[HN Gopher] Swedish publishers file police report against Meta's...
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Swedish publishers file police report against Meta's Zuckerberg for
fraud
Author : Frieren
Score : 106 points
Date : 2025-11-28 15:27 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.sverigesradio.se)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.sverigesradio.se)
| philipwhiuk wrote:
| Interesting that he's named personally. Can any Swedish person
| explain whether this is the normal process?
| Toerktumlare wrote:
| In Sweden, you can charge someone/something two ways.
|
| Either you and a company has a disagreement and you sue one or
| the other and it goes to court.
|
| But in this case, "Utgivarna" which are basically a company/org
| that represents a lot of media outlets, basically went to the
| police instead and said "hey, we think that meta is breaking
| the Swedish law".
|
| What the police does is that they then investigate and then
| finds out who is responsible for the company (Mr. Zuck) and
| then eventually will indict him. Since its Meta that is
| breaking the law and The Zuck is the one in charge of Meta.
| hnlmorg wrote:
| That makes a lot more sense than the stupid approach like
| America (and I'm sure other countries too) where they
| consider the company a person and thus all that actually
| happens is a fine, that almost always amounts to several
| orders of magnitude less than the company made for their
| knowingly wrongdoing
| dietr1ch wrote:
| Isn't that ultimately there's people responsible for a
| company's actions the reason why Mr Burns has a canary that
| actually owns his company?
|
| https://simpsons.fandom.com/wiki/Canary_M._Burns
| Cyclone_ wrote:
| I am not familiar with the legal system in Sweden, but it seems
| odd that it would be a police report instead of a lawsuit.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| I know nothing about Swedish law, but in the US, there can be
| both civil and criminal fraud. They might be planning to file a
| lawsuit also.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| I think fraud is always a crime? Something like breach of
| contract would be a civil matter, as that's probably not
| fraud just a disagreement.
| FinnKuhn wrote:
| Fraud is usually a crime and therefore a matter for the police,
| even in the US.
| Frieren wrote:
| Fraud is a crime. When a crime is committed citizens inform the
| police to investigate.
|
| If someone punches you in the street or steals your wallet will
| you file a lawsuit or call the police? Maybe in America is
| different, but the normal thing to do is to go to the police.
| Fraud is not different, the police will investigate.
| dmoy wrote:
| In the US you can do both (and often that's what happens -
| parallel criminal and civil cases)
|
| US legal system is kinda weird
| SoftTalker wrote:
| > If someone punches you in the street or steals your wallet
| will you file a lawsuit or call the police?
|
| In the USA, probably both. You (or your insurance company)
| might sue them to recover your financial losses, the police
| would investigate the crime of assault and/or robbery and
| pass any evidence along to the prosecutor.
|
| Of course if they have no money or other assets, suing them
| is a bit pointless.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| In the US, you might wait for criminal action if it was
| progressing to initiate civil action because (1) a criminal
| conviction can be used as evidence (and it is asymmetrical,
| because an actual doesn't have the same weight), and (2)
| criminal process can result in a restitution order which
| makes civil action unnecessary (and in some jurisdictions
| may allow recovery from a dedicated fund for victims of
| crime even if no recovery is possible from the perpetrator,
| and in that sense may be _better_ than winning a civil
| action), and (3) criminal prosecution doesn 't cost the
| victim money, civil prosecution generally does.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Yeah point 3 is why you generally don't bother with civil
| claims unless they actually have the means to pay.
| bjourne wrote:
| It means the legal system is investigating the matter and the
| public prosecutor may or may not decide to file charges. The
| publishers might have filed a lawsuit themselves, but that is
| very expensive so they hope the legal system will do it for
| them. My guess is that the investigation will be closed because
| I don't think Swedish authorities think they have jurisdiction
| over Facebook. Unless Meta happens to have offices in Sweden,
| which I don't think they have. In general they can only
| prosecute crimes committed in Sweden or committed by Swedes.
| mongol wrote:
| The investigation maybe will be closed, but not for that
| reason. Fraudulent ads that are paid for and then shown on
| Swedish news sites makes money change hands in Sweden. Even
| though the fraudsters are abroad, Meta makes business with
| the media in Sweden that displays the ads. Jurisdiction will
| not be a problem
| mansandersson wrote:
| > Unless Meta happens to have offices in Sweden, which I
| don't think they have
|
| Meta operates one of their european datacenters out of Lulea
| in Sweden.
| walletdrainer wrote:
| I don't think there's a story here, it's a _police report_ , not
| even a lawsuit.
|
| There's no skin in the game required when filing a police report.
| tokai wrote:
| It's not going to be a lawsuit. You don't sue companies for
| breaking the law in Sweden. It's going to be a criminal case if
| police deem so.
| arnsholt wrote:
| I'm pretty sure the publishers are alleging that a crime has
| been committed. In that case, private parties _can 't_ open a
| suit (at least if Swedish criminal law is at all similar to
| Norwegian law), so this asks the police to open a criminal
| investigation into the matter. What happens next in the
| Norwegian system at least is that the police will conduct their
| investigation, and at some point when the police consider their
| investigations complete the prosecutor's office will decide
| what to do next. Next steps can be concluding that no crime has
| occured, to ask the police to investigate further, that a crime
| has been committed but the evidence are insufficient for a
| trial, or that someone should be tried.
| walletdrainer wrote:
| Surely you can still sue separately through the civil process
| even if you choose to not pursue criminal charges?
|
| If someone causes you damage through non-criminal negligence,
| surely you can sue them?
|
| The idea that you couldn't bring a civil suit over possibly
| criminal conduct seems unworkable. It's _possible_ that my
| neighbour was drunk when he crashed into my parked car late
| at night, but _surely_ that can't preclude me from seeking
| compensation through civilian courts.
|
| It's _possible_ , but tremendously unlikely that Facebook is
| committing fraud here. In Sweden you have to prove _intent_
| to defraud, which is a tremendously high bar.
|
| Which, again, makes the idea that you couldn't bring a civil
| suit seem ever more bizarre. How could you possibly know if
| Facebook has committed fraud here? You presumably can't read
| Zuckerbergs toughts.
| mongol wrote:
| The media commpanies that have filed the report are not the
| victims of the fraud and would not have a case to sue. And the
| defrauded people don't have the means. The media companies can
| however report a committed crime, and their high profile brings
| it more attention
| Frieren wrote:
| This should be just the begging as Social Media companies will
| not be able to just declare themselves over the law on fraud
| claims.
|
| Related:
|
| - "Social media giants liable for financial scams under new EU
| law " https://www.politico.eu/article/social-media-giants-meta-
| tik...
|
| - "Meta is earning a fortune on a deluge of fraudulent ads,
| documents show" https://www.reuters.com/investigations/meta-is-
| earning-fortu...
| javier2 wrote:
| Making these ad companies liable for the scams they allow (even
| take a premium for running them) seems like the only way
| forward.
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| Related:
|
| _Meta is earning a fortune on a deluge of fraudulent ads_
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45834840
| xorcist wrote:
| There is a deluge of financial scams across all Meta platforms
| but also Twitter. A centralized platform have all the right to
| moderate content, but they must also be liable for obvious scams.
|
| Either you are an open messenger like the postal service or an
| ISP. Or you own the platform. You cannot have it both ways.
|
| I never understood why they all get away with doing nothing.
| Meta's own investigation showed 10%+ of all revenue is from
| outright scams, and all they do is charge the scammers a premium.
|
| I have reported scams myself and have been completely stonewalled
| just like everyone else. They obviously earn a _lot_ of money by
| looking the other way. That can 't possibly be legal in any
| jurisdiction. Let's hope the Swedish justice system takes this
| seriously and sets an example for others.
| gruez wrote:
| >Either you are an open messenger like the postal service [...]
|
| In what way is the postal service "open"? Sure, anyone can send
| a letter, but anyone can also create a facebook messenger
| account. If you want to do business with it (eg. sending bulk
| mail or delivering international mail), you still need to enter
| into a commercial agreement.
| retrac wrote:
| It's open in the sense that anyone can use it. Without
| restriction. And there's no way to be banned from it. Since
| anyone can just drop off an anonymous letter in the post. You
| don't have to enter a service agreement. Just dump you
| satchel of letters with stamps on them, in the nearest mail
| box.
|
| It's not just _practically_ open. It 's legally open; at
| least here in Canada, the federal postal service has a legal
| obligation, arising from the constitutional right to free
| speech, to carry any mail that has legal content, regardless
| of how Canada Post or its employees might feel about it.
| They're obligated to take those commercial service agreements
| regardless of content. (This has been a point of contention
| sometimes with graphic anti-abortion flyers delivered as ad-
| mail.)
|
| The main means to deal with someone abusing the postal system
| is the criminal law and court orders.
| gruez wrote:
| >It's open in the sense that anyone can use it. Without
| restriction. And there's no way to be banned from it. Since
| anyone can just drop off an anonymous letter in the post.
| You don't have to enter a service agreement. Just dump you
| satchel of letters with stamps on them, in the nearest mail
| box.
|
| 1. So this sounds like the section 230 debate all over
| again? eg. "Facebook can ban people from facebook
| messenger, so if they're not banning scammers they should
| be on the hook for it"?
|
| 2. What about ISPs? The internet might be open, but ISPs
| certainly aren't. People get banned for AUP violations or
| alleged copyright infringement all the time. If ISPs
| reserve the right to ban users for various ToS violations,
| should they be on the hook of scammers turned out to be
| using their connection?
| rightbyte wrote:
| Thinking about it I think I have received one scambait paper
| mail ever. Dunno why not more. Maybe the stamp makes it not
| profitable.
| ronsor wrote:
| It's because mail fraud carries significant penalties, and
| the involvement of physical objects makes activity much
| more traceable.
| LordRamaKrishna wrote:
| Lord Zuckerberg is above the law everywhere in the world! 100%
| guarantee nothing will come of this.
| erikrothoff wrote:
| My (swedish) grandfather keeps falling for these Meta scams.
| Scrolling through his feed is insane and disgusting. So many ads
| that mimick OS alerts saying storage is low, insane amounts of AI
| crap and fake products. I 100% agree with this. Try scrolling
| through your grandparents' Instagram or Facebook and see for
| yourself. It's obviously _very_ easy for Meta to filter out these
| scams, but they choose not to.
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(page generated 2025-11-28 23:01 UTC)