EU Courts Rule Against PNR Sharing with USA
The European Court has ruled the US/EU treaty on data sharing around air travelers is not legal. (I’m not saying “about air travelers” because I read Ed Hasbrouck, and thus know that PNRs contain data on more than just the travelers.) That’s not why I’m posting. I’m posting because of this choice quote from the New York Times, “European Court Bars Passing Passenger Data to U.S.:”
“The planes will continue to fly and the security data will continue to be exchanged,” [DHS Spokesman Jarrod Agen] said. “There wont’ be any lowering of the data protection standards or effect on passengers or disruption to air traffic in the near term.”
Of course not. The data protection standards can’t get any lower, unless maybe we posted it all on the internet.
Plenty of that going on:
http://www.amhersttimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1710&itemid=27
But the suspect showed officers something they had not seen before. Browsing a government Web site, he pulled up a local divorce document listing the parties’ names, addresses and bank account numbers, along with scans of their signatures. With a common software program and some check stationery, the document provided all he needed to print checks in his victims’ names – and it was all made available, with some fanfare, by the county recorder’s office. The site had thousands of them.