UK increases attempts to track air passengers as safety precautions

Due to threat from terrorists and criminal forces, the UK government has started scrutinising immigration processes carefully. One method that is causing controversy is the government's study of passenger information on flights in and out of Britain. Given the huge numbers of people, to the tune of 200 million numbers travelling in and out of the UK, the government feels it is imperative to implement security measures such as tracking passenger data.

By year 2015, one expects to see the number of travellers to increase from 200 to 300 billion. However, there are quite a few opinions that differ from that of the UK government and feel that privacy of passengers is severely infringed by these methods. The UK minister for immigration, Liam Byrne is supposed to declare the policy of investigating travellers on Eurostar as well. Apart from this, passenger details will be maintained of people on flights operating within Britain and those between states belonging to the EU and Britain. This information has been shared by well-known travel experts www.globalvisas.com.

This is in direct opposition to EU documents that ask for passenger information to be investigated only in cases of terrorism and ‘serious crime'. The UK Home Ministry feels that EU terminology needs to be broadened to accommodate everyone's opinion. The EU has indicated repercussions will follow if the British government chooses to interpret rules in their own way and use passenger data beyond the provisions made.

This concern on the part of the UK government for safety measures seems reasonable given that Britain is one of the worlds most sought after tourist attractions.

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