Database

It is reported that the right of access to public procurement is limited to regional trade agreement partners and members of the WTO’s Government Procurement Agreement.

UK's National Cyber Security Centre has warned the public institutions in the UK against using the Russia anti-virus software Kaspersky on grounds of national security. This is following concern about Kaspersky Lab's connections with Russian security services. Britain's NCSC hasn't issued a blanket warning to the public against using Kaspersky software, although it has warned the Government not to use it in networks that hold official secrets. It has been reported that members of the UK Parliament have suggested this warning be extended to the private sector as well.

The Small Business Act provides that 25% of central government indirect and direct spending should go to SMEs.

The European Regulation No. 1042/2013 amending the Council Implementing Regulation No. 282/2011, declares that from January 2015, all supplies of telecommunications, broadcasting and electronic services will be taxable at the place where the customer belongs. These include, inter alia:
- images or text, such as photos, screensavers, e-books and other digitised documents e.g. PDF files;
- music, films and games, including games of chance and gambling games, and of programmes on demand;
- online magazines website supply or web hosting services distance maintenance of programmes and equipment;
- supplies of software and software updates advertising space on a website.

Both EU and non-EU suppliers have to register for VAT purposes and comply with the relevant obligations of the Member State where the customer is established, has his/her permanent address or usually resides. This may be burdensome as there are 81 VAT rates across the 28 EU countries and the rates may vary between 3% (Luxembourg) to 27% (Hungary) across member states. Furthermore, member states impose varying thresholds at which companies must begin paying VAT, ranging from EUR 0 to EUR 60,000.

As an alternative to obtaining multiple VAT registrations in each Member State where a supplier has a customer, affected suppliers may be able to opt to account for VAT across the EU via a a web-portal in the Member State in which they are identified. Hence, the system, known as the Mini One-Stop Shop (MOSS) scheme, allows taxable persons to avoid registering in each Member State of consumption.

Online ads for spirits are banned.

The European de minimis threshold for import duties is harmonized. Goods with a value of up to 128 SDR / 150 EUR / 186 USD are exempted from customs duties. The VAT de minimis threshold is not harmonized within the EU and can vary between 10 and 22 EUR, i.e. Member States can decide on a value within this range to grant an exemption on VAT for imported goods.

According to Sweden's de minimis rule, goods with a value of up to 19 SDR / 22 EUR / 27 USD are exempted from VAT.

Directive 2000/31/EC (e-Commerce Directive) states that Member States should not impose on providers a general obligation to monitor the information which they transmit or store, nor a general obligation actively to seek facts or circumstances indicating illegal activity.

In Sweden, however, the Act on Responsibility for Electronic Bulletin Board requires internet sites where users can post comments about a particular issue or topic and reply to other users' postings (i.e. bulletin boards) to monitor the service regularly and to an extent that may reasonably be required taking into account the scope and nature of the service. An intentional or grossly negligent violation of the obligation to remove illigal content is considered as a criminal offence.

The Directive 2000/31/EC (E-Commerce Directive) is the legal basis governing the liability of Internet Services Providers (ISPs) in the EU Member States and includes a conditional safe harbor. The Directive covers any type of infringement of third-party rights, including intellectual and industrial property rights and personality rights.

The limitations on liability in the Directive apply to clearly delimited activities (mere conduit, caching and hosting) carried out by internet intermediaries, rather than to categories of service providers or types of information. While it was not considered necessary to cover hyperlinks and search engines in the Directive, the Commission has encouraged Member States to further develop legal security for Internet intermediaries.

Since not all Member States have transposed the relevant articles consistently, the national case law is divergent and leads to legal insecurity on an EU level.

The Act on Electronic Commerce and Information Society Services incorporates the E-commerce Directive into the Swedish law. It does not provide for limitations of liability for search engine operators or providers of hyperlinks.

Under the Directive on Data Retention, operators were required to retain certain categories of traffic and location data (excluding the content of those communications) for a period between six months and two years and to make them available, on request, to law enforcement authorities for the purposes of investigating, detecting and prosecuting serious crime and terrorism. On 8 April 2014, the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) declared the Directive invalid. However, not all national laws which implemented the Directive have been overturned.

Despite the ECJ ruling, the law implementing a data retention period of 12 months is still in force in Sweden. After the ruling, there have been some reported cases of companies that did not incur in any enforcement measure for not having stored their data.

The Financial Services Authority requires 'immediate' access to data in its market supervision which, according to business, the supervisory body interprets as been given physical access to servers. Accordingly, Swedish financial services providers are de facto required to maintain all its their records inside Swedish jurisdiction.

In relation to specific government authorities, there are certain provisions which might require the data processed by the authority to be held within Sweden or within the authority. This might affect the supply of cloud computing to public authorities.

In Sweden, documents such as a company’s annual reports, balance sheets and annual financial reports must be physically stored in Sweden for a period of seven years.

The European Commission is currently investigating the cooperation between Sweden's four largest mobile carriers (Telia AB, CK Hutchison, Tele2 AB and Telenor ASA). Cable operator Com Hem AB has repeatedly expressed interest in entering the market through a deal with the existing operators, but has been unable to reach an agreement with any of them.

TeliaSonera, the incumbent, is a partially state owned company. The Government of Sweden owns 37.3% of the shares.

Sweden implemented the full liberalisation of its electronic communications networks and services. Additionally, voluntary separation of the telecom infrastructure began as a dialogue between the PTS and TeliaSonera in 2007.

A Bill passed in July 2008 applied functional separation to copper network infrastructure, but not to fibre network infrastructure, although TeliaSonera is obliged to offer unbundled access to dark fibre local access networks.