Results of the entire country’s income, wealth and how much tax they paid have been published today. Georg Apenes – director of the Data Inspectorate – would like to see changes made to the system, calling it “disgusting”.

Spy on your neighbour

Being able to get information about everyone’s economic situation is an important historical principle in Norway, designed to ensure all contributed to society as they should – with the possibility of being “reported” if not.

Results used to be published at the local tax office, county hall, or library and anyone with paper and pen/pencil could note the information down for a period of three weeks.

But Norwegians are curious about other people’s finances, and one of the downsides of the system is that anyone can effectively “snoop on” every Norwegian-registered tax payers to find out exactly how much they earned last year, and the size of their wealth.

Then there is the issue about freedom of information.

“The argument about control is still central. The Association of Norwegian Editors and the Press Association have been considerably engaged in the argument about the importance of being able to create debate...this is difficult to resist. Our society has a chronic need to know that somebody is watching the watchers,” Apenes writes in his commentary in Dagbladet yesterday.

Criminal

However with the advent of the Internet freedom of information means the system is also open for abuse, turning tax assessment figures into a permanent electronic goldmine for criminals bent on ID-theft. The results are now available online, forever.

Apenes thinks the system needs to be modified as he believes today’s possibilities are far from satisfactory

“Tax assessment data is (a) small contribution towards making a profile that allows you to introduce yourself using a false identity next time around – and that will be warmly welcomed by unsuspecting third parties.”