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The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

commit.pizza

131–140 of 261 posts

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> public since quite a while... I think this is an interesting point. If you were to suddenly flip a switch and have all US data exposed the same way, I think there would be chaos and maybe even violence. But I think that speaks more negatively to the current state of America than it does the idea of having information be public.

Can you describe why it will create violence? I could maybe understand that it could makes employment harder for some group or something, but how does it lead to violence.

Violence because some Americans just cannot be trusted with public data.

My biggest complaint about living in the US, being a natural born citizen, is that most people seem to make everything about themselves and this is partially the problem. All of this information being publicly available isn't the problem, it's that most people don't know how to leave well enough alone and think that just because they have this information that they need to act on it and use it to their advantage.

Likewise, you have the people who simply have no self-control and will fly off the handle and do something without knowing all the pieces and just assume they have heard enough to make up their mind. They would use that information to hurt their perceived enemies because in their messed up echo chamber if you're not Male, White, Christian, and Heterosexual then you're the wrong kind of American. The current issues surrounding abortion and women's rights only reinforce that mindset. These people label those differences as an "illness" and all that virtue signalling to make you feel like you're wrong if you believe otherwise.

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#132

One of the "pranks" we play on expats moving to Sweden is to look them up on hitta.se, take a screenshot and send it back to them saying "this you?". They always freak out and with reason, these sites contain an obscene amount of personal information about you. Some of them even give you people's salary history, which is slightly harder to obtain but also totally legal. The weirdest thing I thought is that most Swede…

I think Sweden is/was a very high trust society. People knew their fellow Swedes, many times with family links going back generations. There are a lot of things you can do in a high trust society, that do not work in a society without that level of trust - for example, generous welfare benefits where you trust your neighbors not to exploit the system.

What has, in your opinion, contributed to an overall loss of trust in societies where it once was higher?

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#133
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you mean when she wasn't home? Or is it customary to lock you're home even when you're home now?

Yes, these days we lock our homes even when we're home.

for what its worth im in America (where crime is way way higher) and i don't consider that normal. probably a cultural thing.

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably raised at renewal. Deflecting the issue really doesnt help. My advice stands - people should exercise due diligence before moving to that country.

So it was at renewal, not out of the blue? Did the landlord actually mention the pay raise? One should always do as good due diligence as possible before doing a major change in life such as moving to another country. No matter which country it is.

It may have been raised at renewal but notified beforehand. It is deeply frightening knowing someone can monitor your personal finances and with the law on their side.

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#135
post #63

Initial reaction: WTF?! The more I think about it though, the more I'm aligned with the idea — except the home address part, that's just mental and dangerous. So all your details like salary, social security number, etc. are public. What's the end result? For me, nothing. I _could_ care less, but not by much. I know people get all worked up about things like their social security number being exposed, "because fraud!…

A strange comment to be coming from a pseudonymous account with no contact info. Why are you hiding your identity on HN if that's how you feel?

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#136

Interesting! I remember reading that the Soviet Union did not have homelessness, because it was illegal to be homeless..

Technically, it was illegal to be unemployed - i.e. 209th paragraph of USSR criminal code criminalizing living off of a 'parasitic way of life', such as a healthy work-capable person living for more than four months without socially useful labor through begging, vagrancy, etc.

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#137

As a Swede I love this openness. It puts everyone on an a level playing field and makes it much less dramatic and reduces the value of the data.

Fine for you to say when your salary is probably north of 100K+. If Im on disability benefit? Do I want my land lord to know this? Or my friends? I guess I should just shout it as I walk down the street. Embaressment and being an easy target dont exist in your world being healthy i guess and you're lucky.

Before landlord allows you in they ask for proof of income one way or another. And after you moved in it is quite hard to kick you out unless you misbehave. As for friends: if they asked about your income, you refused to answer and they still look it up - what kind of friends they are then? And btw the tax records show how much taxable income you had, not its source.

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Sweden is/was a very high trust society. People knew their fellow Swedes, many times with family links going back generations. There are a lot of things you can do in a high trust society, that do not work in a society without that level of trust - for example, generous welfare benefits where you trust your neighbors not to exploit the system.

What has, in your opinion, contributed to an overall loss of trust in societies where it once was higher?

The sheer number of people. 7% of all humans who have ever lived are alive today.

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#139
post #130

One upside of everyone's name, date of birth, address and personal ID number being public knowledge in Sweden is that organisations don't treat knowing any of those as proof of your identity. It's absurd how that's not the case in other places.

That's purely incidental, though. There is no hard choice betweeen "all your data has to be public" and "you can be totally screwed by identity theft if your private data is leaked". The US system could be fixed much more efficiently by putting the burden of proof on the businesses who made the transaction instead of the individuals whose data got stolen (gave someone a loan who gave you a stolen SSN? better find out…

It's not a direct consequence, but "purely incidental" is a bit strong.

Re: The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

#140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So it was at renewal, not out of the blue? Did the landlord actually mention the pay raise? One should always do as good due diligence as possible before doing a major change in life such as moving to another country. No matter which country it is.

It may have been raised at renewal but notified beforehand. It is deeply frightening knowing someone can monitor your personal finances and with the law on their side.

But what you write isn't true, at least not in the way it comes off:

When I hear "monitor your personal finances" I think on a month to month basis or more frequently.

In Sweden, as written above it is yearly and with several months delay.

Also what you you write just doesn't "feel" realistic at all. Source: I live next to Sweden and have Swedish colleagues.

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