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Scandal hits swedish government as info on citizens leak abroad
- Thread starter Majine
- Start date
Moose Biscuits
It would be extreamly painful...
wat dis
Having just not long ago finally put together a full Government, it would be a bit bothersome to have the Prime Minister now resign. Will see how this develops shortly as Löfven should be having a press conference soon about all this.
A reminder I haven't had a kanelbulle today and feeling a bit peckish.
Miles Quaritch
Member
Lowest bids tend to win and they have to make a profit...
Honestly with SD I am sure they would have just sold all our information immediately to the Russians when they would have realized their budget planning is absolute garbage.
hydrophilic attack
Member
My understanding is that the head of the government agency deliberately decided to ignore the rules. The question is now why did it take so long for the government to act? And why did it take so long before the prime minister was informed?
Swedens best contribution to the world. Everyone could do with more fika in their lives.
For those who don't know, fika is a Swedish term for having a coffee, usually together with some biscuits or a cinnamon roll. Most work places have a designated fika room, and we usually have one or two short breaks each day purely to fika and spend time talking to colleagues. It's a way to stay connected to people and relax your brain for a few minutes.
In my experience it is not much different to a coffee break. People go to the break room, which is also where they eat lunch if they don't go out, and have a cup of coffee.
Maybe it is the work I have been in, but biscuits/buns are rare. Hell, at my current place (games company, just on the edge of finishing my six month probation period) the only "fikas" I've seen were for people leaving.
Yeah, it's pretty much a glorified coffee break. But we've turned it into an institution.
Yup in Finland for the service sector if your work day is over 4 hours, you are allowed to have one "kahvi"break. For over 6 hour days it's 2 breaks. I'm pretty sure that almost every line of work has atleast some mandated coffee breaks here, the lenght of it varies too ofcourse. Bus drivers in example get 30 minutes for every 5.5 hours and it can be held in one or two parts.
I don't know man, might have taken it from us! I mean do you guys even REALLY drink coffee? =P
(Long time lurker here. Writing below on a phone so it's a tl;dr.)
I find it a bit strange that people are discussing "fika" and not what has actually happened and why it is alarming, to say the least. The "scandal", or rather the, pardon the language, huge f**k up is two fold.
1. Side stepping the law.
The Transportstyrelsen (TS) is a branch of the Swedish government handling all personal information (except the case record (?)) of the citizens; all data on all infrastructure within Sweden (roads, bridges, ports), all military vehicles etcetera.
This database was to be outsourced but the project was late on delivering and the Generaldirektör (GD, translating to CEO i suppose) was pressed on delivering. Yes, it was outsourced to IBM but that has no bearing on what has happened at all.
The GD and the board has, and what it seems like, nobody within this branch (TS) have no clue on what kind of highly sensibelt data it holds.
Security experts within TS cries aloud about the huge security hazards on outsourcing this to another firm in another country without running security checks on all involved personnel!
It is iterated many times over several years (2012 - 2015) but always ignored by the board. In 2015 the current GD hits retirement age and all information about the TS is given to the new GD in an hour because "that was the routine". (OMFG!)
The project about outsourcing was briefly mentioned on this meeting. Briefly!
Anyway, the new GD installed Feb 2015 is informed that the project must be complete by year end as no personnel nor buildings to host even the computers exists afterwards. So she is pressed and does not understand just how dier the situation is. So now the real havoc starts...
The chief of it security understand week just how grave the situation is and decides that "if I put in writing that the board is not following the law" surely it must be stopped?
No, that did not happen. The document exists and one of the headlines is "Side stepping the law". Seems like a no-brainer, not breaking the law? Well, the GD ponders the issue a few days and decides to move onwards!
This "has its reason" because the chief of it security "has a personality" where he "blows everything out of proportion"!
Too cut short, all quotes are from hearings done by the Swedish version of the FBI (I guess), called SÄPO. The current GD has actually said that "she wouldn't have documented it if she had understood that it was against the law. Read that again.
After this monumental display of incompetence of the TS I do not trust the government much data at all because clearly it's run by a bunch of baffoons. The is the real issue, that and the issue that all this data might be out in the black market. I cannot understand any citizen trusting our government right now to be honest.
2. The political lack of responsibility.
The dire consequences was mentioned to several Swedish PMs, the internal minister, the infrastructure minister and the defence minister. Neither has taken responsibility, the internal minister has even said that "he couldn't find a secure enough room to inform the prime minister" (I kid you not, this is an actual quote) for over a year!
As the government hold only about 40% of the the seats in the parliament the opposition has now started that they will fire then in a voting to be held within a few weeks. The government will hold a press in ten hours where they will issue a response to this.
There are several options, one is the government will forfeit and a new government must be formed from the current seats or the government can issue another election. The result of this election holds untill the next election in September 2018.
Most are focusing on the #2 whereas I am deeply concerned about #1.
Please feel free to correct me if I missed anything or any wrong information. I've typed this on my phone and it is a pain!
I find it a bit strange that people are discussing "fika" and not what has actually happened and why it is alarming, to say the least. The "scandal", or rather the, pardon the language, huge f**k up is two fold.
1. Side stepping the law.
The Transportstyrelsen (TS) is a branch of the Swedish government handling all personal information (except the case record (?)) of the citizens; all data on all infrastructure within Sweden (roads, bridges, ports), all military vehicles etcetera.
This database was to be outsourced but the project was late on delivering and the Generaldirektör (GD, translating to CEO i suppose) was pressed on delivering. Yes, it was outsourced to IBM but that has no bearing on what has happened at all.
The GD and the board has, and what it seems like, nobody within this branch (TS) have no clue on what kind of highly sensibelt data it holds.
Security experts within TS cries aloud about the huge security hazards on outsourcing this to another firm in another country without running security checks on all involved personnel!
It is iterated many times over several years (2012 - 2015) but always ignored by the board. In 2015 the current GD hits retirement age and all information about the TS is given to the new GD in an hour because "that was the routine". (OMFG!)
The project about outsourcing was briefly mentioned on this meeting. Briefly!
Anyway, the new GD installed Feb 2015 is informed that the project must be complete by year end as no personnel nor buildings to host even the computers exists afterwards. So she is pressed and does not understand just how dier the situation is. So now the real havoc starts...
The chief of it security understand week just how grave the situation is and decides that "if I put in writing that the board is not following the law" surely it must be stopped?
No, that did not happen. The document exists and one of the headlines is "Side stepping the law". Seems like a no-brainer, not breaking the law? Well, the GD ponders the issue a few days and decides to move onwards!
This "has its reason" because the chief of it security "has a personality" where he "blows everything out of proportion"!
Too cut short, all quotes are from hearings done by the Swedish version of the FBI (I guess), called SÄPO. The current GD has actually said that "she wouldn't have documented it if she had understood that it was against the law. Read that again.
After this monumental display of incompetence of the TS I do not trust the government much data at all because clearly it's run by a bunch of baffoons. The is the real issue, that and the issue that all this data might be out in the black market. I cannot understand any citizen trusting our government right now to be honest.
2. The political lack of responsibility.
The dire consequences was mentioned to several Swedish PMs, the internal minister, the infrastructure minister and the defence minister. Neither has taken responsibility, the internal minister has even said that "he couldn't find a secure enough room to inform the prime minister" (I kid you not, this is an actual quote) for over a year!
As the government hold only about 40% of the the seats in the parliament the opposition has now started that they will fire then in a voting to be held within a few weeks. The government will hold a press in ten hours where they will issue a response to this.
There are several options, one is the government will forfeit and a new government must be formed from the current seats or the government can issue another election. The result of this election holds untill the next election in September 2018.
Most are focusing on the #2 whereas I am deeply concerned about #1.
Please feel free to correct me if I missed anything or any wrong information. I've typed this on my phone and it is a pain!
Yeah this is a huge fuck up, the Social Democrats will feel the effect from this for for years to come.
If they call for a new election we can look foward to the Swedish Democrats taking the #2 spot and the Moderates taking #1. Hopefully, I fear that the Swedish Democrats will win.
Either way, it's a huge fuck up but personally I don't see the need for a new leadership until
the election 2018.
If they call for a new election we can look foward to the Swedish Democrats taking the #2 spot and the Moderates taking #1. Hopefully, I fear that the Swedish Democrats will win.
Either way, it's a huge fuck up but personally I don't see the need for a new leadership until
the election 2018.
This would've happened regardless of which political party holding the power as there were many non-political employees signing that it was ok to side step the law. It will take many years of hard work to root out the incompetence displayed. But doing so we must elect leaders owning that responsibility and none of the parties currently shows such and understand I'm afraid.
Moose Biscuits
It would be extreamly painful...
I see, like a tea break
Spiritual_Chaos
Banned
Are there any polls supporting this claim? Have the Social Democrats fallen much because of this?
I'm not keeping up. What makes this leak cause talks about resigning?
I want the people responsible for this to resign.
Deposing the government however, who would take over? We know very well that the Moderates have lost most of their voters to the Swedish Democrats.
Do we really wanna give them a chance to fuck up our country as Trump has done with the US.? Jimmie Åkesson is no Trump in terms of idiocy, but he is still a far-right turd who does not deserve a seat of power within the government. As has been shown so far with every government in the world accepting a far right government, shit goes down the drain fast.
Deposing the government however, who would take over? We know very well that the Moderates have lost most of their voters to the Swedish Democrats.
Do we really wanna give them a chance to fuck up our country as Trump has done with the US.? Jimmie Åkesson is no Trump in terms of idiocy, but he is still a far-right turd who does not deserve a seat of power within the government. As has been shown so far with every government in the world accepting a far right government, shit goes down the drain fast.
hydrophilic attack
Member
It's too recent a development to be reflected in polls. That said, I don't expect this to remain in the public consciousness for all that long. Will be forgotten in a few months. Would probably be disastrous for the current government in an election held soonish though
The reason there is talk about resignations is because the opposition parties are calling for votes of no confidence against the ministers involved. The opposition has been under pressure to go harder on the government (which holds a parliamentary minority) for quite some time, and this scandal finally provided reasonable pretext
I might have phrased that badly, they've been loosing support ever since they won in 2014*, they won with 31% and the latest polls have them at about 25%**. My whole point of them loosing support is purely speculative, but they have been loosing support over the years and this latest scandal probably wont turn that trend around.
The sources are in Swedish.
* http://www.val.se/val/val2014/slutresultat/R/rike/index.html
**
http://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/samhalle/a/E1Apa/s-tappar-valjare--igen
I totaly agree with you. I don't want Åkesson and his cronies running amok, they can fuck off.
But the sad truth is that they are probably going to be Swedens second biggest party come 2018, and the Moderates have shown recently that they are open to the idea of ruling together with the Sweden Democrats, so if the Social Democrats looses, we know what will happen.
Spiritual_Chaos
Banned
I doubt the swedish people would care that much. But obviously they could be manipulated into caring about it. Seems that the opposition is trying to blow it up into something politically bigger than it in reality is(?). Like Hillarys e-mails.
Will have to read up on this. Over some Fika.
Spiritual_Chaos
Banned
Yeah, they might have fallen somewhat in the polls. But haven't Moderaterna cratered completely? So, I don't see how S would fall enough to have Moderaterna take the lead as the #1 party.
hydrophilic attack
Member
Recent poll numbers for the government have been pretty good. Most recent opinion polls have shown S + MP + V ahead of the centre-right alliance. In Sweden, the sitting government is almost always behind the opposition in the years in between elections, only to do better in the election years, as people realize they're quite happy with how things are, and don't want to rock the boat. Remaining ahead in polls a year before regular elections is a very good position for sitting governments to be in. That said, this scandal hasn't really been reflected in polls yet, so it will be interesting to see how the poll numbers evolve over the coming weeks
Seems to be the case from my perspective as well. We'll see. Swedish voters are generally a lot more educated and informed than American voters. Most people vote according to their economical and political interests, and scandals usually only have a small effect on how people vote.
Yeah you're right, I have no idea how I missed that. They are down to 16%, wow.
Then there is still hope I guess.
I missed that poll, my point has been utterly debunked by now. Thanks for setting me straight
.
d00d3n
Member
You are right about the poll numbers for the left block compared with the centre-right alliance, but the left government is not really in a strong position imo. The opposition (centre-right alliance + the sweden democrats) have a (slim) majority of votes from the last election, which will likely grow considerably next time due to the popularity of the populist party, even if the christian democrats are eliminated from our general assembly due to constitutional rules.
The strategy for retaining power is contingent on blocking the influence of the populist party by shaming into compliance and/or making deals with the parties that constitute the centre-right alliance. The fact that all the centre-right parties are cooperating with the populists to fire three important government ministers makes that strategy seem a bit risky at the moment ...
hydrophilic attack
Member
If I understand correctly, one of the three is for health reasons unrelated to this scandal. The prime minister is keeping one of the three that the opposition wanted out in the government
Spiritual_Chaos
Banned
I don't think many people know of, or care about, Johansson or Wikström. But Ygeman was quite popular wasn't he?
Basically k-on
hydrophilic attack
Member
He was. But he was given a high position in Parliament (leader of the Social Democrat group) from which he could mount a comeback in the future
Wikström was already out in practice. He used to be leader of the youth league and had his fans. Literally. Apparently it was a bit of a meme for a time how he was flirted with on Twitter by young women in Turkey (!) because of his dreamy-ness
Looks like Johansson gets nothing lol. I'm sure she'll be fine. Her Gothenburg buddies will hook her up with something. The Gothenburg way
Can someone clarify if there is actually any concrete evidence that the sensitive information has leaked? I haven't followed the specifics of the scandal in detail, but my understanding is that some of the databases that do contain very sensitive information (e.g. locations and routes of sensitive vehicles, locations of people in witness protection etc.) have been accessable by IT technicians that aren't security certified (by IBM). If these people actually have leaked the data further is not proven, or?
Not really IBM's fault, would have been the same deal regardless of contractor, since the Transport agency's director general decided to bypass the law.
From what I've heard, personnel were granted the highest clearance, which meant they could erase any logs that would point to that kind of thing.
If that is true we can't really know if something has leaked, but knowing that personnel didn't go trough the proper security screenings before getting access to sensitive info is bad enough, some of them supposedly had past history in Serbian military.
From what I've heard, personnel were granted the highest clearance, which meant they could erase any logs that would point to that kind of thing.
If that is true we can't really know if something has leaked, but knowing that personnel didn't go trough the proper security screenings before getting access to sensitive info is bad enough, some of them supposedly had past history in Serbian military.
hydrophilic attack
Member
So update: The opposition says they will still go ahead with the vote of no confidence against the defense minister. But it can wait until Parliament opens this fall instead of going ahead immediately. Also, their statement says that they intend to vote him out unless new information on his role arises. This gives them the chance to back out if it seems like taking out the defense minister would be really unpopular. Which it likely would be.
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