European discussions on PNR and CRS privacy

I’ll be in Europe for much of April in the run-up to the European Parliament vote on whether to approve an “agreement” with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for DHS access to airline reservation (PNR) data collected in the European Union. Check my schedule for any updates or additional events, but as of now, here’s where I’ll be and what I have planned:

• Thursday, 8 April 2010 (Brussels, Belgium): Speaker on the proposed agreement between the EU and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security on transfers of Passenger Name Records (PNRs) from the European Union to the DHS at a public hearing on “Protection of Personal Data in Transatlantic Security Cooperation: SWIFT, PNR & Co. - which way forward?”, hosted by Jan Philipp Albrecht, Member of the European Parliament. 14:00-17:00, European Parliament, Brussels, room ASP 1G-3. Agenda; live Webcast (14:00-17:00 Brussels time, 8-11 a.m. USA Eastern time, 5-8 a.m. USA Pacific time); handout (my slides with annotations).
  
  
• Monday-Tuesday, 12-13 April 2010 (Oxford, UK): European Privacy Open Space conference. Info and registration: http://www.PrivacyOS.eu. Presentation by Edward Hasbrouck on “PNR as a case study of privacy and data protection in practice”. Agenda (wiki, subject to change): https://www.privacyos.eu/wiki/index.php/Oxford
  
  
• Wednesday-Friday, 14-16 April 2010 (Berlin, Germany): re:publica conference on blogs, social media and the digital society. Panel discussion Friday, 16 April, 15:00-16:00, Kalkscheune workshop room 2, Privacy across the Atlantic? Perspectives on EU-US data sharing, with Jan Philipp Albrecht (Member of the European Parliament), Eddan Katz (Electronic Frontier Foundation), and Edward Hasbrouck; mdoerated by Ralf Bendrath. Info: http://re-publica.de/10/en/
  
  
• Monday-Thursday, 19-22 April 2010 (Strasbourg, France): European Parliament consideration and plenary vote on whether to approve an agreement with the U.S. DHS on transfers of PNR data from the European Union to the DHS.

My main goal for the trip is to help inform Europeans who don’t understand how much information about them and their travel is already stored in the USA (even if they don;t travel to the USA!), the complete lack of protection for this information once it is transferred to Computerized Reservation Systems (CRS’s) in the USA, and the lack of compliance by CRS’s and other travel companies with existing EU privacy and data protection law and the “Safe Harbor” principles for data sent to the USA.

I’ll also be exploring interest from potential European participants in a joint long-term international coalition project to monitor the work of ICAO in setting international aviation security and travel document standards, as that relates to privacy, civil liberties, and human rights. If other readers are potentially interested in such a project, please get in touch.