Editorial & Advertiser disclosure

Global Banking and Finance Review is an online platform offering news, analysis, and opinion on the latest trends, developments, and innovations in the banking and finance industry worldwide. The platform covers a diverse range of topics, including banking, insurance, investment, wealth management, fintech, and regulatory issues. The website publishes news, press releases, opinion and advertorials on various financial organizations, products and services which are commissioned from various Companies, Organizations, PR agencies, Bloggers etc. These commissioned articles are commercial in nature. This is not to be considered as financial advice and should be considered only for information purposes. It does not reflect the views or opinion of our website and is not to be considered an endorsement or a recommendation. We cannot guarantee the accuracy or applicability of any information provided with respect to your individual or personal circumstances. Please seek Professional advice from a qualified professional before making any financial decisions. We link to various third-party websites, affiliate sales networks, and to our advertising partners websites. When you view or click on certain links available on our articles, our partners may compensate us for displaying the content to you or make a purchase or fill a form. This will not incur any additional charges to you. To make things simpler for you to identity or distinguish advertised or sponsored articles or links, you may consider all articles or links hosted on our site as a commercial article placement. We will not be responsible for any loss you may suffer as a result of any omission or inaccuracy on the website.

Use of airline passenger data must be limited, top EU court says

Published by Wanda Rich

Posted on June 21, 2022

Featured image for article about Top Stories

By Foo Yun Chee

BRUSSELS (Reuters) -EU states may only gather the airline passenger data strictly necessary to combat serious crime and terrorism, Europe’s top court said on Tuesday, and banned the use of machine learning to harvest the data.

The Passenger Name Record Directive (PNR), adopted in 2016, allows police and justice officials to access passenger data on flights to and from the EU to combat serious crimes and maintain security in the 27-country bloc.

Rights groups however said data retention even by law enforcement and other authorities is an invasive and unjustified encroachment on fundamental rights to privacy and data protection.

In 2017, Belgium’s Human Rights League (LDH) and other rights groups challenged the PNR at a Belgian court, saying it allows the collection of too much data and could lead to mass surveillance, discrimination and profiling.

The court subsequently sought advice from the Luxembourg-based Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU).

“The Court considers that respect for fundamental rights requires that the powers provided for by the PNR Directive be limited to what is strictly necessary,” the CJEU said.

Judges said the PNR must be limited to terrorist offences and serious crime having an objective link, even if only an indirect one, with the carriage of passengers by air.

The CJEU said the extension of the PNR to intra-EU flights should only be allowed only if it is strictly necessary and open to review by a court or independent administrative body

“In the absence of a genuine and present or foreseeable terrorist threat to a member state, EU law precludes national legislation providing for the transfer and processing of the PNR data of intra-EU flights and transport operations carried out by other means within the European Union,” judges said.

The CJEU also said artificial intelligence technology in self-learning systems (machine learning) may not be used in collecting airline passenger data.

The case is C-817/19 Ligue des droits humains.

(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee; Editing by Jon Boyle)