The Internet age has meant a big increase in identity theft, criminals using credit card numbers or other means to buy things in someone else’s name and similar crimes. This hasn’t been as big a problem in Sweden as in some other countries. According to the British authorities, in 2008 there were more than 77,000 cases of identity fraud reported. In the United States, there were almost a quarter of million cases of identity theft reported in 2006. But the trend there has been downwards, as preventive measures are taken. The reverse is true in Sweden, and the credit and business information company Soliditet reports a 29 percent increase in the past year. [read more]
More than half of all Swedish children have their own computer, according to an annual study by Statistics Sweden looking at the lives of kids between the ages of 10 and 18 in this Nordic nation. 95% have their own mobile telephone, and 9% of girls say they have been the victim of bullying on the internet. Only 2% of boys say they have faced the same problem. [read more]
Swedish Centre Party leader Maud Olofsson has re-affirmed that she would not be a part of any government that includes the former communist Left Party. [read more]
The Swedish Police is to set up a group of experienced detectives to assist local police forces in murder investigations. The group of 12 will be activated if no suspect has been found a month after a murder has been discovered. [read more]
A pharmacy in southern Sweden got an unusual visitor Wednesday as a moose jumped through a window and into a back yard, according to the local Borås Tidning newspaper. The moose was injured in the break-in and had to be put down by a hunter. [read more]
Sweden's economy grew by a unexpectedly high 4.6% in the second quarter of 2010, compared to the same period last year. Preliminary figures put the rise at 3.7%. Household consumption grew by 2.4% between March and June, according to the new figures from Statistics Sweden. The upward revision of the economic figures was larger than most predictions, according to news agency TT. Swedish economists expect the economy to continue to grow during the third quarter as well, reclaiming much of the fall in BNP experienced during 2009. [read more]
The film "Simple Simon" has been chosen as Sweden's official nomination to the Best Foreign Film award at next year's Oscar's awards. [read more]
Zlatan Ibrahimovic scored the first goal in Sweden’s qualifying game in the European Championship against San Marino. Already after seven minutes, he managed to kick the ball into the net and the audience in his home arena in Malmö was ecstatic. Within half an hour, Sweden was in the lead 3-0, a result that remained till half-time. [read more]
On Tuesday the first person was arrested in the growing bribe-scandal in Gothenburg. He was a 45-year old supplier to the local public housing company. Meanwhile a 60-year old man at the public housing company was arrested in abstentia. The 45-year-old man owned a building company that did jobs for a bigger building company, which in turn sent fake invoices to the public housing company. According to the prosecutor Nils-Eric Schultz there has then been one or more people at the public housing company have used the services of the supplier, while seeing to that the public housing company paid the forged invoices. [read more]
Four Swedes have been questioned on suspicion of illegal file sharing, as a result of a Europe-wide file sharing raid on Tuesday. Belgian police had asked their colleagues in 14 European countries to assist in the crackdown on the file sharing "pros" in the network called The Scene. [read more]
Sweden took a central role in EU discussions on Tuesday morning about how the finance sector should pay for future economic crises, reports news agency TT. The nation's finance minister, Anders Borg, came out strongly against the idea that Europe raise taxes for banks. According to Agence France-Presse, the minister said, "We don't want a new transaction tax." [read more]
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has fired his high-profile lawyer Leif Silbersky and is seeking a replacement, according to news agency TT. Assange is currently suspected for sex crimes in Sweden. In a letter to the Stockholm district court, Assange expressed that would like attorney Björn Hurtig to defend him instead of Silbersky. According to Assange, Silbersky has not been engaged enough in the case, and it has been difficult for Assange to contact him. [read more]
Sweden's education minister and leader of the Liberal party, Jan Björklund, has said he wants to forbid schools from handing out bonuses to school principals, reports Swedish Radio news. This system has been used in at least one Swedish municipality where students are socially deprived, the rector can receive a higher salary if students' grades go up. Björklund says this can lead to grade inflation. His suggestion comes on the tails of a heated debate on Swedish television on Monday night as the nation's seven major political party leaders discussed their education policies. [read more]
France’s decision to deport over 8.000 Romani people back to Romania and Bulgaria has helped bring the issue to the political agenda. And hopefully this will mean the beginning to the end of the discrimination of the Roma in Europe, according to Maria Leissner, Sweden’s ambassador for democracy and the chair for the Foreign Affairs Ministry’s delegation on Roma issues. During a seminar on Tuesday, Leissner, who is also the former leader of the Swedish Liberal Party, said that a "shocking lack of knowledge" about the Romas’ history and their contribution to European culture has contributed to make anti-Romanism an accepted form of racism. The problem, she said, is that Europeans are not "ashamed" enough about what has happened to the Roma in the past or what is happening today. [read more]
People who suffer from manic depression are not more likely than others to commit violent acts, according to a new study by Karolinska Institutet and Oxford University. The study revealed that people with bipolar disorder who have been convicted of violent crimes have almost always suffered from substance abuse in the past. [read more]
Sweden's towns and cities are plastered with election propaganda at the moment. Every streetlight and fence has at least one party's posters tied to it, all trying to get the voters attention. Some have pictures of the politicians, others catchy slogans. But how good are they really? Viggo Cavling is editor-in-chief at the advertising and PR magazine Resumé, he says that the posters should have a home-made look about them. [read more]
In the wake of more bus shootings in the southern Swedish city of Malmö, the police arrested two 18-year-old males late Monday night on suspicion of the crimes. During the night, seven buses were shot at with air guns and many of their windows shattered. But no injuries were reported. In connection with the arrests, the police found two air guns and cartridges. According to the police, both suspects were identified by a witness as having been involved in one of the bus shootings. [read more]