Sweden warrantlessly wiretaps all Internet traffic crossing its borders

This is actually old news, but what is interesting is that recently Finlands gov. approved plans to layout new cable to the sea, so that internet traffic can be routed from Finland to Germany, bypassing Sweden all together...

http://yle.fi/uutiset/suomi_haluaa_oman_tietoliikennereitin_...

Picture from the article shows how the connection towards Europe/US goes trough Germany and the connections towards Asia will be directed trough nothern part of Finland, trough Norway - instead of Sweden:

http://yle.fi/uutiset/kotimaa/article6559090.ece/ALTERNATES/...

The Wikipedia article is quite focused on the discussion before the law was made into effect, and are thus missing how the focus on terrorism was changed before even a year had passed.

Before the law was voted in, political leaders and columnist promised high and low that FRA would never be used for anything other than counter terrorism. Anyone who said otherwise was a tinfoil hat, and just didn't understand the issue. The law was about preventing terrorists from killing our children and nothing more!

A little less than a year after the law was passed, and the secret police got access to the collected data. Soon after, the legislative assembly and diplomats. After that, the police wanted in and was also granted access.

Today, go to their website and they talk very little about terrorism. The focus currently is on it-threats, malware and pen-testing[1], and thus calling out how great help they are currently providing in connection with the regular police and secret-police[2]. The "mission" description sounds more like the slogan of a pen-test company than that of counter-terrorism, mostly noticeable because the word terrorism is not even mentioned most of the time, and on the list of services, the word "terrorism" is demoted to the bottom part of a bullet point list.[3]

The last attempt to expand the "goal" of FRA was when the Swedish version of IRS asked for access. I don't know if they were granted, and the media don't care much anymore.

[1]http://www.fra.se/verksamhet/informationssakerhet/regeringsu...

[2]http://www.fra.se/verksamhet/informationssakerhet/tjanster.7...

[3]http://www.fra.se/verksamhet/signalunderrattelseverksamhet.6...

* Correction *

The IRS has not asked yet for FRA data. They have asked ISP's and webhosting providers for customers data, but not from FRA. There have been speculation on where the FRA scope would go next after that the police got access, but from what I can find, nothing official.

Just want to emphasize the difference between the FRA law and what's happening in the U.S. right now: FRA (swedish agency doing SIGINT) don't need a warrant. This is all supported by law.

"Nothing to hide" dominated the pro-debate for this. Only populist representatives like Fredrick Federley and Annie Lööf voiced their discontent with the proposed changes in law, and they happily agreed to it while some minor things where changed. Common people just didn't care. Still don't.

It's widely known and acknowledged that the information gathered this way is used not only by Swedish agencies, but also traded with foreign agencies in exchange for information gathered in whatever way is possible to them. In effect it means that communication that crosses any border is likely collected, analyzed and available to all western intelligence agencies. Good luck trying to hide.

It's worth noting that Facebook's European datacenter is in Sweden so a large part of Facebook traffic passes Swedish borders.

Sweden used to be the most open country for internet access.

Since America threatened it with economic sanctions (because of the piratebay, sweden was sued by America and their entertainment industry), Sweden has changed a lot.

A pitty America has to threaten every other country in the world... :-) .

Well, this is getting really grim. There seems to be no safe place left.

Although, this is to be expected. The US is a common trend-maker and the world is looking up to them. Of course who can sit this one out when the US itself is at full speed spearheading it. And very likely gently forcing to abide.

We're all at fault in what is happening.

overall moral: even if your own country don't collected your internet traffic, always assume that another country does.

Not that it gives Sweden any real excuse here, but I believe most countries do SIGINT at least on a level comparable to that enabled by the FRA law already. That we did already have a law disabling the government to do so legally was mostly percieved as an inconvenience that had to be "fixed". The real issue here should not be the miltary SIGINT that is performed today, but what will happen years from now when these possibilities might be used for gradually varying purposes.

That is not such a big problem. When a government does something like that in the open you can use appropriate protection if you feel you need it. There is not information asymmetry. You just remove all sweden related certificates from the CA bundle and use VPN to other country.

If tomorrow the US says openly - we collect all data you send to Apple,Facebook,Google and Yahoo although stupid you can use or not them depending on how you feel about it.

What should be noted is that before Sweden gave FRA authority to increase it's surveillance the swedish public was well awere of what was happening. There was a public debate, the adversaries would say it was only for the curtains, but the people still had a chance to rally up against it before the legislatures reached their decision. But the public majority didnt care that much.

It's reassuring to see how "terrorism" is still the magic word to pass all manners of freedom-trampling laws.

But it's something that people voted on, something that people knew about, something that people had a chance to protest...which was not the case with PRISM. I mean, yes, people did vote on the Patriot act, but I wonder if things would have been different if there was more transparency in putting this system into place.

I expect most countries either monitor traffic endpoints or capture data. I know the one one in which I live does.

The difference is that this program is public and the Swedish public can debate it.

I have no sources but I'd be willing to bet that so do India and China.

Swedish government - or Lisbeth Salander?

I'm fine with traffic going in and out being tappable. As long as they have good reason I have trust in the FRA.

I think the Swedish wiretapping is wrong and that the law should be torn up.

That said, in practice it's less intrusive than the recently revealed US wiretapping-programs. Since more or less all software encrypt their traffic, the FRA-wiretapping is pretty useless.