Russia wants to increase control over citizens' airline ticket purchases

The Russian authorities are planning to expand the list of airline booking data that airlines will be required to hand over to the state.

Source: Russian media outlet Izvestia, referring to sources in the aviation market and government agencies

Details: Currently, the automated centralised database of personal data on passengers, operated by the Federal State Unitary Enterprise ZashchitaInfoTrans, which is subordinate to the Ministry of Transport of the Russian Federation, mainly contains personal data on passengers:

• passenger's full name
• date of birth,
• details of the document used to make the booking,
• points of departure and destination of the passenger,
• date of travel,
• gender and citizenship,
• phone number and email address.

[Federal State Unitary Enterprise ZashchitaInfoTrans is a leading system integrator of the Russian transport industry in the field of transport and information security, as well as the implementation of information technologies - ed.]

In the future, new information may be added to these categories. For example:

• information about the method of payment for the ticket (name of the bank, last four digits of the account number or card used to make the payment),
• passenger's account details on the airline's website and the Internet Protocol (IP) address of the computer from which the information was transmitted during the booking,
• baggage data,
• the date when the passenger booked the ticket,
• with whom they booked it and whether any changes were made to the booking.

The sources clarify that there are no exact new categories of information that will be transferred to the authorities.

An official with whom the media outlet spoke said that such plans are indeed being discussed. The official said that this can be taken in different ways, but such actions are allegedly "related to the desire to increase the level of security, in particular in the transport sector, in this difficult time".

The press service for Rostec [a state-owned defence conglomerate], as well as other operators of Russian ticketing systems, said they operate in accordance with the rules set by the state, and therefore, if the authorities ask for additional data, they will comply with these requirements.

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