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EU Wants Air Passenger Data Collected

Posted by kdawson on Wed Nov 07, 2007 07:55 AM
from the you-can-leave-your-hat-on dept.
Privacy Government Politics
An anonymous reader sends news of the EU following in the footsteps of the US in that they are contemplating requiring all 27 member states to collect data on airline passengers and to retain it for up to 13 years. No centralized database would be created; instead states would be encouraged to store and to share their own data as needed. All states would have to pass enabling laws before the measure could come into effect. The rules would not apply to flights entirely within the EU. The proposal is part of an anti-terrorism package that also includes tighter laws to control hate speech and bomb-making instructions.
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Submission: EU wants air passenger data collected, too by Anonymous Coward
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  • Damnit! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Corporate Troll (537873) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @07:57AM (#21265547) Homepage Journal
    Damnit! Now we EUers can't feel smug anymore and belittle our less free friends in the US ;-))

    • Yes but... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:02AM (#21265577)
      ...at least they'll never be able to take away from us the fact we never elected George Bush.

      Well, at least unless there's a major change in international politics sometime soon I hope not ;)

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by cavac (640390)
      I don't mean to sound rude, but i've given up traverling to the US, i don't like to be viewed as a "stupid foreigner" by the authorities.

      Last time i was in NY (pre 2001, though), it was "US citizens and greencard holders first, europeans last". Maybe we should have something similar at EU airports, to make us EU citizens feel smug and let US citizens stand around for long hours for a change...

      All in the name of "security", 'couse, naturally, non-EU-citizens will have to fill in pointless imigration forms, a

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by sayfawa (1099071)
        Last time i was in NY (pre 2001, though), it was "US citizens and greencard holders first, europeans last". Maybe we should have something similar at EU airports, to make us EU citizens feel smug and let US citizens stand around for long hours for a change...

        You don't have to wish for it, that already exists. At every European airport I've been to I had to stand in a longer, slower moving line because I'm not an EU citizen.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by IANAAC (692242)

        All in the name of "security", 'couse, naturally, non-EU-citizens will have to fill in pointless imigration forms, answer stupid questions like "Are you a terrorist" to armed security guards while everybody is watching and generally made of fool of yourself. After all, the EU has to bring up its security standard to US levels...

        Sounds like my last pass through Dublin. Of course it was the day after a bomb scare. Still not as bad as Heathrow though.

        Many don't want to admit it, but it's just as bad i

      • I've given up no flying altogether... No matter what the destination is... It'd have to be pretty important if I'm going to deal with airports again!

        The way you get treated at airports these days is simply amazing, you are considered a criminal just because you are boarding an airplane. What possible other reason except terrorism could one possibly have for flying?

        In the near future I will have to travel between Belgium and the UK quite frequently and I've already decided to take the Eurostar. Sitting on th
      • When I came back from Scotland last year, O'Hare had a line for returning Americans and another for foreign visitors.

        That's about the only nice thing I can say about O'Hare, though.

      • Re:Damnit! (Score:4, Informative)

        by krlynch (158571) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @10:54AM (#21267721) Homepage

        Last time i was in NY (pre 2001, though), it was "US citizens and greencard holders first, europeans last".

        Watch where you're throwing those stones, buddy :-)

        I travel to Europe regularly on business. At EVERY European airport I've been too, there's an "EU passport holders" line (and Switzerland, usually) and an "everyone else" line.

        • Well, i haven't been outside the EU since 2000 or so by plane, so i'm not up-to-date. Now that there are essentially no inner-european borders every few hundred kilometers, visiting other europeans countries by car has become much more fun (no hour-long traffic jams at the borders anymore. YES!!!)

          Also, having a common currency made inner-european travel quite a bit cheaper, cause it did get rid of that exchange rates. As an Austrian visiting for example the Netherlands, you had to change Austrian Schillings

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by eebra82 (907996)
      What exactly makes you think we're not heading the same way? EU has stood for a tightened control of its citizens. Not too long ago, they forced telecom operators to store data in order to fight terrorism and such.
    • There are more "data" collection laws here (Passports to check into hotels). But they can't sell the data to corporations and for the police to use the data they need a warrant. Personal data in the EU is protected by law in most member states and by the EU itself.

      The odd thing with this law is this. What about trains? I recently visited Italy, Czech Republic, Hungry and Slovakia all on the train. I can get a train to any major city in the EU and most are within the overnight train distance from central
      • I remember visiting Italy, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria by train during the cold war. No queues for passport checks then either! It was much easier than the train from England to France is now.

  • Cut to the chase (Score:4, Insightful)

    by locster (1140121) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:06AM (#21265593)
    [Sarcasm mode on]
    Heck, let's just cut to the chase and have an international law that everything and anything has to be logged and stored for all eternity. That should save a few decades of protesting against dumb legislature that will eventually get in through the back door anyway.

    Presumably if storage capacity where unlimited we'd be seeing calls to log the position of every atom in the world!
    [Sarcasm mode off]
    • ...let's just cut to the chase and have an international law that everything and anything has to be logged and stored for all eternity.

      OK! Let'em choke on all that data! There's no way that they could keep it all straight - and that's assuming there's no errors!

      The genie is out of the bottle, let's give them what they want to the 666 power!

    • The next step being to pass legislation outlawing the Uncertainty Principle because only a terrorist wouldn't want you to know where they are *and* where they're going.
  • I spent some time in Italy this summer. It is a very lovely country with amazing food. One thing that struck me as strange was the extremely lax security at the airport. Me and my party literally walked through without anyone checking anything at any time. They didn't even LOOK at our passports. I wanted them to stamp mine so I would have the Italy stamp, but the man just waved us on past. I did notice though that all the people the men with machine guns where searching all where Arabic looking men.
    I had
    • It's always amusing coming back to Birmingham Airport ( UK ) the customs guys spend around 5 seconds scanning your passport and thats it.

      I flew back from Dublin once to Stanstead airport and in order to get through the barrier without going to customs you had to show your boarding card. Unfortunately I'd thrown mine away but the guy let me through on the strength of a reciept from a Burger King in Dublin which he reckoned proved I'd just come from Ireland right enough.

      French security are always nice, happy
    • And the irony is last year they (morons) tried to blow up a train in Germany. Not in Italy.

      But anyway. We're being terrorized by our own governments right now. In the EU it's forbidden to take a normal bottle of water on board.

      Terrorism 2, Freedom 0 :(
    • Security on internal flights in Papua New Guinea is light (there is none)... however, when you get OFF the airplane in the Highlands, they check to make sure you haven't brought any guns or liquor.
    • Me and my party literally walked through without anyone checking anything at any time. They didn't even LOOK at our passports. I wanted them to stamp mine so I would have the Italy stamp, but the man just waved us on past.

      Why not?

      When has airport security ever stopped a real threat?

      All the 9/11 terrorists had valid ID and passed all criteria that raised no flags. Even the "do not fly list" would not have stopped them. Its just a waste of time and better methods of security are needed other than the current

  • Spain is already doing this (Score:3, Informative)

    by mikael (484) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:09AM (#21265625)
    New Spanish security rules likely to cause airport delays [uk-airport-news.info]
  • Say what you want about the U.S., but we don't outlaw 'hate speech' here. We have outlawed bomb-making instructions since 1997 (Thanks, Diane Feinstein!), but only those with that give instructions for the purposes of violating federal law. You can still read about the basic chemistry, and for that you just need to go to your local library or read any of a number of articles publicly available on the Internet.

    • Say what you want about the U.S., but we don't outlaw 'hate speech' here. We have outlawed bomb-making instructions since 1997

      Alright I will. In the US, you outlaw chemical formulae, but allow people to call for "infidels" to be burned at the stake. Do you regard this as a laudable state of affairs?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by PjotrP (593817)
      The hate speech thing always is an easy way to put europeans in their place. Then again it usually only works when you don't go into the details about just how free speech works in practice. In practice for example it might be that the freedom of the press somehow is in a much better shape in europe than in the united states.

      The US might not have a law to limit free speech, but in reality it seems the free speech of journalists is more limited than in europe. If you use a law to limit it, or just use patrio

      • The US might not have a law to limit free speech, but in reality it seems the free speech of journalists is more limited than in europe.
        Give an example. There aren't any laws, other than slander and libel, specifically on the books in the U.S. limiting the free speech of journalists. Protection of sources, reporter's privelege, whatever -- these are decided on a case-by-case basis in the U.S., as is true for most of Europe.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by PjotrP (593817)
          the point is that having a law one way or another, doesn't necessarily mean that the actual practice and reality is so.
          I'm no expert about how free speech works in practice in the US, but I refer to an index of the freedom of press. As I'm no expert I can't judge the index, but the way the index is compiled seems fair enough.

          about the US they said:
          "There were slightly fewer press freedom violations in the United States [than last year] (48th) and blogger Josh Wolf was freed after 224 days in prison. But the

  • I Can See This Leading to Trouble (Score:5, Insightful)

    by segedunum (883035) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:13AM (#21265651) Homepage
    How exactly does one define 'hate speech', and separate it from freedom of speech (one man's free speech is another's hate speech), and how exactly does one separate home chemistry sets from bomb making equipment, and mere discussions on bombs and explosives (they're not exactly secrets) from people who are actually going to use them?

    I'm also not sure how collecting data on all passengers will help them with the small minority they want to track.
    • Hell, it's easier than that. All you need are beauty products...

       

    • Re:I Can See This Leading to Trouble (Score:4, Insightful)

      by NewbieProgrammerMan (558327) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:39AM (#21265833) Homepage
      <cynical bastard>
      Didn't you get the memo? It's not about laws making sense, or actually helping prevent terrorism. For a lot of these politicians and bureaucrats it's all about *looking* like you're doing something so you can get reelected and/or be perceived as somebody who's "doing something about it." Bonus points if you can work something in there that empowers the bureaucracy a little bit, extra bonus if you can limit any kind of pesky individualism or unmonitored behavior.
      </cynical bastard>

  • Welcome to the USSR (Score:5, Insightful)

    by thatskinnyguy (1129515) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:16AM (#21265671)
    I seriously think the Soviets covertly won the Cold War after the end was declared every time I hear crap like this. What's next? Are we all going to celebrate the October Revolution and call each other "Comrade" while the Secret Police read our mail and make people disappear?

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by owlnation (858981)
      Every time I see stuff like this and I'm reminded of something Günter Grass said, about how once the Berlin wall came down the way was opened up for Fascism to have free reign again.

      Seems to be true. Red or Blue -- they both screw you.
  • Can't let the US take a lead on this issue. Freedom of movement is demonstrated by the fact they won't even consider imposing it on inter-union travel.

  • In Soviet Russia ... (Score:4, Funny)

    by ACK!! (10229) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:18AM (#21265681) Journal
    Shit that doesn't work here.

  • I cringe at the though of hate speech (Score:3, Insightful)

    by ducomputergeek (595742) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:19AM (#21265693) Homepage
    I know it's Europe where the ideas of freedom of speech are a little different than on this side of the pond, but still every time I hear or read hate speech I shudder. Who gets to define what "hate speech" is?
    • I have lived in both Europe and in the US for years. I think that the American's idea of "freedom of speech" is dysfunctional. Most people have no idea what constitutes protected or unprotected speech. They think they can say just whatever the hell they want, whenever they want, in whatever forum they want (and in the case of political speech with as many dollars as they want). In reality speech in the US isn't like that, rather it is as legislated as it is Europe, albeit with different nuances.
      In answer to your question: They have laws made by parliaments in Europe which define protected or forbidden speech. Just like in America they have laws made by Congress which define protected or forbidden speech. It's just that in response to horrors of WWII, several European countries have enacted 'Don't make the same mistake twice' laws. Which forbid denial of the events or glorification of perpetrators in public events.

      I think you will find that the US has civil laws which can be used just as effectively end hate speech.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by faloi (738831)
      Who gets to define what "hate speech" is?

      The government, thankfully. They always know what's best for us. You'd have to be insane to say something negative about the government, because loosely defined enough hate speech laws might allow the government to jail opposition voices because they "could be seeking to disrupt public order or incite riots." We can't have riots, that would be double-plus ungood.
  • Terrorism is really begining to be an excuse for everything... What frighten me is to see that in France, the president talks about terrorism like an imminent threat against our country that nearly requiere martial law, while our last terrorism attemps go back 10 years ago and we have been livin peacefully since.
  • These particular terrorists are funded by oil producing nations, Iran and Saudi. They're doing it because they don't like the influence particularly the USA has within their nations. The US for instance is propping up the Saudi royal family, paying them with worthless bits of green paper and military aid. Most of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi, Osama bin Laden is Saudi. They see themselves as freedom fighters, fighting the great satan that is literally sucking their wealth dry, and, frankly, when Bernanke sw
  • thats a mighty slippery slope we are approaching that skirts perilously close to that line that we should not be crossing.

    and so it begins.....

  • I don't get it (Score:3, Interesting)

    by haeger (85819) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:39AM (#21265835)
    I really don't. How is this supposed to help? I don't see it.
    Also I don't understand the priorities. How many people were killed by terrorist actions last year in the EU? 100? 1000? And how many traffic deaths were there? How many died from obesity or diseases related to smoking?
    If they are concerned about protecting lives they should track how much candy or tobacco/alcohol people buy and use. If they monitor/forbid overconsumption of that it would probably save more lives.

    Yes, it would really suck to be blown up buy some nutter but the fact remains that I'm so much more likely to get killed in a car accident that the "terror threat" hardly deserves mentioning.

    I just don't get it. Why are people so dumb that they fall for these tricks.

    .haeger

    • You are not getting it because (Score:5, Insightful)

      by dk90406 (797452) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:52AM (#21266037)
      all these measures make no sense security wise what so ever. They are only designed to make the average EU citizen feel safer.
      This is just another of the knee jerk reactions that we have seen during the last 6 years. Politicians make a show of "competence" in order to protect the safety of the people. Classic "cover your ass" reaction.

      And you are right. The amount of people killed by terror in EU is minimal compared to traffic accidents, workplace accidents, domestic violence, pollution related deaths etc. But we are used to the above, but *terror* is new and unpredictable, hence it *seems* more scary.

      Sadly, the governments (and mainstream media) are helping the terrorists, by fueling the fear for terror, by constantly talking about it and making senseless measures against it.

      ----

      An annoyed European

  • Is there ANY evidence that all this crap works? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by jonwil (467024) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @08:41AM (#21265863)
    Is there ANY evidence at all that if this stuff (privacy violations, ID checks, data collection, profiling etc) was in place in the US before 9/11 that it would have had any effect in stopping the attacks? Or would it have stopped the London Underground bombings? Or the Spanish train bombs? Or the Bali bombs? Or any of the other terrorist attacks of the past 50 years?

    Measures like reinforced cockpit doors are good. As are measures to make passports harder to forge (including measures requiring that the information on the passport be stored electronically as well as physically and that said information be digitally signed against tampering such that only the governments have the private keys to digitally sign the information) And the measures designed to stop bombs from being taken onto aircraft disguised as otherwise harmless looking objects.

    Unfortunatly, the world has turned into a mass of sheeple who only care about their bread (i.e. mass-produced consumer goods made by the lowest bidder and full of hidden unwanted stuff like lead paint and illicit drugs) and their circuses (i.e. mass-produced media content made by big corporations designed to keep you distracted whilst other big corporations ruin the planet in the name of the almighty Dollar/Euro/Pound/Yen/etc) and are unlikely to stand up to the crap the governments of the world want to inflict on them (especially since the few people who DO care enough to stand up to the governments end up in secret jails that make Auschwitz look like Club Med)

  • Your #1 EU Bomb-Making Info-Site! (Score:3, Informative)

    by adnonsense (826530) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @12:18PM (#21269079) Homepage Journal

    Get it here! How To Make A Bomb [how-to-make-a-bomb.eu] .

    (My personal reaction after reading earlier comments by Mr. Frattini, who's not only the EU's anti-terrorism muppet but is also responsible for "Fundamental Rights and citizenship", hahaha.)

  • Why? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by PPH (736903) on Wednesday November 07 2007, @02:48PM (#21271417)
    Why should the EU copy US procedures. I've always thought that most EU countries had tighter security surrounding air travel. Even after 9/11. I've been through airports in quite a few EU countries. Their security at entry points all appear to be trained (and armed) law enforcement personnel. In the US, it still appears to be minimum wage folks running the scanners. On the other hand, the US places its 'first string' people at customs. Sort of a stupid move if you want to catch someone blowing up an airplane (its too late) but not so stupid if your real motivation is to enforce economic restrictions and collect duties.

    This proposal seems odd for the same reasons. If you want to blow up an airplane, you find people with clean records and get them on board. Once the plane goes down, 13 years of archived records won't do you a bit of good. On the other hand, if you are trying to conduct espionage for other political or economic reasons, then this kind of data makes sense.

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