New measures announced requiring airlines to provide Advance Passenger Information to Irish Immigration authorities
Date Published: 28-10-2011
The Minister for Justice, Equality and Defence, Mr. Alan Shatter, T.D., has signed the European Communities (Communication of Passenger Data) Regulations 2011. These require airlines to provide advance passenger data to Irish Immigration authorities for the stated purpose of “improving border control and combating illegal immigration.”
These Regulations transpose European Council Directive 2004/82/EC of 29 April 2004 (on the obligation of carriers to communicate passenger data) into Irish law and will apply to all passengers on inbound flights to Ireland from outside the EU.
Airlines are asked to:-
- provide data on passengers from machine readable passports in advance of flights arriving in Ireland
- transmit the data captured to the Irish Immigration authorities after the completion of a flight’s check-in.
The Department for Justice and Equality states that these new requirements will facilitate checks by immigration authorities in Ireland against watch-lists, in order to identify persons of interest before passengers arrive at border control.
For more information
See Department of Justice and Equality press release