US Government demands access to European police databases and biometrics [video]

Post by bpodgursky » Fri, Jan 02, 2026, 7:56 PM UTC

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #20

bpodgursky wrote: post #15

This is for the visa-free travel program (VWP). The US wants to check whether people who show up for vacation without a visa have a criminal record. If European countries don't want to grant access that's their right, but it's not at all an unreasonable thing for the US to want access to, if the data exists and is easy to check. If someone is a convicted sex trafficker or drug dealer or whatever, I'm fully in favor o…

> The US wants to check whether people who show up for vacation without a visa have a criminal record. Surprisingly, (at least some) European countries will tell you directly whether someone has a specific criminal record (given that someone's consent.) If that's what the US wanted, then that could be given directly. But that's not what the US is asking for.

Post by hyghjiyhu » Fri, Jan 02, 2026, 8:08 PM UTC

bpodgursky wrote: post #21

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The US wants to check whether people who show up for vacation without a visa have a criminal record. Surprisingly, (at least some) European countries will tell you directly whether someone has a specific criminal record (given that someone's consent.) If that's what the US wanted, then that could be given directly. But that's not what the US is asking for.

lol no, I don't think the US is asking for the subset of criminal records which the criminals have consented to sharing.

Post by Arodex » Fri, Jan 02, 2026, 9:21 PM UTC

bpodgursky wrote: post #24

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno. If people crime, are convicted, and serve their time, I'd say they paid their debt. I know some people don't think that way though. Better hope they never find themselves in that situation.

For a variety of reasons, it's pretty common in many western countries for convicted first/second offenders even for pretty serious crimes to not serve much time. You see that in the UK for sex crimes for example, where offenses with "mitigating" cultural factors are punished extremely lightly. Which again is that country's choice, but it's not one that countries accepting their tourists are obligated to accept.

Post by bpodgursky » Fri, Jan 02, 2026, 9:39 PM UTC

Arodex wrote: post #25

bpodgursky wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a variety of reasons, it's pretty common in many western countries for convicted first/second offenders even for pretty serious crimes to not serve much time. You see that in the UK for sex crimes for example, where offenses with "mitigating" cultural factors are punished extremely lightly. Which again is that country's choice, but it's not one that countries accepting their tourists are obligated to accept.

Of course, amongst all the examples you could choose, you had to give a xenophobic example. There were no other example you could think of. You are seriously stating that the country who elected a sex offender (on top a being many other things like being a con man and an insurrectionist who tried to overturn a legitimate election and got away with it - hey, isn't that "offenses with "mitigating" cultural factors puni…

Post by wolvoleo » Fri, Jan 02, 2026, 9:50 PM UTC

letmetweakit wrote: post #11

In Belgium, our Minister of Defence talks about buying services from Palantir, and wants to let Oracle build a cloud for the Defence department. He even dares to say that this will result in our own Sovereign Data Streams [1]. I can imagine this is a guy that will have not a single issue sharing the requested data with the US Government, even in the face of the recent hostility of the US towards the EU. [1] https://x…