Federal Act
on Foreign Nationals and Integration
(Foreign Nationals and Integration Act, FNIA)¹

¹ The SEM shall main­tain a pas­sen­ger in­form­a­tion sys­tem (API Sys­tem) in or­der to:

a.

im­prove bor­der con­trols;

b.

com­bat un­law­ful entry in­to the Schen­gen area and trans­it through the in­ter­na­tion­al trans­it zones of the air­ports;

c.

com­bat in­ter­na­tion­al or­gan­ised crime and ter­ror­ism, es­pi­on­age and pre­par­a­tions for il­leg­al trad­ing in weapons and ra­dio­act­ive ma­ter­i­als and il­leg­al tech­no­logy trans­fers.³²²

^1bis The API Sys­tem con­tains the data in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 104 para­graph 3 and the res­ults of com­par­is­ons in ac­cord­ance with para­graph 4.³²³

² In or­der to check wheth­er air car­ri­ers are ful­filling their duty to provide data, and to en­force pen­al­ties un­der Art­icle 122b, the SEM may re­trieve data in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 104 para­graph 3 from the API Sys­tem.³²⁴

³ In or­der to im­prove bor­der con­trols and to com­bat un­law­ful entry in­to the Schen­gen area and trans­it through the in­ter­na­tion­al trans­it zones of the air­ports, the au­thor­it­ies re­spons­ible for checks on per­sons at the Schen­gen ex­tern­al bor­ders may re­trieve data in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 104 para­graph 3 from the API Sys­tem.³²⁵

^3bis If it is sus­pec­ted that a per­son is pre­par­ing for or com­mit­ting of­fences un­der Art­icle 104 para­graph 1^bis let­ter a, fed­pol may re­trieve the data in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 104 para­graph 3.³²⁶

⁴ The data in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 104 para­graph 3 let­ters a and b shall be auto­mat­ic­ally and sys­tem­at­ic­ally com­pared with the data from RI­POL, the SIS, the ZEMIS and the In­ter­pol data­base for stolen and lost doc­u­ments (ASF-SLTD).³²⁷

⁵ The data in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 104 para­graph 3 and the res­ults of the com­par­is­ons in ac­cord­ance with para­graph 4 may only be used fol­low­ing the ar­rival of the flight con­cerned in or­der to con­duct crim­in­al or asylum pro­ceed­ings, or pro­ceed­ings un­der the law on for­eign na­tion­als. It must be erased:

a.

when it is es­tab­lished that no pro­ceed­ings of this type will be con­duc­ted, or two years after the date of the flight con­cerned at the latest;

b.

on the day after the rul­ing in pro­ceed­ings of this type takes full leg­al ef­fect.

⁶ The data may be re­tained in an­onymised form for stat­ist­ic­al pur­poses bey­ond the dead­lines set out in para­graph 5.