Which objective(s) does the Commission pursue?

The proposals aim at enhancing the ability of the system to fight terrorism and cross-border crime, improving border and migration management and ensuring an effective information exchange between Member States to increase the security of European citizens.

The Commission proposals aim at strengthening the operational effectiveness and efficiency of the Schengen Information System (SIS). Improved information exchange between Member States should lead to reducing administrative burden on law enforcement officers and border guards across the participating countries.

The proposals enhance an already streamlined communication process and clearly set out the necessary procedures and actions to take. This will simplify the internal communication process in each Member State and reduce the administrative burden on SIRENE staff.

Estimated savings and benefits

Strengthened personal data protection, enhanced security of the system, and improved information sharing and cooperation between Member States are direct benefits of the proposals. Smoother communication among Member States regarding wanted criminals, missing people and lost and stolen objects or documents will improve the visibility and enforcement of returns decisions and entry bans for participating Member States. However, these benefits are difficult to quantify in financial terms.

Savings are also expected as there should be less fruitless search for people who are subject to a return decision but have voluntarily returned. More effective and efficient policing and border control should also imply savings for Member States.

Outcome of Legislative Procedure

The three new Regulations were adopted on 28 November 2018 and entered into force on 28 December 2018.

The co-legislators respected the objectives of the Commission proposals but made the following changes:

• Business continuity and resilience of the Schengen Information System (technical architecture): the co-legislators agreed on optional national copies (as opposed to mandatory national copies, as proposed), the possibility to have shared national copies and shared back-up infrastructures and active/active operation of Central SIS;

• Fight against terrorism: the co-legislators added the obligation to report hits on terrorism-related alerts to Europol and made Europol part of the Supplementary Information Request at the National Entries information exchange (SIRENE);

• Stronger provisions on missing children and people in need of protection: the co-legislators extended the scope of SIS to include preventive alerts on certain categories of vulnerable children and adults in addition to children at risk of parental abduction;

• Prevention of irregular migration through the enforcement of entry bans and return decisions: more harmonisation was achieved but at the same time a sufficiently high threshold was maintained for refusal of entry alerts linked to security reasons;

• Variable geometry: the return proposal is defined by the co-legislators as a development of the Schengen acquis and not as a hybrid instrument as in the Commission proposal;

• Stronger data protection rules: the co-legislators added references in specific articles to the General Data Protection Regulation and the Police Directive on data protection, including in the context of exchange of data on return with third countries, and defined the number of fingerprints (up to 10)  and palm prints (up to 2) to be attached to the alerts;

• Biometrics: while maintaining the Commission proposals whereby the use of facial recognition technology remains limited to regular border checks, the co-legislators empowered the Commission to adopt a delegated act to extend the use of this technology beyond the context of regular border checks;

• Implementing and delegated acts: the co-legislators agreed to refer delegation to the Commission to adopt delegated acts to extend the use of facial image technology beyond the context of regular border checks and the addition of new object alert categories; other empowerments to adopt implementing acts remained as proposed by the Commission;

• Entry into force and application: a phased approach for the entry into operation of the new functionalities with a binding deadline of three years following the entry into force was agreed. This three year deadline is realistic and will be helpful for the Commission in order to ensure timely implementation of all new functionalities at central and national level. Nevertheless, due to delays in the execution of testing including delays encountered by some Member States, the deadline for the start of application set out in the regulations [28 December 2021] could not be met because the necessary conditions are not fulfilled.

The legal acts need to be implemented in different phases:

1) implementation phase I (to be ready for entry into operation by end 2019): Europol and members of the teams deployed by the European Border and Coast Guard Agency are allowed to access all categories of alerts in SIS;

2) implementation phase II (to be ready for entry into operation by end 2020): all Member States are able to use the Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS) for searches on the basis of fingerprints in SIS;

3) implementation phase III: full implementation of all provisions of the new SIS regulations.

Regulation (EU) 2018/1861 and Regulation (EU) 2018/1862 foresee in their final Articles [Article 66(2) for SIS Borders and Article 79(2) for SIS Police] the full entry into application of the provisions on a date set by the Commission in a decision.

The adoption of the Commission decision is subject to the following two conditions:

The Commission decision can only be adopted after verification that three conditions have been met:

(a) the implementing acts have been adopted by the Commission;

(b) Member States have notified the Commission that they have made the necessary technical and legal arrangements to process SIS data and exchange supplementary information according to the new Regulations;

(c) eu-LISA has notified the Commission of the successful completion of all testing activities with regard to CS-SIS and to the interaction between CS-SIS and N.SIS.

According to the current planning, as approved by the Council in its meeting of 8 December 2022, it is scheduled that the regulations would be applicable as from 7 March 2023.