Dysfunctional Sweden: Gang-Related Crime Epidemic Now Targeting Crypto Owners for Brutal Robberies
Remember when Sweden was a functioning society?
In the midst of a gang-related crime epidemic, Sweden is having to deal with a diversification in criminal activity in a way Law Enforcement didn’t have to deal with before.
Now it arises that criminals in the Scandinavian country have begun specifically targeting prominent local Bitcoin figures for brutal robberies.
At this point, these episodes appear to be the result of Sweden’s radical ease of access to both personal information and residential addresses.
Coin Telegraph reported:
“Reports from Swedish media outlets LT and Aftonbladet have linked separate robberies in Rönninge and Södertälje that appear to have occurred under the same modus operandi. Victims were tied up and physically abused to steal physical and virtual Bitcoin holdings.
Prominent cryptocurrency proponent Eric Wall, who currently serves as a StarkNet Foundation board member, highlighted the incidents in an X post.
‘This Monday, a middle-aged Swedish couple was tied up in their home and robbed by 4 masked men. They were physically abused and threatened with their own kitchen knives. They were tied up for hours and one had to be escorted to the hospital via helicopter’, Wall wrote.”
The victims suffered violent physical abuse to steal their Bitcoin holdings held in hardware wallets.
Wall believes that Sweden’s Principle of Public Access to Information laws is becoming a means for criminals to prey on ecosystem participants.
Eric Wall reported on X:
“The first time this happened was last year, one of Sweden’s most well-known bitcoiners had criminals break into their apartment. Even though that person gave up a significant amount of Bitcoin/crypto, they were physically beaten and abused for hours in front of their partner. that person was scarred for months and largely withdrew from public life after the assault.”
All these cases have a feature in common. Every victim had livestreamed a podcast about Bitcoin/crypto days before their assault, or else mentioned Bitcoin in a public context.
“This situation is occurring because in Sweden, you can easily search for any person’s residential address and drive straight to their house. if you’re curious, you can also search for their tax records, and find out exactly how much they paid in income or capital gains tax, and size them up from that.
[…] ‘The Principle of Public Access to Information’, known in Swedish as ‘Offentlighetsprincipen’ (the law that makes residential addresses and tax records public) is the main culprit behind this strangeness relative to other countries. while the intentions behind this legislation was to reduce corruption, it is not fit for modern society.”
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