Police and the justice department are failing to act against a doxing site which has been active since 2018, causing thousands of adults and at least 200 children in the Netherlands to be sexually harassed and blackmailed, an investigation by RTL Nieuws has shown.
The site, unnamed to protect the privacy of the victims, is used to publish personal data to name and shame people for alleged “crimes” such as adultery or “just being a jerk”.
RTL Nieuws approached over 50 people whose personal data appeared on the site. Many of them were too ashamed to talk or share their story anonymously.
‘Laura’ was 17 when her social media account and phone number were shared on the site, along with a text in English calling her a “pedo who likes to play the whore”, and to “use this information as you like”. She has been bombarded with sexually suggestive texts and threats for over a year.
Both anti-terrorist and child pornography organisation ATKM and the anti-terrorism coordinator NCTV have said taking action against the site is not within their mandate. The public prosecution office and privacy watchdog Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens (AP) did not want to comment, RTL reported.
According to a police spokesman, combating doxing, which is a criminal offence in the Netherlands, is “complicated. “Many of these sites are being hosted abroad. The administrators are anonymous and the payments are in crypto coins,” he said. Police are “actively dealing with the problem but that is not always visible,” he said.
Babette Keuning, coordinator at the anti-child pornography expertise centre Offlimits, said it was “absurd” that the site is still active. Over the years, more victims have reported instances of extortion over sexually explicit material, threats and bullying. Removing the data costs €400.
The consequences can be serious, she said, with one of the victims a 13-year-old, attempting suicide, and another needing psychiatric care.
The site regularly moves location, which complicates legal action further. In the last two months, it was traced to servers in Lithuania and Switzerland and in 2021, it was found to be hosted by a Dutch provider Worldstream which, according to a spokesman, removed it because of the reports of abuse.
The person behind the site may be a 25-year-old hacker living in Australia, cyber security sources told RTL but Australian police could not confirm any knowledge of him.
There are currently some 200,000 messages on the site and hundreds are added every day. “This must stop and we hope the regulators see this and take action,” Keuning said.
