EU Talks on Use of Passenger Data to Tackle Terrorism Underway

Photo source: europarl.europa.eu – ©BELGAIMAGE/EASYSTOCKFOTO/J.R:Sancke

Negotiations over a proposal that would oblige airlines to hand over their passengers’ data to EU countries in order to help authorities fight terrorism and serious transnational crime are currently underway between EU bodies with an agreement expected by the end of the month.

Civil Liberties Committee MEP Timothy Kirkhope is leading three-way talks with the EU Council and the EU Commission on the EU Passenger Name Record (PNR) proposal on the use of air passengers’ data to tackle terrorism and crime.

Mr Kirkhope said on Tuesday, that he was optimistic a deal addressing Parliament’s concerns would be reached and added that progress had been made on key issues thanks to “good cooperation between the political groups”.

According to Mr Kirkhope, “intra-EU flights” will be included in the scope of the EU PNR directive.

In the meantime, the three bodies, set to meet again on December 15, do not seem to agree on the data retention period: the EU Council requests data be retained for five years before being “masked out”, whereas the Committee is pushing for 30 days.