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Vincent van Steen, Dutch interior ministry spokesman, declined to say whether Iranian authorities in the Netherlands or Iran had been contacted, and said more details would be published in a letter to the Dutch parliament early next week.

But Mr van Steen confirmed the veracity of a report by the Dutch news agency ANP saying the cabinet was looking into whether the Iranian government played a part in breaking into Dutch government websites.

Such websites may no longer be safe after the digital theft of internet security certificates from Dutch IT company DigiNotar, the interior ministry said in a statement.

Officials at the Iranian embassy in The Hague were not immediately available for comment nor was there an immediate reply to emails asking for comment.

Google said in its security blog on Aug. 29 that it had received reports of attacks on Google users, that "the people affected were primarily located in Iran", and that the attacker used a fraudulent certificate issued by DigiNotar.