THE HAGUE — The Council of State advises against changing the validity of the new Dutch passport from five to ten years. The reason for the negative advice is that the Dutch government cannot guarantee security risks can be solved during those ten years.

In 2010 the Dutch government decided to introduce a new passport with a longer validity so that residents of the Netherlands, Curaçao, St. Maarten and Aruba only need to get a new passport every ten years. The government acknowledges there are extra security risks with a longer validity. The Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations explained that with a longer validity of the document the holder’s looks can change thus making it easier for others with a good likeness to take advantage of this by using someone else’s ID-card. Furthermore, during a period of at least ten years it should be made impossible to falsify the passport and imitate the electronic chip for security. However, for the government the advantages for a ten-year validity of the passport are more important than the risks.

The Council of State disagrees and points out there could be numerous circumstances where the face of the owner doesn’t resemble his/her picture even after a short period and further queries the reliability of the electronic chip. “According to experts, the number of vulnerabilities in the chips and the tempo in which they are found will increase in the future. (…) Considering the aforementioned, the Council of State isn’t convinced that the longer validity is wise, given the assumption that with the determination of the validity the reliability of the document should be more important. The Council advises to reconsider the proposal for longer validity.”

The original proposal also mentioned the passport having one or more fingerprints of the owner but this led to criticism from the Lower Chamber and Dutch citizens abroad because the passports could then not be issued by every consulate.