The Service was, in its present form, founded in 1989, as part of theNational Police Board and became an autonomous police agency on 1 January 2015.[9][10] National headquarters are located at Bolstomtavägen[11] in south-eastSolna since 2014, drawing together personnel from five different locations into a single 30,000 m2 (320,000 sq ft) HQ facility.[12][13]
Lt ColAdlercreutz, credited with the formation of the General Security Service in 1938
The origins of the Swedish Security Service is often linked to the establishment of a special police bureau (Polisbyrån) during theFirst World War in 1914, which reported directly to theGeneral Staff, predecessor of the Office for theSupreme Commander of the Armed Forces.[14][15] The bureau's main mission was protecting national security (e.g. counter-espionage), and its first chief was CaptainErik af Edholm.[15] Operations shut down after the end of the war in 1918, although some intelligence activities carried on at the Stockholm police, managed by a small group of approximately ten police officers led by Chief SuperintendentEric Hallgren, who later was to become the first chief of the General Security Service (Allmänna säkerhetstjänsten).[14][16] Operations were mainly focused on monitoringcommunists from the start of the war until the early 1930s when the service also began to focus onNazis.[17]
In 1932, operations were transferred to the newly formed State Police (statspolisen).[14] The group of officers working at the State Police did not have the means to monitor phone calls or to intercept and open mail. This, and the general lack of staff and financial resources worried the chief of Sweden's military intelligence, Lieutenant-ColonelCarlos Adlercreutz, who felt the country needed a more powerful security agency if Europe once again ended up in war. Thus, in 1938 the General Security Service was formed, following an initiative by Adlercreutz andErnst Leche at theMinistry of Justice, among others.[18] The entire organisation and its activities were top-secret. During theSecond World War the agency monitored about 25,000 phone calls and intercepted over 200,000 letters every week.[19] In 1946, following apost-war parliamentary evaluation, operations were significantly reduced and once again organized under the State Police, mainly tasked with counter-espionage.[14][20] In 1965, the Swedish police was nationalized, and all work was organized under theNational Police Board in the Department of Security (Rikspolisstyrelsens säkerhetsavdelning, abbreviatedRPS/SÄK).[21][22]
Stig Wennerström, convicted Soviet spy,c. 1960
The period between 1939 and 1945 was marked by extensive foreign intelligence activity in Sweden, resulting in the arrest of numerous spies and enemy agents. Some of the most notorious post-war spies areFritiof Enbom,Hilding Andersson,Stig Wennerström andStig Bergling. In all of these cases the spying was done on behalf of theSoviet Union and the spies were convicted tolifetime of penal labour, the supreme penalty under civilian law. All were, however, pardoned after roughly ten years.[14][a]
In the early 1970s, Sweden was rocked by a number of terrorist acts perpetrated byCroatian separatists. Some of the most significant cases were the1971 Yugoslavian embassy attack in Stockholm and the hijacking ofScandinavian Airlines System Flight 130 a year later.[23] The inception of the first Terrorist Act in 1973 was an immediate policy upshot of this, which among other things gave the police the right to deport people affiliated with terrorist organizations without delay. These incidents also led to internal changes within the Department of Security, which received more resources.[24][25] On 28 February 1986,Prime MinisterOlof Palme was assassinated by an unknown gunman. The Department was not widely criticized, partly because Palme himself had declined protection on the night of the murder.[26] It nevertheless sparked the resignation of theNational Police CommissionerNils Erik Åhmansson and the head of the Department,Sune Sandström, following the revelation of theEbbe Carlsson affair in 1988.[27]
The Swedish Security Service was established on 1 October 1989, on the recommendations put forward by a Government committee tasked with evaluating the Department of Security following the assassination of Palme.[28] The new agency was—although still formally a part of the National Police Board—more independent, with its own Director-General and political oversight also increased.[29][30][31] Furthermore, the Service took over the formal responsibility for all close protection tasks, which was previously shared with the National Police Board and the Stockholm County Police.[30][32] On 10 September 2003,Minister for Foreign AffairsAnna Lindh was assassinated byMijailo Mijailović, who was arrested two weeks later. The Government reviewed its procedures in the wake of the Lindh killing,[33] which led to the doubling of the number of close-protection officers.[34] On 1 January 2015, the police reorganized again into a unified agency, with the Swedish Security Service becoming a fully independent agency.[35]
The Swedish Security Service's main tasks and responsibilities are:[6][14]
Counter-espionage – preventing and detectingespionage and other unlawful intelligence activities; targeting Sweden, itsnational interests abroad, and also foreign interests and refugees within the borders of Sweden.[5]
Counter-subversion – to counter illegalsubversive activities (e.g. violence, threats and harassment targeting elected representatives, public officials and journalists) intended to affect policy-making and implementation, or prevent citizens from exercising their constitutional rights and freedoms.[5]
Counter-terrorism – preventing and detectingterrorism; this includes acts of terrorism directed against Sweden or foreign interests within the borders of Sweden, as well as terrorism in other countries and the financing and support of terrorist organizations in Sweden.[5]
Protective security – providing advice, analysis and oversight to companies and government agencies of importance to national security, in addition tobackground checks.[5]
The Swedish Security Service became a separate agency 1 January 2015, and is directly organized under the Ministry of Justice. Similar to other government agencies in Sweden, it is essentially autonomous. Under the1974 Instrument of Government, neither the Government nor individual ministers have the right to influence how an agency decide in a particular case or on the application of legislation. This also applies to the Security Service, which instead is governed by general policy instruments.[38][b] What sets the Security Service apart from other agencies is that most directives guiding the Service are classified on the grounds of national security, along with the bulk of the reports it produces.[29] The Service is led by a Director-General, who is titledHead of the Swedish Security Service. Operations are led by a Chief Operating Officer, reporting directly the Head of the Security Service. He is in turn assisted by a Deputy Chief Operating Officer and an Office for Operations. The Service is organized into four departments and a secretariat, each led by a Head of Department.[39]
Provides all support processes needed for day-to-day operations.[39]
Department of Intelligence Collection
In charge of intelligence gathering through the use of secret surveillance, informants or other interpersonal contacts, and by use ofinformation technology (e.g.signals intelligence). Included in the department are the regional units, which primarily conduct human intelligence (HUMINT) operations and offer local knowledge and support to HQ.[39]
Department of Security Intelligence
Responsible for security intelligence work, primarily aimed at providing the Service with data for decisions regarding security measures.[39]
The Service has a regional presence and operates from several locations; from its headquarters inSolna and from six regional units with offices inUmeå,Uppsala,Örebro,Norrköping,Gothenburg andMalmö. The Service has approximately 1,100 employees, of which about 10 percent are stationed at the regional offices. The regional units are based on the geographic boundaries of severalcounties:[40][41]
"Swedish intelligence" was frequently referenced on the American Cold War spy drama television showThe Americans. The male lead character on the show,Philip Jennings, had an alias who allegedly worked for Swedish intelligence.[43]
