Airline security hard to get off the ground

Airline security measures due to come into effect in Europe in the coming year will increase IT costs and hit low-cost carriers particularly hard.

This week Spain became the first European country to require all airlines to collect and transmit advance passenger information (API) – including passport number, name, date of birth and nationality – before a traveller is allowed to fly.

Under an EU Directive all countries in the Schengen area, which does not include the UK, will be subject to the same requirement within 12 months.

The US already insists on API, so long-haul carriers such as British Airways (BA) have the necessary technology.

In March 2006, BA installed software to collect data from its departure control and booking systems. It outsources the data extraction and transmission to Amadeus, a third-party reservation system.

The US requirement, including the robust security measures needed to protect the data when it is transferred, has increased complexity and cost for BA. But the processes can now be used for Europe.

‘With the systems already in place, we have been able to extend it to send data to Spanish authorities and we can expand it further to include other European countries,’ said a BA spokesman.

But budget carriers now face extra costs. Meeting the needs of API requires upgraded check-in desks to capture the requisite data, additional back-end capacity to identify and store the files, as well as the ability to transmit the information securely.

Less-advanced infrastructure may also cause problems. Few low-cost airlines have automated passport readers, for example, and the manual input of API data could slow check-ins.

Ryanair, Europe’s biggest budget carrier, has a programme under way to upgrade its systems. But key problems are still to be resolved industry-wide, says IT director Eric Neville.

‘There is a question mark around how the API requirement will actually work in an airport,’ he said.

Neville believes a single standard for the transmission of data is needed.

'If all countries have different systems and requirements, then it will be a nightmare for airlines,' he said.

Unless the deadlines are staggered, airlines will struggle to cope, says Forrester Research analyst Henry Harteveldt.

If carriers are forced to scale up their systems to accommodate API information for a large number of countries on the same day, the sheer volume of data could be overwhelming.

‘Passengers might be better off flying with airlines that have established and tested systems when the requirement comes in across Europe,’ said Harteveldt.

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