Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)
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303. To ask the Minister for Justice and Equality following the recent installation of automated passport checks in Dublin Airporty, if data on the entry of Irish citizens into the State is retained; if so, the length of time for which such data retained; the persons that would have access to such data and the purposes of same. [21574/13]

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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The Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Services (INIS) recently commenced a six month trial of automated border control gates (e-gates) at Pier A/D of Terminal One in Dublin Airport. The e-gates offer certain categories of arriving passengers (passport holders from EU states - including Ireland, EEA states and Switzerland who are over 18 years of age and hold a first generation biometric passport i.e. with an electronic chip which contains the holder's facial image) a 'self-service' type channel to clear immigration control.

The gates' systems operate by first reading the passport to establish that the holder is a person who is entitled to use the gate. Persons under 18 years of age or a person who is not a passport holder from the geographical areas mentioned above will be automatically refused entry to the gates. For those persons who can use the gates, the facial image contained in the passport is compared electronically to a live photograph taken at the gate to verify that the person presenting at the gate is the person to whom the passport was issued. For the trial period, once the comparison is made, the passport data is deleted except for some anonymised data which will be used for statistical purposes.