Estonia has applied for managing the EU's Central Data Bank

| 2009.08.27

Estonia is the only one from European Union (EU) countries that has applied to manage the EU's Central Data Bank which would combine all existing data systems into a single record. The planned IT agency, as a result of announced competition in June 2009, could be located in Estonia. It would combine all existing data from existing systems – the Schengen SIS II system, a biometric visa data from non-EU citizens, SIS and refugees’ fingerprints database EURODAC. Several high-ranking EU politicians and experts have already been ascertain and recognized Estonian competence in the IT field. Many of them admit that they are very surprised by Estonian development in the IT field.

Politically, this issue is very delicate in the European Union, but Estonians are the first and the only ones who applied for this project. Currently a large part of EU personal data is stored on servers in France. SIS II and SIS are stored in Austria, but EURODAC data in Luxembourg.

In case of a success, Estonia would manage the European Union's personal database as well as flow of travellers and refugees within the EU.