OlympicsBelgian athletes who travel to the Olympic Winter Games in China at the end of this month should leave their own telephone and laptop at home. That is the advice of the Belgian Olympic and Interfederal Committee. With this, the BOIC is anticipating Chinese surveillance during the Games.
Earlier today it became known that the Dutch athletes also received the advice. In fact, the sports umbrella organization NOC*NSF even forbids athletes to bring their own telephone and laptop. There is a fear that the Chinese government is eavesdropping on the equipment, endangering the privacy of the athletes or allowing them to watch training programs. The staff is therefore given clean equipment – that also applies to the Belgian athletes who decide to leave their own telephone and laptop at home.
When asked, Maurits Hendriks, technical director of NOC*NSF, confirms to the newspaper that the sports umbrella is taking various measures. He does not want to say what those are for the safety of the athletes.
Two months ago, the sports umbrella organization was updated by the National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism (NCTV) and intelligence service AIVD about the situation in China. Hendriks: “That is usual. In doing so, we zoom in very closely on the security situation in a country, on the political context, but also on cybersecurity.”
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