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The only way of being anonymous in Sweden is illegal?

commit.pizza

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

#141
post #107
post #3

Almost as interesting, you can (as I understand it) look up the current salary of anyone you want to. Though in doing so they will be notified that you have done so.

Salary is not freely available, you generally have to pay for specific lookups as a private person. However there is a lowtech way around this. Taxed income is published yearly in a book that resembles an old phonebook, Taxeringskalendern ("the tax calendar"). Freedoom of the press, see? This book (or the part of the book that covers your region) will be available at your local library in the "reference" section. For…

That sounds like the perfect book for thieves to find out exactly who has money. I have survived living in sketchy high-theft areas by pretending to be poor -- this would totally blow my cover.

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

#142
post #35

IANAL but in EU the EU laws override member laws. So, since GDPR if you want your info to be removed you' ll be able to do it. Of course maybe you' ll need to go to EUCJ to acheive it

EU laws does not override what's in an individual nation's constitution. National constitution > EU laws.

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

#143

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.

But how about international organizations then?

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

#144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

And the only human you can truly trust after all is a dead one.

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

#145
post #8

"This system was built and created for a different time where criminality was pretty much absent in Sweden" When was this golden age of (almost) no crime, I wonder?

Maybe 35-40 years ago. My grandmother never locked her door when she was at home, for example, even in 2020, because she'd lived so long in society as it was that she literally couldn't believe that it could end up as it had; and this wasn't due to stupidity. It was actually safe and normal once.

I used to think this about Sweden but literature of that time does not describe a society like that. Literature is often reflective of the world it is in.

Not like 2001 : A Space Odyssey is about what the world is like in 2001 but it sort of reflects the assumptions of the world at that time. For instance, there are no smartphones in that world.

Anyway, Swedish contemporary literature of that time doesn't tell such a picture which makes me think this is more a factor of an individual experience rather than what that society was like.

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

#146
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This makes me wonder why ordinary people are not swatted, police called on them, deliveries made in their name, etc. in Sweden when a country that doesn't have such public records like USA has this so regularly several people have died.

Swatting works in USA because of how the police handle it. In Sweden, and in most of the world, you would get a knock on the door and some questions from two policemen. US police going in blind no-knock raids with weapons hot on the basis of a single anonymous phone call is the issue, not public addresses.

Does Sweden have something like CPS? In America, if someone discovers you have a child they can make repeated allegation to CPS. CPS is required to investigate and they're also required by law to not disclose who reported it. So having your name in a book with any evidence you have children allows anyone to harrass you endlessly, each time you'll be under investigation for weeks to months and you can never find out who's causing it.

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

#147
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.

I don't even do that in SF, the great crime capital of the world.

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

#148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Freedom of expression is actually relatively limited in Sweden, but freedom of the press is almost absurdly well protected. It's more about ensuring the dynamics between institutions than the liberties of individuals.

> Freedom of expression is actually relatively limited in Sweden I was curious about this so found https://www.riksdagen.se/en/how-the-riksdag-works/democracy/... In it they write: "In Sweden, you have the right to have an opinion on anything and say almost anything you want. You have the right to express yourself freely on the radio, TV and the Internet. The Fundamental Law on Freedom of Expression sets out these ri…

It's fairly difficult to establish criminal levels of defamation.

A recent high profile case in Sweden seems to establish that persecuting a man, acquitted by court, with continued accusations of sexual assault, through wide-audience Twitter and similar, as well as a number of moderately large audience paper publications, qualifies.

(For context: in the social environment in question the consequences effectively destroy the target's livelihood as well as severely impairing his social life)

But getting to near the end of that one took about five years of process, so I guess it can't have been firmly in obvious territory.

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

#149
post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Other posters commented that it's not even true, so 'purely incidental' is arguably euphemistic (instead of 'false').
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