Italy Providing Misleading Information on Schengen Entry Bans, EU Report Says

An internal European Union report obtained by Statewatch says that the Italian police are providing misleading information to individuals asking if they are banned from entering the Schengen Area.

When a person is issued an entry ban, they are prohibited from entering the territory of the Schengen area for a period of time. 

However, in line with the data protection law, people have the right to access information stored about them by government authorities to learn whether they are subject to an entry ban or not, Schengen.News reports. 

According to the internal EU report, this is not the case for those who request such information from the Italian authorities. As explained in the document, the Italian authorities issue a standard response to all requests made for entry bans. 

In their response, the Italian authorities say that “the data subject has no entry bans in the Schengen territory.” 

Since the response is the same for everyone and does not include any additional information, the document says that it is considered misleading as states can refuse to give such a response only in certain circumstances.

Italy Faces Challenges in Monitoring EU Databases Due to Staffing Issues 
In addition to the above-mentioned, the report further says that Italy’s data protection authority faces challenges in supervising the use of the two EU databases – the Schengen Information System (SIS) and the Visa Information System (VIS). 

According to the document, these issues occur due to insufficient staff and the already-provided data is not easily comprehensible by non-Italian speakers. 

Entry bans are stored in SIS, which is a policing and immigration database. Figures show that at the end of 2023, the database registered over 600,000 entry bans. 

Despite the information being recorded in the system, the EU argues that the information about the SIS published by the Ministry of Interior of Italy needs to be provided in such a way that is understandable for others too.

The draft recommendations also call on the Italian authorities to make sure that the authority responsible for data protection regularly inspects the agencies using the SIS and VIS.

Source: https://schengen.news/italy-providing-misleading-information-on-schengen-entry-bans-eu-report-says/