A year ago, the government appointed an inquiry with the aim of conducting a legal and systematic review of rules regarding secret and preventive coercive measures, in order to achieve more effective and clear regulations and improve the possibilities to use such measures in different phases of crime-fighting. Now, additional directives have been issued.

According to the government, the possibilities to use secret and preventive coercive measures are often absolutely crucial for preventing, stopping, and investigating serious crime—regardless of the offender’s age.

The investigator is, among other things, to consider whether the temporarily extended opportunities to use preventive coercive measures should continue to apply without a time limit. Preventive coercive measures include things like secret wiretapping and surveillance to prevent especially serious crime within criminal networks.

The assignment was originally to be reported by May 29 this year but is now extended until February 1, 2027.

Additional directives

The government is now introducing additional directives for the inquiry, which is also being extended. These mean that police and prosecutors will no longer have to apply for permission to wiretap and monitor electronic communications and secret data reading for individual electronic devices—the permit will instead cover all technical equipment that the person under surveillance might use.

They also want to “analyze and consider whether preventive coercive measures should be able to be used in more cases and without any connection to an organization or group.”

Up to now, some kind of connection to a criminal group has been required for coercive measures to be used—this is now a limitation they want to remove.

Concerned expert

“This opens up for anyone to be subjected to surveillance without suspicion of a crime, if the authorities deem it appropriate,” comments journalist and social commentator Henrik Alexandersson, who is knowledgeable on the topic.

Alexandersson also notes that this “makes unwarranted and incorrect surveillance easier” and points out that “in the hands of an authoritarian state, this is a tool that can easily be used for oppression and persecution of dissenters.”

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