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What happens when there's an internet outage? A cashless society works fine in the sunshine case, but it's not inconceivable that the network could go down in

What happens when there's an internet outage? A cashless society works fine in the sunshine case, but it's not inconceivable that the network could go down in various crisis scenarios for an extended period of time (days). Economic transactions still need to happen ...

pintxo 2y ago
As I recall there was some news about this a while back, the Swedish central bank looking into crisis scenarios.
- pintxo 2y ago
  Only found this one in Swedish: https://www.riksbank.se/sv/press-och-publicerat/nyheter-och-pressmeddelanden/nyheter/2023/nya-foreskrifter-om-betalningar-under-fredstida-krissituationer-och-vid-hojd-beredskap/ https://www.riksbank.se/sv/press-och-publicerat/nyheter-och-...
pgsandstrom 2y ago
I work at a swedish bank. We spend very much time and effort to prepare for different situations such as that. Some preparation is required by the EU Dora act: https://www.digital-operational-resilience-act.com/ https://www.digital-operational-resilience-act.com/ (yes I know that HN hates all EU regulations) Being a cashless society does require some extra emergency planning, but I feel confident that Sweden has prepared as well as you could ever expect for such a crisis.
- Brian_K_White 2y ago
  What preparations that a bank does in any way helps all the actual people out in the world? The net is inaccessible in a way the bank can't fix. Broken cables or something cuts off a whole area even if the bank and the city the bank is in are up. Is there an established fallback that everyone knows about and is ready to use? Credit cards used to have a fallback methilod (which was the primary method originally), where if the pos system is out, a business can still process a transaction off-line by taking an impression of your card with a carbonless receipt in this purely mechanical device. The receipts are all deposited at the bank at a later time. Unless there is some fallback like that that's actually ready to go and everyone is ready to use when needed, then how do you buy soup and heating fuel? Hand written IOU's? Every time I've seen a payment system unavailable, the various goods and services simply stopped. Even food and fuel. At all big and little scales. Here in the US a few years ago hackers took down some computers relating to a major oil pipe. For something like a few weeks a big chunk of the country couldn't get fuel. It later came out that the computers that were affected were only related to billing, NOT anything about actually operating the pipe. Fuel could have been flowing the whole time. Rather than allow any tiny chance of a billing discrepency, they stopped the flow and let everyone freeze and starve and die from lack of ambulances etc. (a little hyperbole, idk if anyone actually died that could be tied back to the fuel cutoff) This and other examples tells me that when "merely the billing" is down, that the goods and services stop too, and all of them, not just the luxuries. It is not valid to propose that grocery stores and gas stations will switch to some emergency humanitarian mode of operation for the duration of an emergency and figure out the crass money later.
ibaikov 2y ago
I live in a major city where people also don't use cash. Some older people still do, but absolute most transactions are cashless, especially if you'd ask eg a coffee shop or a restaurant. It is about 99:1 - 97:3 ratio of cashless:cash. Internet outages are extremely rare and are fixed in just about an hour, be it a major backbone outage, a bank server outage, or a local wire cut. In this case, most cafes will switch to a mobile hotspot connection. Not an issue, and wasn't for like last 10 years. I honestly don't remember when I had cash on me.
- The_Colonel 2y ago
  > Not an issue, and wasn't for like last 10 years. I honestly don't remember when I had cash on me. I'm not talking about normal day-to-day life. I'm thinking of massive hacker / DDOS attack, radio interference, EMP attack or some equivalent natural disaster (extremely strong solar flares). Switching to hotspot won't help, since that obviously won't work either.
anotherhue 2y ago
Happened in Ireland a few times: https://www.nytimes.com/1970/05/06/archives/money-circulates-in-ireland-in-spite-of-closed-banks-irish.html https://www.nytimes.com/1970/05/06/archives/money-circulates... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_bank_strikes_(1966%E2%80%931976) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_bank_strikes_(1966%E2%80... Exactly what you'd expect to happen in Ireland happened.
NalNezumi 2y ago
People just need to eat shit and accept it. Two years ago I returned to Sweden over holiday, and local mall (2nd biggest in the country) had an internet outrage. Apparently some construction worker cut the wrong cable somewhere You can imagine the chaos. Grocery store line got long and many people couldn't buy the dinner for their day, I saw some people calling their partners asking if they had cash. (grocery store at least accept cash) If say a east European nation decided to invade here, all they need is to blast internet and chaos(looting) would ensure.

pintxo 2y ago

As I recall there was some news about this a while back, the Swedish central bank looking into crisis scenarios.

pintxo 2y ago
Only found this one in Swedish: https://www.riksbank.se/sv/press-och-publicerat/nyheter-och-pressmeddelanden/nyheter/2023/nya-foreskrifter-om-betalningar-under-fredstida-krissituationer-och-vid-hojd-beredskap/ https://www.riksbank.se/sv/press-och-publicerat/nyheter-och-...

pgsandstrom 2y ago

I work at a swedish bank. We spend very much time and effort to prepare for different situations such as that. Some preparation is required by the EU Dora act: https://www.digital-operational-resilience-act.com/ https://www.digital-operational-resilience-act.com/ (yes I know that HN hates all EU regulations) Being a cashless society does require some extra emergency planning, but I feel confident that Sweden has prepared as well as you could ever expect for such a crisis.

Brian_K_White 2y ago
What preparations that a bank does in any way helps all the actual people out in the world? The net is inaccessible in a way the bank can't fix. Broken cables or something cuts off a whole area even if the bank and the city the bank is in are up. Is there an established fallback that everyone knows about and is ready to use? Credit cards used to have a fallback methilod (which was the primary method originally), where if the pos system is out, a business can still process a transaction off-line by taking an impression of your card with a carbonless receipt in this purely mechanical device. The receipts are all deposited at the bank at a later time. Unless there is some fallback like that that's actually ready to go and everyone is ready to use when needed, then how do you buy soup and heating fuel? Hand written IOU's? Every time I've seen a payment system unavailable, the various goods and services simply stopped. Even food and fuel. At all big and little scales. Here in the US a few years ago hackers took down some computers relating to a major oil pipe. For something like a few weeks a big chunk of the country couldn't get fuel. It later came out that the computers that were affected were only related to billing, NOT anything about actually operating the pipe. Fuel could have been flowing the whole time. Rather than allow any tiny chance of a billing discrepency, they stopped the flow and let everyone freeze and starve and die from lack of ambulances etc. (a little hyperbole, idk if anyone actually died that could be tied back to the fuel cutoff) This and other examples tells me that when "merely the billing" is down, that the goods and services stop too, and all of them, not just the luxuries. It is not valid to propose that grocery stores and gas stations will switch to some emergency humanitarian mode of operation for the duration of an emergency and figure out the crass money later.

ibaikov 2y ago

I live in a major city where people also don't use cash. Some older people still do, but absolute most transactions are cashless, especially if you'd ask eg a coffee shop or a restaurant. It is about 99:1 - 97:3 ratio of cashless:cash. Internet outages are extremely rare and are fixed in just about an hour, be it a major backbone outage, a bank server outage, or a local wire cut. In this case, most cafes will switch to a mobile hotspot connection. Not an issue, and wasn't for like last 10 years. I honestly don't remember when I had cash on me.

The_Colonel 2y ago
> Not an issue, and wasn't for like last 10 years. I honestly don't remember when I had cash on me. I'm not talking about normal day-to-day life. I'm thinking of massive hacker / DDOS attack, radio interference, EMP attack or some equivalent natural disaster (extremely strong solar flares). Switching to hotspot won't help, since that obviously won't work either.

anotherhue 2y ago

Happened in Ireland a few times: https://www.nytimes.com/1970/05/06/archives/money-circulates-in-ireland-in-spite-of-closed-banks-irish.html https://www.nytimes.com/1970/05/06/archives/money-circulates... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_bank_strikes_(1966%E2%80%931976) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_bank_strikes_(1966%E2%80... Exactly what you'd expect to happen in Ireland happened.

NalNezumi 2y ago

People just need to eat shit and accept it. Two years ago I returned to Sweden over holiday, and local mall (2nd biggest in the country) had an internet outrage. Apparently some construction worker cut the wrong cable somewhere You can imagine the chaos. Grocery store line got long and many people couldn't buy the dinner for their day, I saw some people calling their partners asking if they had cash. (grocery store at least accept cash) If say a east European nation decided to invade here, all they need is to blast internet and chaos(looting) would ensure.