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5-6 mm body length, inhabits a shopping mall in Norway.

There is reason to believe that the spider(s) came with a shipment from Asia (China?) or Central Europe.

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close up

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Pholcidae family.

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Really common in every house in Central Europe. Surely there are populations in Norway also. But it is also possible, that it comes from another continent. But it is not adult, so no hope for a proper ID. (Has no Epigyne!)

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Thanks, good to hear it might very well be a native.

Does this family have 'dangerous' members? (As if any spiders aren't dangerous ;))

With my arachnophobia, I will still throw it in the fire even though it is stone dead. It MIGHT be the yet to be discovered 'Chinese Ressurecting Spider of Doom' :D

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There are about 20-30 deadly spiders known. This is not among one of them! Chelicerae are very small to pierce the skin, so no worries. And even if it was possbile for this specimen to pierce the skin there would no problem too... as far as I know I never heard any fatal bite from Pholcidae family.
Some deadly or at least VERY dangerous (tissues highly damaged) spiders are: Atrax robustus (from Sydney and around); Hadronyche (MANY species..) spp. - maybe Hadronyche formidabilis has a deadly potential venom to the humans (fortunately is not present in urban areas as far as I know!); some Missulena spp. can trigger serious problems. (these spiders are in Australia and South America); Phoneutria (many species) -- VERY DANGEROUS! (from Brasil); Loxosceles laeta - it has dermonecrotic venom... which can give serious damage to the skin! Present in cHILE, Canarias, and maybe already in South Spain. Some species of Latrodectus can deliver some very nasty bites...

Note that the majority of the spiders are rather "shy" and usually they have much more "fear" than us, humans. Only a few use attack even without being disturbed (one famous example is the terrible Phoneutria. In comparation, in general, bees kill much more people, in Europe, than the spiders. So I advice you to go to the South Africa (almost all known spiders families are present in this country) or Australia so you can loose your aracnhophobia.

The net is full of myths in spiders. There are many, many blunders around concerning the spiders. Many wrong ideas, many preconceptions...

You should try to spot more times the webs and you will be very surprised how many dipterans/strepsipterans you can find. You can find some very peculiar behaviour among some nematocerans that hang on in the very thin silk thread of the spider! (there are also flies that stole the food of spiders... milichiids and asilids, if I'm not wrong).

Now compare: 20-30 deadly spiders in 41253 species known so far (January 2010) is nothing! Venom bees can trigger fatal anaphylactic shock and there are much more medical reports in this last case than the spiders bite cases.

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I'd like to add that I think not even a single person has died from European spiders.

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Thank you Jorge.

My arachnophobic tendencies comes from a childhood experience:

Being a child at 6 years of age and living in Madagascar. One day I ran from a forest to my home becuse we were playing some game. Passing between two bushes I ran through a huge net and and I was covered from top to toe in yellow spiderweb, I can still hear the sound and feel the sensation of the net tightening lightly and snapping around my face.

I looked down and on my chest a I had a Nephilid of the largest kind in that area.

So I am embarresed to admit it, but I have trouble with spiders still.

That said, the malagasy Nephilids are fantastic!

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Madagascar has a family of spiders that is truly fantastic. Archaeidae! Check it out.

Fatilities in Europe due the bites of the spiders, not sure... maybe you are right.