EU-US agreement on airline passenger name record data

SUMMARY OF:

Agreement between the United States of America and the European Union on the use and transfer of passenger name records to the United States Department of Homeland Security

Decision 2012/471/EU on the signing, on behalf of the EU, of the Agreement between the United States of America and the EU on the use and transfer of passenger name records to the United States Department of Homeland Security

Decision 2012/472/EU on the conclusion of the agreement between the United States of America and the EU on the use and transfer of passenger name records to the United States Department of Homeland Security

WHAT IS THE AIM OF THE AGREEMENT AND THE DECISIONS?

The aim of the agreement is to set a legal framework for the transfer of passenger name records (PNR) data by carriers operating passenger flights between the European Union (EU) and the United States to the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the subsequent use of that data by the US DHS.

The main purpose is to prevent, detect, investigate and prosecute terrorist offences and related crimes, as well as other serious cross-border crimes punishable by a sentence of imprisonment of at least 3 years.

Decision (EU) 2012/471/EU authorises the EU’s signature to the agreement. Decision 2012/472/EU approves the agreement itself.

KEY POINTS

PNR data is the information voluntarily provided by passengers and collected by air carriers during the reservation and check-in procedures. It includes information such as name, dates of travel and travel itinerary, ticket information, contact information, payment/billing information, travel agent, seat number and baggage information.

Key points of the EU-US PNR agreement are as follows:

The use of PNR data will be limited to the prevention, detection, investigation and prosecution of terrorist offences or transnational crime.
There will be a legally binding commitment from the US Department of Homeland Security to inform the Member States and EU authorities of any EU-relevant intelligence leads flowing from the analysis of these PNR data.
There will be a robust data protection regime with strong data security and integrity requirements.
Individuals will have the right to access their PNR data held in the United States and, if the information is inaccurate, it must be changed or removed.
There will be limited usage of PNR data for a period of 10 years for transnational crime and 15 years for terrorism. After 6 months, personally identifiable information of PNR data will be masked out and after 5 years PNR data will be moved to a dormant database with additional controls.

DATE OF ENTRY INTO FORCE

The agreement entered into force on 1 July 2012.

BACKGROUND

PNR is the information passengers provide to the airline or travel agent when booking a flight. This information has been used by law enforcement authorities around the world for many years to identify serious criminals and terrorists. It was used, for example, to catch the terrorists behind the planning of a suicide bombing in the subway in New York in 2009. It was also used after the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai and to catch the plotter behind the planned attack in Times Square in 2010. This information is also an extremely important tool to identify drug smugglers.

The 2012 EU-US agreement on PNR replaces the EU-US agreement of 2007.

For more information, see:

Passenger Name Record (PNR) (European Commission).

MAIN DOCUMENTS

Agreement between the United States of America and the European Union on the use and transfer of passenger name records to the United States Department of Homeland Security (OJ L 215, 11.8.2012, pp. 5-14)

Council Decision 2012/471/EU of 13 December 2011 on the signing, on behalf of the Union, of the Agreement between the United States of America and the European Union on the use and transfer of Passenger Name Records to the United States Department of Homeland Security (OJ L 215, 11.8.2012, pp. 1-3)

Council Decision 2012/472/EU of 26 April 2012 on the conclusion of the agreement between the United States of America and the European Union on the use and transfer of passenger name records to the United States Department of Homeland Security (OJ L 215, 11.8.2012, p. 4)