Sweden ponders regulations for kids’ spending on mobile phones

Stockholm has said that it is looking into introducing laws that will limit the amount of money that children can spend via smartphones. The country’s government said that the move comes in the effort of preventing young people from being able to drain their parents’ bank accounts with only a few clicks on their phones.  

The news follows the tabling of the “App to date” report, in which an independent panel presented ways for the Swedish government to enhance consumer protection for mobile phone users.

Torgny Håstad, the report’s head author and a former judge of the Supreme Court in Stockholm, said in the report that such a law would help to bring solid resolutions to court cases in which parents say that substantial mobile bills came as a result of unauthorised charges initiated by their children.

The App to Date report also recommended that mobile providers be required to ensure that customers making each purchase are in fact authorised users of the credit or debit card on file.

Birgitta Ohlsson, the country’s minister of consumer affairs, told reporters, “It isn’t okay that children can subject their parents to financial ruin with just a few clicks on their phone,” The Local reports.