On May 8, 2019: François BAUSCH, Minister of Homeland Security, and Bertrand KIENTZ, Chief Executive Officer of the software editor company Conztanz, signed the statutes of the Economic Interest Group “Luxembourg agency for the promotion of a unified interface in the field of passenger data exchange for security purposes”.

Access the Press release in French from the Luxembourg Police.

This Economic Interest Grouping (EIG) operates in the context of the exchange and use of air passenger record data, in order to prevent and detect terrorist offenses and serious forms of crime. The EIG, of which the Luxembourg State holds 75% of the shares and Conztanz 25%, aims to develop, operate, support and maintain a single IT gateway for this data as well as promote the platform to other States.

This gateway is called the API-PNR Gateway (related “Advanced Passenger Information” and “Passenger Name Record”) and functions as a central communication node. It proposes to securely process, validate, transform and route messages sent by airlines or their representatives (certified data providers) to the analysis systems of the Member States of the European Union and to other countries – without, however, storing information.

Created on the initiative of  Conztanz and Grand Ducal Police’s experts, the tool is innovative in the sense that it considerably simplifies the flow of information. Indeed, thanks to this solution, the airlines as well as the States using the platform as technical intermediary just have to set up one point of connection to the gateway, instead of building myriad of connections between each others. After having been fed with the airlines information, the API-PNR Gateway dispatches the information in an automated and secure way to the actors of the concerned states. This approach opens up new opportunities for sharing security information systems between States and for pooling development, maintenance and infrastructure costs.

​For now, the tool is mainly used for data exchange between the airlines operating in Luxembourg and the Grand Ducal Police. The aim is to promote the platform so that the competent authorities of other countries can also benefit from it. In addition, this common solution would allow all stakeholders to reduce their costs in the long term through economies of scale and the establishment of a unique connexion for each state – instead of one to each airline.
Similarly, the API-PNR Gateway would be economically attractive for airlines, otherwise forced to put in place individual communication procedures with each national authority. Therefore, the API-PNR Gateway as a central communication node would be a “win-win” solution for both the participating States and the air operators. Initial contacts with other States, european institutions and international organizations have already generated strong interest.

The signature of the statutes of the Economic Interest Group “Luxembourg Agency for the promotion of a unified interface for the exchange of passenger data in the field of security” marks a new moment for the development and promotion of the solution API-PNR Gateway.

In parallel, have been appointed on the Board of Managers of the GIE : Stéphane LEVY, acting Director of the Information Processing Department of the Grand-Ducal Police, Florent GONIVA, Director of the International Relations Department of the Grand-Ducal Police, as the State representatives and Eric ISABEY, in charge of Security & Government affairs of Conztanz, as Conztanz representative.