Unknown operator runs website posing as Icelandic Treasury

A website using the domains rikissjodur.is and ríkissjóður.is appears to present itself as an official government information service, but it has no connection to the Icelandic Treasury, Morgunblaðið reports. The site publishes claims about the cost of using Iceland’s krona as its currency during this century.

Finance Minister Daði Már Kristófersson confirmed to Morgunblaðið that the website was not created by the Treasury or any of its subordinate institutions.

“It is preferable that those who publish information do so under their own names. In this case, as in others, it is important that the public be critical of the information presented,” he said.

The identity of the person or people behind the website is unknown. The site provides no information about its operator and does not even list an email address for inquiries. Its underlying code gives no further indication, apart from showing that Claude, an artificial intelligence tool developed by Anthropic, was used to build the website. The wording suggests that Claude also assisted in writing its content.

ISNIC refuses to disclose registrant

The domain registry ISNIC, which handles registrations in Iceland’s part of the internet, lists the registrant only under the username EAA32-IS. That may indicate the person’s initials.

Morgunblaðið asked ISNIC for information about the registrant but was refused on privacy grounds. ISNIC chief executive Þór Jensen said the organisation had clear procedures for suspected false registration details and that, in this case, the information was sufficient and there was no reason to question its validity.

Morgunblaðið also asked whether any concerns had arisen when an individual sought to register a domain associated with the government. No answer had been received to that question.

The newspaper also contacted Netvís, Iceland’s cybersecurity centre operating under the Media Commission. The centre has been tasked, among other things, with monitoring information disorder ahead of the referendum. It has said that false and misleading information is often used to influence public opinion and decision-making in democratic countries. No response had been received by Tuesday evening.

Billions and trillions

The website claims that the krona cost Icelanders 6,432 billion krona between 2000 and 2024. The figure is based on several calculations that do not appear to be entirely arbitrary until their assumptions are examined.

The calculations assume that Iceland had used the euro from its introduction around the turn of the century, while household debt would nevertheless have developed exactly as it did in reality, including through the banking collapse. Icelandic interest costs are then compared with the median in 11 euro-area countries.

The calculations do not account for changes in borrowing, indebtedness, inflation or creditworthiness, although the website acknowledges that cheaper lending would probably have led to higher debt. Indexed interest payments are treated as cash paid out.

Interest payments by households, companies and the government are then added together as though the money had disappeared from the national economy.