Air passenger data deal with US defended by Kenneth Clarke

Agreement will be ‘crucial to improving security’, says justice secretary, and personal information will be stored for 15 years The justice secretary, Kenneth Clarke, has defended a joint American-European agreement to store the personal data, including credit card details, of millions of transatlantic air passengers for 15 years. Clarke said that despite strong concerns about civil liberties, the agreement to share passenger name records with the US department of homeland security was crucial to improving US and EU security. His data protection speech in Brussels on Thursday followed the Guardian’s disclosure of the text of the draft US-EU agreement on sharing passenger name records in the wake of negotiations concluded last Friday. But the disclosure also revealed increasing opposition in the European parliament to the deal, with a warning from Claude Moraes, the socialists and democrats group civil liberties spokesman, that the data would not be used just to combat terrorism and serious crime. Clarke called for a “flexible approach” to data protection in Europe. He also backed the campaign by the home secretary, Theresa May, to ensure that passenger data on flights within Europe were also collected and stored for up to five years. “The UK agrees with the large majority of other member states who think that it makes no sense to collect passenger name records information on flights to and from third countries without also collecting the same information on flights between EU members states,” Clarke told the British Chamber of Commerce in Brussels. “We cannot provide the protection we all wish to see without working with our non-EU partners, given the threats we face are global in nature. We should continue to engage closely with the United States on passenger name records and data protection – it is crucial to improving US and EU security.” But Moraes, Labour MEP for London, said socialist MEPs were “absolutely appalled” by the text of the US-EU passenger name record agreement. “There is no justification for a 15-year retention period of people’s personal details,” Moraes said, adding that it compared with 5½ years for a similar agreement with Australia, and five years for the EU’s own airline data collection plans. The agreement left the “door wide open” for the use of the personal data – which includes bank card details, home addresses and mobile phone numbers – for “mission creep” purposes way beyond combating terrorism and serious crimes.”It is also wrong that we should adopt the position that because it is for anti-terrorist purposes, we can’t question whether it is a proportionate response,” Moraes said. The German and French governments have already expressed concerns about the length of the retention period with Australia. That agreement and the US deal need to pass the scrutiny of the European parliament before they can come into effect.ends Data protection Data and computer security Civil liberties – international UK civil liberties Immigration and asylum Kenneth Clarke Alan Travis guardian.co.uk

Posted by on May 26, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.