it
en
fr
es
eo
Nl
Passenger-Data Deal May Be Near
Tweet
BRUSSELS-U.S. and European officials are set to lock horns again this week on the use of airline-passenger records amid signs the two sides are nearing a compromise between privacy and law-enforcement priorities.
The meeting is the latest in a series of attempts to avoid a new conflict between the U.S. and the European Union, which are already at loggerheads over steel, Iraq and genetically modified foods.
Publicly, the two sides are locked in a stalemate on so-called passenger-name records, too: The U.S. insists on collecting a wide range of information about every airline passenger headed for American soil as a tool against terrorism and threatens to make life difficult for airlines that refuse to cooperate. The EU forbids its airlines from providing such information because that violates EU privacy laws, and powerful national-privacy authorities are threatening to sue airlines that comply with the U.S. requests.
Privately, however, Europe is searching for ways to meet the U.S. halfway, as European law-enforcement officials back the U.S., at least in part, in demanding access to data that can be used to fight terrorists and organized crime, for example by cross-checking information to detect false passports. "The debate was being dictated by data-privacy officials," says one U.S. government official familiar with the state of discussions. "We've succeeded in broadening it."
One major sticking point is how long to keep the data, which include a passenger's name, address, phone number, itinerary, seat number, e-mail address, and birthday.
Italian Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu, who chairs the committee of Europe's top law-enforcement officials through the end of this year, said recent developments in Italy underlined the utility of archiving some data many years after their original purpose is fulfilled.
Far from being deleted after a few years, as privacy advocates demand, some information "has to be kept as long as possible," Mr. Pisanu said.
"The problem isn't the length of availability of data," he added, "but the conditions of security in which they're kept. Instead of keeping them for four years in a place that's not secure, I'd rather see them kept 10 years in a place that's safe."
To emphasize his point, Mr. Pisanu cited the arrest late last month in Italy of six alleged Red Brigades terrorists suspected of killing an important figure advising the government on labor-market overhauls. Police identified the suspects in part through old telephone-traffic datadata that would have been unavailable under a new Italian law set to enter force Jan. 1. The law would require such data to be destroyed after 21/z years. Under current law, the data are generally kept for five years, and sometimes longer.
"If we had limited our conservation of this information to five years, today there'd be terrorists walking the streets of Italy who instead are behind bars," Mr. Pisanu said, noting that two of the arrested suspects had confessed to being members of the Red Brigades, a leftwing group responsible for numerous shootings and bombings.
In the wake of the arrests, Italian lawenforcement officials offered a compromise plan that Mr. Pisanu says could apply to Italian telephone records and transAtlantic airline-passenger records: Hand the data over to privacy authorities after a certain time. There, they could remain available, but only under court order. Mr. Pisanu said the proposal, accepted in principle by Italian privacy advocates, could be a model for the U.S.-EU dispute.
Stefano Rodota, head of Italy's national-privacy authority, said in order for such data to be stored in the U.S, "there'd have to be an independent authority, but for the moment there isn't any."
The U.S. says it is willing to entrust old data to a privacy officer within the Department of Homeland Security who is responsible directly to the U.S. Congress.
Mr. Pisanu, for his part, says there are "plenty of safe places in the U.S.," notably in public hands, where data could be kept under lock and key unless needed.
So far, no airline has been sued in the dispute, but Marco Cappato, a member of the European Parliament, on Friday lodged an official complaint with the European Commission, the EU's executive agency, demanding that it enforce strict EU-privacy laws.
The meeting is the latest in a series of attempts to avoid a new conflict between the U.S. and the European Union, which are already at loggerheads over steel, Iraq and genetically modified foods.
Publicly, the two sides are locked in a stalemate on so-called passenger-name records, too: The U.S. insists on collecting a wide range of information about every airline passenger headed for American soil as a tool against terrorism and threatens to make life difficult for airlines that refuse to cooperate. The EU forbids its airlines from providing such information because that violates EU privacy laws, and powerful national-privacy authorities are threatening to sue airlines that comply with the U.S. requests.
Privately, however, Europe is searching for ways to meet the U.S. halfway, as European law-enforcement officials back the U.S., at least in part, in demanding access to data that can be used to fight terrorists and organized crime, for example by cross-checking information to detect false passports. "The debate was being dictated by data-privacy officials," says one U.S. government official familiar with the state of discussions. "We've succeeded in broadening it."
One major sticking point is how long to keep the data, which include a passenger's name, address, phone number, itinerary, seat number, e-mail address, and birthday.
Italian Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu, who chairs the committee of Europe's top law-enforcement officials through the end of this year, said recent developments in Italy underlined the utility of archiving some data many years after their original purpose is fulfilled.
Far from being deleted after a few years, as privacy advocates demand, some information "has to be kept as long as possible," Mr. Pisanu said.
"The problem isn't the length of availability of data," he added, "but the conditions of security in which they're kept. Instead of keeping them for four years in a place that's not secure, I'd rather see them kept 10 years in a place that's safe."
To emphasize his point, Mr. Pisanu cited the arrest late last month in Italy of six alleged Red Brigades terrorists suspected of killing an important figure advising the government on labor-market overhauls. Police identified the suspects in part through old telephone-traffic datadata that would have been unavailable under a new Italian law set to enter force Jan. 1. The law would require such data to be destroyed after 21/z years. Under current law, the data are generally kept for five years, and sometimes longer.
"If we had limited our conservation of this information to five years, today there'd be terrorists walking the streets of Italy who instead are behind bars," Mr. Pisanu said, noting that two of the arrested suspects had confessed to being members of the Red Brigades, a leftwing group responsible for numerous shootings and bombings.
In the wake of the arrests, Italian lawenforcement officials offered a compromise plan that Mr. Pisanu says could apply to Italian telephone records and transAtlantic airline-passenger records: Hand the data over to privacy authorities after a certain time. There, they could remain available, but only under court order. Mr. Pisanu said the proposal, accepted in principle by Italian privacy advocates, could be a model for the U.S.-EU dispute.
Stefano Rodota, head of Italy's national-privacy authority, said in order for such data to be stored in the U.S, "there'd have to be an independent authority, but for the moment there isn't any."
The U.S. says it is willing to entrust old data to a privacy officer within the Department of Homeland Security who is responsible directly to the U.S. Congress.
Mr. Pisanu, for his part, says there are "plenty of safe places in the U.S.," notably in public hands, where data could be kept under lock and key unless needed.
So far, no airline has been sued in the dispute, but Marco Cappato, a member of the European Parliament, on Friday lodged an official complaint with the European Commission, the EU's executive agency, demanding that it enforce strict EU-privacy laws.
