ABSTRACT
The establishment and use of computerized systems for the collection, generation, exchange and analysis of information and personal data are a key part of how European Union (EU) home affairs are conducted today. The first of these networks, the Schengen Information System (SIS), was rolled out in 1995. Since then, the number and scope of home affairs computerized systems in operation and under consideration by the EU institutions has increased dramatically. A 2008 study found fourteen home affairs databases and information systems in operation, under development (the second-generation SIS and the Visa Information System, VIS), under consideration or adopted as a legislative proposal (Geyer 2008). In its first and to this day only overview of home affairs information management, the European Commission (2010) identified seventeen arrangements for collecting, generating, exchanging and analyzing information and personal data in operation, under implementation or consideration in the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ). The document identified four additional arrangements involving the exchange of information and personal data between the EU and third countries: three agreements on Passenger Name Record data (PNR) with Australia, Canada and the USA, and the EU–US agreement on the US Terrorist Finance Tracking Program (TFTP). The same document, finally, announced that the European Commission was planning legislative proposals on three additional information systems, and considering three more, for a grand total of twenty-seven measures. A 2012 study, using a slightly different methodology, came up with a more conservative total of twenty measures in operation, under implementation or consideration (Bigo et al. 2012).
