Sweden ramps up pressure on social media to stop online gang crime wave

Sweden is trying to crack down on kids being recruited into crime on online platforms — and it wants the European Union to step in.
The Scandinavian country has in the past few years been rocked by a juvenile gang crime wave, described in 2020 as a “second pandemic” by then-opposition leader and current Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson.  
The Swedish government is now sounding the alarm at the EU level on what it sees as a worrying escalation: gangs recruiting children into crime via online platforms.
This is a “particularly concerning aspect” of the gangs’ activities, the country said in a note that it presented to EU home affairs ministers Thursday, seen by POLITICO.
Alongside partners from the other Nordic countries, the Swedish government raised the issue with Meta, Google, Snap and TikTok in a meeting last month. But now the country wants the EU to step in, too. 
Sweden asked ministers on Thursday whether they agreed that one of the bloc’s landmark digital laws would apply to online criminal recruitment.
The Digital Services Act (DSA), passed last year, is an attempt by the EU to force companies to clean up their online platforms. The biggest players — including Facebook, Snap, YouTube and TikTok — have a special designation obligating them to meet more stringent requirements under the DSA. One of the big platforms’ responsibilities is tackling “systemic” risks resulting from the way their services are built.
“In our view, online recruitment constitutes ‘systemic risks … stemming from the design or functioning of their service and its related systems, including algorithmic systems,'” Sweden said in its note.
Companies that fail to comply with the DSA face sweeping fines of up to 6 percent of their global annual revenue. 
Stockholm is also asking the European Commission’s home affairs department to consider how the EU Internet Forum, a group set up in 2015 and composed of EU interior ministers and Big Tech representatives, could be used to tackle the issue. 
“The issue involves a cross-border dimension, it involves a number of online platforms … and it represents an evolving modus operandi” of criminals involved in what the government sees as “crime-as-a-service,” the note it shared with EU governments said.
A Commission official said the EU executive was aware of Sweden’s request and was working on the broader issue, including as part of a plan to fight organized crime and drug trafficking. 
Cees van Koppen, head of public policy for Benelux and the Nordics at Snap, said: “We welcome the conversations we have held with the Nordic ministers” and would “continue this work in collaboration with law enforcement, online safety experts, industry peers, parents, teens, educators and policymakers.” 
Meta and Google declined to comment, and TikTok did not respond to a request for comment.
This article has been updated.