The Dutch government launched the DAWO program after U.S. sanctions against the International Criminal Court cut off the chief prosecutor's access to Microsoft email. The goal is to ensure that critical government systems cannot be switched off at the whim of a foreign country, so the program covers operating systems, office software, and cloud services.
DAWO is built on NixOS, whose package manager installs each package in its own immutable, signed directory. This makes configurations highly reproducible across machines, with up to 90% of a configuration potentially carried over between deployments. NixOS can also run on older hardware that Windows 11 would not support.
Three service providers—SSC-ICT, DICTU, and DUO-ICT—are handling the rollout, overseen by the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations. Eight municipalities are currently running trial programs, and the first stable version is expected by the end of 2027. The Netherlands is not alone in this effort: Germany has already moved away from Microsoft-based systems, while Denmark and France are pursuing similar reviews of their technology stacks.