police told to seize digital assets ‘without proof of crime’

The Swedish Minister of Justice would have ordered the police to strengthen the convulsions of unexplained cryptographic participation – even without direct evidence of a crime. The directive depends on a controversial law which could redefine the forfeiture of assets in the digital age.

On July 4, decrypt reported The Minister of Justice of Sweden, Gunnar Strömmer, launched an official appeal for the application of laws, the tax authorities and the national authority for the application of the law to intensify the confiscations of cryptographic assets suspected of being linked to illegal activity.

The directive is based on a law adopted last November which grants the authorities of sweeping powers to grasp digital assets, even without final evidence of criminal driving, if the owners cannot adequately explain their origins. Since its introduction, the law has already been used to seize $ 8.4 million in goods, marking one of the most aggressive positions in Europe on unexplained wealth.

According to the report, Strömmer highlighted the importance of improving interinstitutions coordination, especially when treated assets of great value such as cryptocurrency, declaring that it was “time to go up the pressure”.

Why Sweden targets crypto with aggressive crisis powers

The push of the Minister of Justice Strömmer seems to come from the growing participation concerning the role of digital assets in the economy of organized crime in Sweden.

A September 2024 report The Police Authority and the financial intelligence unit of Sweden noted that certain cryptocurrency exchanges are operating as de facto money laundering – facilitating the flow of drugs, fraud product and other criminal income. The report explicitly urged the police to “increase its presence” on cryptographic trading platforms to help identify and dismantle such operations.

Meanwhile, recent figures for the Bloomsbury Intelligence & Security Institute estimate that around 62,000 people were involved or linked to criminal networks in Sweden in 2024.

While data on crypto-specific crime remain rare, the authorities cite anonymity and cross-border capacities of digital assets as key catalysts of organized crime. These concerns have probably fueled Strömmer’s argument that laws on the forfeiture of Sweden’s assets must evolve to correspond to the realities of financial crime in the digital age.

One of the most vocal supporters of Strömmer’s repression is the Swedish democrat Dennis Dioukarev, a leading defender for a Bitcoin national reserve. Dioukarev maintains that crypto has been seized, in particular bitcoin (BTC), should be transferred to the Swedish central bank, the Riksbank, to build a strategic reserve.

“Cryptocurrencies confiscated by criminals should be reused to strengthen the financial situation of Sweden,” said Dioukarev in the report, framing this decision as a means of transforming the fight against crime into a long-term economic asset.

However, the government’s silence on what will really happen to the confiscated crypto has raised questions. Once in a hurry, the Strömmer office refused to clarify whether the assets entered would be liquidated, held or directed in a national reserve.