strict asy- lumpolicy, exclusion of illegal foreigners: a small selection of the governmentpolicy of the last few years.
The choice that is being made, is clear: big infrastructural projects like the Betuwelijn (railway for transport to Ger- many), the HSL (High speed train to Paris) and the enlargement of Schiphol Airport have to give the Netherlands a place in the new Europe. The new Europe, where there is no place for refugees, unemployed, people who are ill for a long time and illegals. The justification of this choice is made by dis- courses about fraud, misuse and criminality. 'Hundreds of illegal immigrants registered at one address', 'Large scale fraud among unemployed in Groningen", 'Misuse of WAO must stop'. And slowly the truth becomes what was no more than an lie during the election.

The new technology and registrations also make the policies really feasible. Even worse, politicians bolt when thinking of the possibilities of these technologies. Exclusion and control are presented as the solutions to a failing government policy. The number of centralised registrations, linkings and controls has therefor increased tremendously. Starting-point is the Community Basic Administration (GBA). In the GBA a 'digital twin' is kept of everyone who resides in the Netherlands for more than three months. All important personal information is kept in this system. Although there has always been resistance against the introduction of a central personal number in the Netherlands, the social-fiscal number is registrated in GBA, too. This so-fi-number appears increasingly in computer regis- trations (at health insurance funds for example) and identity- cards. The digital citizen in GBA has to become a sort of standardised citizen. Not only (semi)government institutions are able to exchange information with GBA. Third parties' like the Insurance-bank, health insurance funds etc, can appeal for information from GBA. Within this network of registrations and linkings, GBA is the pounding heart. Through this the digital citizen becomes an easy to control object, with as only prob- lem the verification in the physical world. For this the solution is proposed that when making changes in GBA, one will have to identify him/herself. It is obvious that this obliga- tion to identify will later also be entered for use of other services. The possibilities of control through GBA (with social-fiscal number really linkable to everything), are boundless. The linking to the Foreigners Administration System (VAS) is one of the first and shows how laws and rules go together with the development of technology.

Registration by the police

One of the biggest collector of information is the police. Of everyone who has had dealings with the police, information is stored. For one part it concerns 'hard' legal information about persons, for instance in the Central Police Register (CPR). People who are wanted are in a comparable register, which is also directly accessible for the officer in the street. But more and more the police also register 'soft' information. For example, every police region has its own Antecedents-register, in which data are entered about everyone who has ever got a process-verbal. The mayor or an intelli- gence service can consult this register for a screening or when giving a proof of good conduct.
The criteria become more vague when it concerns the Regional Intelligence Service (RID) and the Regional Criminal Intelli- gence Service (RCID). These are pre-eminently the services to collect 'soft' information. The RID about politically active people, immigrants, asylumseekers and the extreme right, the RCID about the background of possible criminals. On a european level the police-force is also very active. One of the most important registers at the moment is the Schengen Information System (SIS), the predecessor of the European Information System (EIS). In SIS, information is kept about persons, vehicles and other goods. Besides this also about: people who are wanted for a crime or extradition, foreigners who can be expulsed, missing persons, those who have to be detained temporarily, for their own purpose or those of others, witnesses for court and last but not least those who are dangerous to the state. Next to SIS the EURODAC is in develop- ment since 1993. This registration system of fingerprints of refugees will have to link the different European systems to each other, and with that make it impossible for refugees to apply for asylum in more than one European country. For Euro- pol, residing in The Hague since 1995, the exchange of 'soft' criminal information is planned. If the Europol treaty is ratified by the member-states (within two years) sensitive CID information can be exchanged. The databanks are the result of, and the source for controls. The Identification duty is one of the means with which the controls can take place. The develop- ment of technology will, in the future, make many forms of identification possible. No longer will the government be dependent on the benevolence of the citizens. Without them knowing, cameras, smart-cards and biometric techniques will take over the control and exclusion. What follows here is a, certainly, incomplete list of developments happening.

Videocontrol

Videoregistration and control has been the third eye in the security business for years. Industrial complexes, government offices, entrance controls and shoppingcentres, there is nowhere where you can hide from the surveilling eye of the camera. The last few years the videocamera is seen more and more often in the public roads with the possibility to regis- trate everything and everyone that passes. This is already happening on large scale in Britain. More than 300,000 cam- eras, pointed at the public roads, form a network of closed videocircuits. In the Netherlands this sort of closed video- systems are in advance. Many shoppingcentres already have them and a number of cities spy on the public roads, soon all the railway stations will be provided with them.

Digitalized pictures

The government of Massachusetts (USA) has developed a new plan to counter criminality and fraud. In the end of 1995 they began with a computer database which contains digitalized photos of all the 4,2 million car owners. Within one second the database can cough up the photos with which answering questions like: 'who is that bankrobber' or 'who joined this demonstration', becomes very simple. The system can see through disguises because it primarily registers essential characteristics, like facial structure and the size of the pupils. All photos can be scanned and compared with the data- base. The system is a modernised version of the in the Nether- lands tested and used licence registration system.
It is expected that in the USA the technology, Computerised Facial Recognition (CFR), will be used in short term, by the FBI and other investigative services, and in the long run will lead to a nation wide facial recognition system, comparable to the fingerprint recognition systems already in use everywhere. The system can also be used as an entry controlsystem, some- thing what will happen at the Olympic Games in Atlanta and Sydney.
The technology used, is Optical Character Recognition, a technology in which video-images are directly converted into ASCI-signs. This technique is not only usable in facial recog- nition, but can be used for everything, in principle. In the Netherlands there is a test going on, to compare in this way licenceregistrations with the licenceregistration databank in Veendam. In the future all motorways will be surveilled in this way, so that on every moment of the day can be known who is using which part of the road.

Smart Card

For registration and control the smart card is used increas- ingly. This is a kind of bankcard with a chip, on which a large amount of information can be stored. It can be used as an entrypass, as S.O.S.-pass in emergencies, but also as extensive medical card or identification card. In the Nether- lands the smart card is now used for registration and control of refugees in the reception centres. With a so-called elec- tronic W-document their movements are registered and checked. In Germany there are far-advanced plans to store medical files on smart cards. In the U.K. proposals have been made to intro- duce a complete identification duty, whereby there is also an electronic photo registered on the smart card.

Biometrics

Around the world governments and companies use Biometry: collecting, processing and registering detailed personal characteristics. The most well-known forms are the registra- tion of fingerprints, voice recognition and digitalized stor- age of passport photographs. With these technologies different countries work on a variety of methods of exclusion. In Spain a fingerprintsystem for unemployed is started, Russia announced a fingerprintsystem for banking transactions, in Jamaica everyone will soon have to let a fingerprint of the thumb be scanned into a computer, before they can participate in the elections. Two major insurance companies in the USA, Blue Shield and Blue Cross, have developed plans to take fingerprints of everyone who is administered in hospital.

'Chipknip'

The Chipknip is a digital wallet, you put your chipknip in a machine, charge it and then you can pay with it. With this centralised system is registered who makes a withdrawal or pays. The whole system of money can be mapped this way. In Arnhem a large scale test is going on, it is expected that the system will be in operation nation-wide next year.

European regulation.

Increasingly it is decided who can register what, on a euro- pean level. What can be registered, is hardly limited. In the meanwhile a more joint policy is made on the field of internal security. The developments with the Schengen-agreement and the competence of Europol, makes one think.

Europol and Schengen

The goal of cooperation is no longer only the prosecution of crime, but also extensive pro-active control focused on the prevention of crime. The intention is to combat criminal activities before they can even take place. The start of police activities is so set to a stage preceding possible criminal behaviour. No longer individuals are concerned, on the basis of equal rights, but whole groups of which the behaviour is viewed as marginal, deviant or potentially dan- gerous. Not on the basis of criteria set by law, but by dep- artments in charge of security and public order.

Examples:

According to article 46 of the Executive Agreement of Schen- gen, the police of a member-state can, unasked for, exchange information with other partners of the agreement. This con- cerns information: "in the importance of preventing future crimes against, or threats of, public order and security." According to this line of thinking, the Schengen Information System (SIS) contains not only data of people who are sus- pected of a crime. On the basis of article 99.3 information can be stored and processed also for 'tactical observation' or 'targeted control'. This can take place "on request of author- ities in charge of the security of the state, when concrete supportive evidence induces the assumption that the informa- tion (..) is essential to prevent a serious threat by the person in question, or other serious threats to the internal or external security of the state."
The Europol treaty anticipates the possibility of collecting, processing and use of data, according to the following cat- egories:

* criminals and possible future criminals;
* possible witnesses of (future) crimes;
* victims or future victims;
* contacts and associates;
* possible informants.

The treaty however does not define what kind of personal information can be stored. Essentially this will have to be judged by the management. The first proposal to define this, concerned an extensive form of registration with privacy- sensitive data like race, political conviction, religion, sexual behaviour and health.

As a consequence of the pro-active control-thinking the divi- sion between competence of police and security services becomes more unclear. The, in the Europol convention proposed, cooperation does not only concern the policeforces of the member-states, but all 'authorised services', meaning all national services active, in one way or another, in the pre- vention or prosecution of criminality. Taking into account that some member-states have legislation whereby intelligence services are responsible for combatting certain forms of criminality, the Europol convention silently and uncondi- tionally procures a place for the security services. The same thing can be said about the Executive Agreement of Schengen, which refers in article 99 to 'authorities in charge with the security of the state.'

The definitions of 'criminal behaviour' and 'threatening situations', which should legitimate actions of the police, appear to become even more vague. Vague definitions open the door for extensive and arbitrary interpretation.
Both the Schengen Executive Agreement and the Europol conven- tion must be seen as framework-laws and judicial carcasses, that can be filled in later, by the executive departments which are responsible for the actual implementation. Then they will get their true meaning, but by then the legislative organs don't have a say any more. The Europol convention does not contain a common definition of what a 'terrorist' crime is, nor any clear legal description of what can be seen as 'serious forms of international criminality'. Both treaties give extensive competence, concerning interpretation and issu- ing of further regulation, to the administrative and executive committees, of which the members are chosen by the governments of the member-states.

Generally one can perceive a tendency to see so-called 'org- anised crime' as something inherent to marginal situations and economic activities- meaning a form of 'street crime' caused by carthieves, 'peoplesmugglers, drugdealers and illegal immigrants. In this way of reasoning, it is left out of con- sideration that large scale organised crime is not confined to the margins of society, on the contrary it is an integrated function of a world-economy which is, increasingly, based on free movement of goods, services and capital. The real problem is that it becomes more difficult to differentiate between legal and illegal business. To cope with the stricter competi- tion even big international companies are tempted to break the law, when advantages of competition and cost/assets calcula- tions seem to demand this.
Nevertheless it is clear that Europols opinion of inter- nationally organised crime is not directed to companies like Siemens, Agusta, British Aerospace, or the conduct of Swiss bankers and Italian government ministers. Instead the scenario of threats as described in the Europol convention appeals to the fears of the 'ordinary citizen': the fear of your car (status-symbol par excellence) being stolen by a 'Polish car- smuggler'; the fear of an Albanian or Lebanese asylum-seeker selling drugs to your children; in short the fear of people for social misery and insecurity, personified by foreigners, the poor and marginal people in all forms and shapes. This scenario serves to get the public justification for a general pro-active control, directed mainly at socially weak groups for whom it gets increasingly difficult to adept the condi- tions of live to the existing rules.
The two treaties mention foreigners together with crime. In this way this specific choice of definition of crime, suggests an explicit necessity to control foreigners. That it is this way, is shown by the fact that the so-called Analysis regis- ter(s?) of Europol will contain information of not suspected persons, such as potential witnesses and victims of future crimes. This gives Europol room to, in the example of smuggl- ing people, register not only suspected smugglers, but also refugees as possible future witnesses or victims of smuggle (art. 10). The same emphasis on foreigners is clear on a number of other fields of the Europol criminality list, such as the falsifying of official documents (identity-papers!) and offering of illegal work.

Dataprotection is rendered a 'utopia from the past'. Both treaties anticipate (or do not exclude) the possibility of information exchange for other purposes than what it was stored for. The fact that exchange of information with third parties needs clearance by the party who entered it, probably will not mean that an extensive exchange will be limited to the basis of 'give and take'.
Europol will have three databanks: the Information-system, the Index-system and the Analysis-system. The last one gives Europol disposal of an informationregister that, being hardly confined by legal regulations, makes it possible to become the leading criminal intelligence service in Europe, and to be active with crime in the broadest sense of the word. Only Europol itself, not the member-states, will have access to the information stored in the Analysis-system. The advantage from the information headstart, which Europol could have, on natio- nal authorities, makes you wonder if the current controversy about the competence of Europol has not been outdated by reality.
Europol will make itself unreplaceable by its privileged posi- tion on the basis of a technical equipment, knowledge and access to information. In turn this will probably lead to a steady increase of funds, employees and power. We can expect a constant extension of a police-sector justified by its own internal dynamics.

Around Christmas '95 nelson visits a coffeeshop in Leiden. People from foreign descent regularly go there. The police raid the shop in search of a person, who is not there. They check Nelson for identity-papers, which he can not produce. He is taken, held for 24 hours in a policecell and dumped on the street. In his experience this personal control is bizarre. The owner of the coffeeshop states that the police don't usually raid the place, but that they do arrest people just outside.

Gordon wants to go back to Kazachstan. They have already tried to expulse him to Moscow, but Moscow sent him to Kazachstan. There he was not accepted, sent back to Moscow and then sent back to the Netherlands. He has been in different prisons for illegal foreigners in Germany and in the Willem II in Tilburg. End of december '95, he tries to travel out of Germany and is taken out of the train by the Bundes Grenzschutz. Gordon doesn't have any travel or identitydocuments. He has to pay 400 US dollars as a kind of bail for a possible trial and is summoned to leave Germany within two days, or he will be arrested again. Except for Gordon a few other people are also taken out of the train and given a fine. An attempt in january '96 to get a traveldocument (laissez-passer) finally succeeds at the embassy in Bruxelles. Gordon travels directly to Kazac- hstan.

Musa is in a car with two others, on the road to Alkmaar, when they pass a policecar. The passengers of the car, including Musa, are black and the driver is white. The policecar follows them a while and then stops them. They have checked the licen- ce and have found out that the car is not insured. The two black people are asked for identity-papers, the driver gets a fine. The two are taken, registered and are in a policecell for ten days, then they are transferred to the illegals-prison Willem II in Tilburg. Musa is held in foreigners-detention for five months and is, in the end, dumped on the street. The other is held for four months and also dumped.

Melvin distributes the newspaper every morning. One time he is held without reason and asked for identity-papers, which he can not produce. Again he is taken, to the same policestation, where the same police officer checks him. It is soon clear, that Melvin is the one held for riding a bike in the wrong direction of the street and is registered in the computer as a foreigner. Melvin states that he was then dumped on the street and that he thinks the same should happen now. This time however, he is locked up in a policecell for twelve days. The police ask him all kinds of questions about how he, in gods name, can survive as an illegal, where he lives and how long he is already living here. The result of a conversation between Melvin and the police is that they come to his house to see how he lives. When they have seen that, they release him, saying that he should stay clear from the police.

A‹cha, wife of Hicham, both illegally residing in the Nether- lands, is pregnant. She has to go to a hospital, because of complications. She has the baby in the Slotervaart-hospital, the baby is born early and has to go in the incubator. This costs hundreds of guilders a day. The costs of the delivery and the stay in the hospital also have to be paid. The couple doesn't have health insurance, the needed medical assistance is to expensive. The parents decide to take the child, to find a cheaper solution, perhaps another hospital. The hospital wants the parents to first sign a declaration that they take the responsibility of the risk for the child. They sign and go away, there is no other choice. Their midwife blazes with indignation when she hears that the hospital has released the child at this stage. She thinks the hospital is negligible of their duty. She demands new hospitalisation of the baby, which happens. In this situation of uninsured illegals, the parents, it seems that having a residence-permit is a condition to get health insurance. No residence-permit, no medical assistance. Still a baby in an incubator is an acute medical necessity. Negligence of this care creates a life-threatening situation.