Description

The Schengen Information System is currently in use within Europe helping law enforcement agencies work closer together to combat international crime and improve safety in the EU.

Via the Police National Computer (PNC), law enforcement officers will be able to share and use certain information with other police organisations from all Schengen countries. Use of this information will allow them to locate missing persons, criminals and stolen property from other countries - increasing our opportunities to deal with cross-border crime and extending their reach across Europe.

Schengen Information System II (SIS II) is currently in development.

Purpose

The purpose of the Schengen Information System is to hold a number of specific alerts on people, vehicles and property.

There are five types of alerts that law enforcement officers can either create or respond to depending on the circumstances and policy:

• persons wanted for extradition to another member state
• missing persons
• requests for a locate report on witnesses and people for court appearances
• request information reports on major criminals and linked vehicles
• stolen vehicles, trailers, firearms, identity documents and registered banknotes

When operational, officers will be able to perform PNC checks on foreign vehicles, persons and ID documents from within the Schengen countries. If that person or object has an alert placed against them, the officer will be notified and provided with information in order to take the correct initial action. Likewise, law enforcement officers in the other Schengen countries can check the details of a UK national, registered vehicle, passport or driving licence.

Who will be using it?

It will be used by all Law Enforcement Officers who have access to PNC, which include the UK Police Service, HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC), the United Kingdom Border Agency (UKBA) and a number of other investigative organisations.

Benefits to the police service and others

Among other benefits, this joined-up approach to policing will help:

• extend the reach of police enquiries and investigations across Europe
• disrupt the movement of criminals and stolen goods and vehicles within Europe
• locate people on behalf of courts
• recover stolen property
• track and find missing and wanted persons within Europe
• reduce the opportunity for identity fraud

Background

The Schengen Aquis was brought about by five Member States (France, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg) allowing freedom and movement of persons through the lowering of borders in 1995 and the sharing of information on people and property of interest. This was incorporated into EU law in 1999. Since then, the legal basis has driven the use of SIS and any subsequent changes to the operation and membership of the system

In May 2000 the UK Government application to join the Schengen Convention was approved by the EU.  As part of this, the UK has agreed to implement the Schengen Information System (SIS) in the UK. The SIS allows participating countries to exchange information on wanted and missing people, and stolen and missing objects.  It also allows for tracing of people for investigations.  The system works through a set of alerts, based on Articles in the Convention.  The UK will receive all alerts except those relating to refusal of access to the EU, which the UK is not signed up for.

The SIS works on a 'hub and spoke' set up with a central server in Strasbourg sending and receiving data from national servers in each Member State. These servers are connected to the relevant national system, in the UK this is the Police National Computer (PNC). When a PNC user carries out a check on a person or object, a search will be undertaken on both databases and a hit/no hit result returned. It was rolled out as SISI for the original Member States, with an enhanced version, SISII for the accession countries including the UK and Ireland to join.

Further information

See the Joint Supervisory Authority's website Data Protection on SIS