EU and US Reach Deal On Airline Data 132
gambit3 writes "According to the BBC, the EU and the US have struck a new deal for sharing airline passenger data. It will replace a deal struck down by the European Court of Justice in May, which allowed the US its own access to passenger data. Under the deal, the EU will 'push' the data — 34 pieces of information per passenger — to the US, replacing the current 'pull' system. The new deal will expire at the end of July 2007."
What are the 34 data items? (Score:2, Interesting)
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I don't know but I am sure US customs will make sure that retrieving at least one of them will involve a large and cold hand, a latex glove and a rectal search.
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It is only for health purposes. US Customs doesn't want anyone coming into the country with hiccups. It's really just a public service.
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Yup. Got to watch out for all those Sikh terrorists...
That is the whole freaking point Kemosabee. (Score:2)
Governments resort to this instead of the hard work of genuine intelligence gathering.
If governments are waiting for the information about passengers in a flight before actin, we are already at danger.
Good intelligence would mean a real dangerous person would not even manage to get a foot in the airport, perhaps not even manage to buy a ticket, before being busted.
Profiling of passengers is an exercise of hand waving to the peanut gallery.
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It's certainly an effective means of distinguishing potential terrorists. If you don't look, act, and think just like you MUST be a terrorist or terrorist supporter. I never thought I'd see the day when my president said that.
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- Name
- Passport no. and nationality
- Creditcard no.
- DOB and POB
- Food preference
- Religion
- Seat (preference)
I wonder how this is going to work though, I've never had an airliner ask me for my religion and if they would, they could file me with all the other Pastafarians on the flight. Good luck profiling that.
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determining religeon (Score:2)
Make all the seats on the plane be leather... from pigs.
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1. PNR record locator code
2. Date of reservation
3. Date(s) of intended travel
4. Name
5. Other names on PNR
6. Address
7. All forms of payment information
8. Billing address
9. Contact telephone numbers
10. All travel itinerary for specific PNR
11. Frequent flyer information (limited to miles flown and address(es))
12. Travel agency
13. Travel agent
14. Code share PNR information
15. Travel status of passenger
16. Split/Divided PNR information
17. Email address
18. Ticketing fiel
No difference whatsoever (Score:2)
The only formal difference is that in Europe you have higer protection in regards how your personal data is used, but I am sure that if you don't allow that data to be used you will not fly.
Push? (Score:1)
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As I said:
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Commercial airlines and governments use "push" technology heavily, as they have been since the mid-1960's (and maybe even before). That's what
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So what's changed? (Score:5, Informative)
New system: EU pushes 34 items of data about each passenger.
Unless the data itself has dramatically changed, I really can't see any functional difference. So how is this any better?
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personally I'd like to see proof that ANY effect has come out of this other than of course a massive breach of privacy.
jacquesm posting on the road as AC
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that depends on what data is being documented, what that data is being used for, and who has access to that data.
Re:So what's changed? (Score:5, Insightful)
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The previous agreement was claimed to be legal until the court pointed out that it plainly wasn't. This agreement is only legal until the court again (after a long and expensive process) points out that it plainly isn't.
The only change is that it's changed. And that is the point.
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100 of thousands killed in the illegal bombing of Cambodia
supported terrorits in Nicaragua
overthrew the democratically elected government in Guatemala and installed a bloody dictatorship
same for Iran
supported Iraq in the war it started with Iran and supplied targetting information for sadam's chemical weapons
get your head out of the sand, this is just the tip of the iceberg
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Push datafeeds exist in several forms. Some require explict application-level acknowledgements for each message and employ multi-priority queueing mechanisms (allowing high-priority messages to be sent ahead of everyone else), while others simply push messages into the ether and efectively forget about them (a response m
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I just don't see how it makes the remotest difference in this context as the net result is the same - the same amount of information about the same number of people leaves the same countries under much the same terms - the only difference is how it does so.
Re:So what's changed? (Score:5, Informative)
RTFA Please
The new system is better from an EU standpoint because the data is sent to a single secure source. They no longer have to worry about it being pulled from an untrusted source. There is no longer an external logon to the EU system that could potentially reveal private information. Instead it is pushed securely to a trusted homeland security site which is then responsible for distributing it within the US. Because the EU is no longer a risk for distributing private information it is OK within the EU. If there is a privacy breach it won't be the fault of the EU and that makes the EU authorities happy. From the standpoint of the consumer the same data still flies around but that was never the issue, the issue was that there was potential for the EU system to leak sensitive data which was unacceptable.
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I don't think you're correct. The issue was not only about an EU leak of information.
Their strong privacy laws prohibit them from disseminating information to countries without strong privacy protections. It
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Plausable deniability? There's no way that the data leak was OUR fault. Even though we were spineless and gave it to the US to begin with...
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EU data protection law, amongst other things, outlaws sending data to countries without similarly strong data protection law. So technically, it matters not how the data gets to the US, it's still illegal. This is just an agreement to effectively exempt the US from the law.
Thing is, if you're going to start cooking up agreements to exempt ce
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Brigitte Zypries (SPD) begrüßte die Einigung zwischen EU und USA. "Es bleibt bei einem hohen Datenschutz-Niveau", sagte sie heute am Rande des EU-Justi [spiegel.de]
34 data fields (missing from article) (Score:5, Informative)
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That's scary.
the passenger's history of not showing up for flights
Why do they want to know that?
how the ticket was paid for (including credit card number)
That's even scarier.
whether the passenger bought the ticket at the airport just before the flight
Because terrorists never plan anything out in advance, they just buy the ticket at the last minute, right? It seems like they want to know if this is a person fleeing from law enforcement.
special requests, such as requests for specia
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Presumably frequent flyers are more likely to be businessmen
the passenger's history of not showing up for flights
Weird one this.
how the ticket was paid for (including credit card number)
Is a lot of tickets are bought witht he same CC, then I suppose this will show something. Or maybe they have some "suspicious" credit cards. That just makes it seem scarier.
whether the passenger bought the ticket at the airp
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Weird one this.
It could be indicative of dry runs. If someone booked a LHR-JFK flight and then didn't turn up, then books another LHR-JFK flight for a week later on the exact same plane, alarm bells should be ringing.
I bet they're only interested in the meal requests. But the terrorists know this. Best bet for terrorists is to opt for the vegetarian option. Unlikely to offend any dietry requirements and common enough in the western world that it would be
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True. I remember reading about a list of items that have been used for profiling drug smugglers. Since the smugglers knew about these signs and responded to them, items included disembarking first, last and in the middle, as well as travelling alone and in a group. Wish I could remember where I read about it.
Well, doh. (Score:2)
Profiling does not work. It is hand weaving for the peanut gallery....
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Why do they want to know that?</blockquote>
i'd guess so that if you don't always show up they can TRY to overbook the flight and get away with it, or give your seat away to standby passengers before boarding has started just to piss you off.
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Now that is a mental image I didn't need !
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So basically what are looking for is (Score:1)
Brilliant!
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"What is the purpose of you trip?" (Score:2)
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I always refuse to give my email (airlines sooner or later use it for spam) and if I have to, I always give: diespamdie@127.0.0.1. Does this mean I'm screwed?
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I for one don't ever want countries to share this data unless it is serious enough
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Does this violate the EU's data protection law? (Score:3, Interesting)
Once the data leaves the hands of the EU, it is beyond the control of the EU. DHS can (and will, I'm sure) give it to anyone they want to. I have little reason to believe that won't include corporations that are willing to pay off the right people.
So, really, how is this any better than what the U.S. was demanding to begin with, other than the fact that the EU gets to decide ahead of time whose data gets sent to the U.S.? For ordinary people, it seems to me that this is no different. Only people with "special" standing within the EU (i.e., those who have special connections to the people who decide what data goes out) will be protected.
The actions of all governments with respect to the rights, liberties, and protections of the people have become so predictable that it's depressing. :-(
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Is it really surprising that you cannot travel anywhere you want without a passport/visa, etc? The passenger data they are getting is the same thing you would give to the airline when you book the flight.
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European governments (excluding the UK, which is superglued to the US's hindquarters) have no particlular objection to data collection, it's the processing and transmission that usually causes the problems. The US would like, for example, the EU passenger data to be transmitted to agencies that strictly have nothing to do with passport control such as the FBI. Given that nowhe
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It's now going to US DHS, who are going to "facilitate" passing the data on to other security agencies, apparently. I'm sure we can all work out where this one is going to end.
And yes, it does quite flagrantly violate the spirit of EU data protection laws, even if they've found a technicality to work around the letter. The correct response was to deny the US any information that isn't clearly necessary to allow them to take reasonable security precautions, and if the US threatened to deny landing rights,
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Your own government collects tax information, occupational information, health care information, education information. This information is not kept secure the same way defense and security information is kept secure by your government, because it would be cost ineffective to
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Now these rules apply to anyone who wishes to maintain databases on
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The only reason it is even semi-legal is that the EU commissioner wrote a statement saying that he fully trusts the US government to comply with the data protection act, and there are no adverse privacy implications. This was written despite the US government refusing to comply with the conditions. Basically, the EU is saying "don't tell me
Frankly (Score:4, Insightful)
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I'm personally boycotting any travel to the US for this and a myriad of other reasons. Apart from all the risks to my own personal liberty and freedom if I do happen to go there, there's the added fact that it's faster to fly to Europe than to the US (from Canada).
When you add the four hours spent getting through security to the four hour flight, that pretty much equals the 1h security + 7h flight to Europe. And, you get to spend more of that time sitting down, rath
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In the Toronto Airport (YYZ) it usualy takes under thirty minutes to clear through both US customs (yes you clear through US customs while still in Canada) and security. A direct flight to Florida takes about 2 and a half hours.
To be safe I usualy show up 90 minutes before my flight departs and usualy have about an hour wait when I get to the terminal.
I don't know where you fly out of by 4 hours is absurd and I
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I now have a Canadian passport, but last year I travelled to the US on my British one, the first time I'd tried in five years afte
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But regarding your point about risks to your personal liberty and freedom if you come here; I have to point out that the EU is the one that collects this data on it's citzens in the first place.
Isn't the EU also infringing on on their personal liberty and freedom?
What about Canada? They have to do the same thing. Here's Air Canada's policy. Isn't your government infriging on your personal liberty and freedom as w
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Me too. (Score:2)
I could save money making stop overs in the US but I don't, I prefer to pay a bit more but to be treated with some respect and dignity.
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I don't think any country or group has a monopoly on airport and/or airline security. See for example, this wikipedia list of airline hijackings [wikipedia.org], the hijackings seem distributed all over the world. Or consider the number of terrorist acts over the last couple of decades at various airports around the world. These include terrorist events in Germany and Italy.
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Now, if the US refuses to reciprocate, then there's a problem. What's good for the goose is good for the gander, etc.
-Jeff
P.S. Please do not read this as "the us is perfect, us security is perfect, etc". I'm only commenting on the exchange of information.
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Bullshit. (Score:2)
I can confidently say that US immigration is unpolite, aggressive and downright racist.
As for security, it is similar to Europe now, but the US was the one that upgraded.
I remeber my first travel to the US and watched in horror in the way back as they allowed pretty much anybody and hi
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and gave up (or at least postponed until
2u leaves office).
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I'm actually blown away that so many people are willing to travel voluntarily to the US based on the new laws. The first thing we do to everyone who isn't a Canadian or Mexican is photograph and fingerprint them. I wouldn't travel to any country that did that to me. (And I do support other countries doing it to US citizens until we stop doing it to their citizens.)
This article [usatoday.com] implies that some tourists are already telling th
It went something like this (Score:5, Funny)
EU: Oh, is there a problem, I thought I was giving you the right number, 34 is the minimum right?
US: Oh, yes, 34 is the minimum number of pieces of information, if you just want to do the minimum
US: Look at Bulgaria over there, they give 54 pieces of information, don't you want to be like Bulgaria?
EU: Look, if you want 54 pieces of information, just make the minimum 54
US: I just want you to want to do more than the minimum
Sorry, I forget the actual script, that's off the top of my head.
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A side question - do you have any information about Bulgaria providing more info? As far as I know, there are no direct flights, so
ISR (Score:1)
In Soviet Russia^H^H^H^H EU airline reports YOU!
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So, that's the new definition of "reaching a deal" (Score:2)
or "dealing a reach-around" (Score:2)
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Think of the children! Although... it would be soooo wrong with children... in other words, twice as likely to appear on YouTube.
What about US citizens? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Maybe not, but apparently they have no problem giving a reacharound. If you think for one minute that the US isn't allowing passenger data to go to the EU, then you're a little naive.
The EU's concern was that the US would too freely share such information with non-terrorism-related agencies; the US has no such compunctions, and has no problem forking the information over to the EU.
However, the EU doesn't currently have as much of a centr
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Besides, looking at that information would probably be too depressing for them anyhow, credit card numbers for maxed out credit cards, finding out how little US folks pay for flights, that they use AOL email, tolerate the "standard" coach airline meal, and are travelling on a generic 21 country Trafalgar tour. I think after looking at a few hundred tho
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Well, it's either that or EU citizens won't be allowed to travel to the USA.
It's the same with the Biometric Passports, and I don't think the EU has much of a choice here...
Under the new deal... (Score:2)
Huge difference in privacy rights (Score:2, Interesting)
Europe and US has a huge difference in privacy rights. In Europe the individual owns his own data. In the US the entity (read corporation) owns whatever they can collect (And sell).
In Norway, for example, if you are unhappy with your credit rating, you just call them and tell them that they have to erase all data they have on you. (This will of course not result in a good score of course). Companies can not keep any information other than what is needed to complete a customer tr
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Why on Earth does the USA need all this info? (Score:2, Insightful)
Funny, but I don't see terrorists these days showing up to the airport to buy a one way ticket in cash, ordering a Halal meal, and pre booking a tour of The White House and The Capitol.
IMHO they are
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When governments collude (Score:2)
Well, I guess that isn't news: whenever governments to anything, you and I lose rights.
If you don't do this voluntarily... (Score:1)
- RG>
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