Yeah it makes you wonder... I think a lot of efforts have been refocused on Corona prevention over the last two years. And a lot of security workers were laid

Yeah it makes you wonder... I think a lot of efforts have been refocused on Corona prevention over the last two years. And a lot of security workers were laid off during this time. In the Netherlands (and several other EU countries) the airports are in total chaos now because they are so understaffed. I wouldn't be surprised if some formalities that were always of questionable effectiveness (often known as security theater) were just toned down a bit. Also, your passport photo is probably in a database somewhere already :) They're supposed to delete it after issuing the passport, but there have been several incidents noted by privacy watchdogs where the government 'forgot' to actually do this (and the fingerprints too).