Airline Ryanair is facing the Irish privacy watchdog. The investigation is to determine whether ID checks carried out by Ryanair violate the GDPR law.
Ireland’s privacy watchdog DPC is announcing an investigation against Ryanair. The authority says it has received multiple complaints about the airline’s verification process for customers who purchased their tickets through an external platform, such as price comparison sites or online travel agents.
Ryanair obviously prefers customers to purchase their tickets directly from them. Those who do go through an external platform will be subject to additional ID checks. Ryanair does not hide its distaste for external ticketing platforms: CEO Michael O’Leary has repeatedly described such services as “piracy. Most recently, the company won a legal battle against Booking.com for illegally scraping data from its website.
DPC will now investigate whether those ID checks are compliant with GDPR laws. Among other things, Ryanair uses biometric identification methods to determine customers’ identities. How Ryanair processes this data will determine whether Ryanair is accused of a breach. The investigation will be international.
In the meantime, Ryanair seems confident. “Customers booking through unapproved parties must go through a simple verification process that is fully GDPR compliant. This verification ensures that these passengers make the necessary security declarations and immediately receive all security and regulatory protocols required by law when traveling,” the company responded via The Register.