Sweden's Suspicion Machine
Lighthouse Reports
Ref: SRC-003-SWE-001
Accessed: 3/25/2026
Summary
Primary investigative report. Three-year investigation using FOI requests, court cases, confidential sources, and statistical fairness testing reviewed by eight academic experts. Analysed dataset of 6,129 people (5,082 ML-flagged, 1,047 random) from 977,730 applications in 2017. Documented systematic overselection of women, migrants, low-income, and non-degree holders. Found 2016 Integrity Committee warning, 2018 ISF finding of unequal treatment, and 2020 GDPR warning. Published code and data on GitHub.
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Granberg, S., Geiger, G., Tiberg, A., Braun, J.-C., Malmsten, H., Molén, T., Abdigadir, A., Ljungmark, I., Laurin, F., Constantaras, E. and Howden, D. (2024) 'Sweden's Suspicion Machine', Lighthouse Reports, 27 November. Available at: https://www.lighthousereports.com/investigation/swedens-suspicion-machine/ (Accessed: 25 March 2026).