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The release of WikiLeaks’ unredacted haul of 250,000 secret US diplomatic cables has thrown up an unusual victim: Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands.
Although unlikely to be the most harmful, the personal phone number of the 73-year-old Dutch monarch is just one of many pieces of information which probably would have been better not published on the internet.
(Note: I’ve blurred out the phone numbers in the image below)
Queen Beatrix, we are told, speaks good English. Well, that’s true for just about everybody I’ve ever encountered from the Netherlands.
Amongst those to have had their contact details exposed alongside the Dutch Queen include former Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende, foreign minister Ben Bot and Defense minister Henk Kamp.
Hopefully prank calls are the the worst scenario which might emerge from from these phone numbers reaching the public domain – but it’s an important reminder that it’s not just whistleblowers and secret informants who might find themselves affected by the WikiLeaks leak.
I suspect Julian Assange won’t be getting an invitation for afternoon tea at the Dutch Royal Family’s official residence any time soon.
I'm not sure if I'm right here, but wouldn't numbers like these have been vetted if The Guardian had not have released the password for the whole cable database?
Back in 1993 I saw U2 perform in Rotterdam — we all do silly things when we are young — and at the end of the gig Bono called someone famous, as he seemed to do at every show of their tour. He decided to call the queen. He did not get through to her but someone like the grandmaster of her household did pick up the phone. So I wonder how top secret this number was.
The numbers of Balkenende, Bot and Kamp are probably much more of a secret. But Balkenende quit as a PM last year, Bot quit in 2006 and Kamp as well, although the latter is now a government minister again.