Madrid in bid to force airlines to supply data on passengers

Date: 27/02/03

By David Cronin

SPAIN has recommended that airlines should be forced to pass on data about all passengers flying into the EU from the wider world to border control authorities as a new prevention of terrorism measure.

The Madrid proposal, tabled to the Council of Ministers' working group on frontiers, comes as the EU -prepares to introduce an accord with the United States, requiring that European carriers transmit details of people taking transatlantic flights to American authorities from next Wednesday, 5 March.

If the Spanish move is endorsed by the main EU institutions, a similar system would be implemented for all flights between airports in member states and countries outside the Union.

Spanish officials are suggesting that such a system could be useful for thwarting terrorist attacks and reducing illegal immigration.

The Spanish document advocates that information on all passengers should "be conveyed immediately to the border control authorities in the member state of destination".

It adds: "This would ensure that a period of time is available to perform a detailed analysis, on the basis of each specific situation or of each passenger's country of departure."

A Spanish government official said that, unlike the US system, Madrid is not seeking that the information passed on should be stored on a database.

It is intended, the official explained, that most of the details concerned would be deleted soon after they have been handed over.

Washington's efforts to secure its new arrangement with the EU had earlier caused a spat with the European Commission, which argued it would violate the Union's data protection laws and threatened to sue companies that complied.

This caused consternation among carriers, who had also been told they would be fined by the US if they did not allow it to peruse their electronic booking systems.

But the Commission's transport spokesman, Gilles Gantelet, remarked that key assurances had been granted during talks between Brussels and Washington officials.

The Americans pledged that any data handed over would only be accessible to federal, rather than state authorities, and that customs officials who disclose data to unauthorised persons would be punished.

"We received lots of guarantees," said Gantelet. "California will not have access to this information, Florida will not have access to it. Only the federal authorities will."

Civil liberties groups are nonetheless wary of the accord.

Statewatch spokesman Tony Bunyan argued it was "ludicrous" that a deal with far-reaching effects was due to come into place before it had been scrutinised by the European Parliament.

"This is a bit like going to war and then having a discussion about why we should go to war," he said.

The new accord is expected to be one of the major topics at a 25 March hearing on data protection after the 11 September 2001 attacks, organised by the Parliament's committee on citizen's rights. Under the EU's data protection directive, the Commission is required to give MEPs an assessment of whether the privacy laws in a country are adequate if the state wishes to have data given to its authorities.

Spain has recommended that airlines should be forced to pass on data about all passengers flying into the EU from the wider world to border control authorities as a new prevention of terrorism measure.