The entry-exit system will replace the passport stamp for third-country nationals traveling to the Schengen zone for short stays. The system includes a European central database in which a third-country national’s entire travel history is available, with all his entries, exits or refusals of entry. The purpose of EES is to improve the effectiveness of border controls and field checks and to gain better visibility of overstayers. The system includes biometric data such as fingerprints and facial images, which aid in the verification and identification of a traveler.

EES is described in Regulation EU 2017/2226.

The VIS is an already existing system for managing Visas at the European level. This system will be extended under Smartborders to support interoperability with the other systems. This will allow the VIS and its users to use the information from the EES to better decide on visa applications. Because of the centralized nature of the VIS, it also helps deter fraud. This system also contains biometric data of third-country nationals, as well as a calculator to inform services and third-country nationals about their stay and visas.

VIS is described in Regulation EU 2008/767.

Currently, Europe does not have information, prior to travel, on who crosses borders and their history. To solve this, ETIAS is being set up as a travel authorization system. A third-country national requiring a visa must submit an application before traveling to the Schengen zone. Based on this application, various databases of Smartborders and Europol are checked, combined with a risk analysis, in order to see and evaluate whether the third-country national poses a potential risk. If the person poses a risk, an assessment can be made not to grant him travel authorization. This authorization is a mandatory condition of entry, but not a guarantee of entry. A border guard can still refuse the person at the border despite a valid travel authorization. The purpose of ETIAS is to contribute to detecting terrorist activities and increasing the security of the Schengen zone.

ETIAS is described in Regulation EU 2018/1240.

SIS is a European database that contains all alerts. These are alerts of persons, vehicles, weapons and other prohibited objects,… SIS is also an already existing system that will be renewed in the framework of Smartborders, to ensure interoperability with other systems.

SIS is described in Regulation EU 2018/1860 and EU 2018/1861.

The interoperability project aims to support all Smartborder systems with generic, shared components. It includes the ESP (European Search Portal), which is a central search engine to retrieve data from Smartborders, the CIR (Central Identity Repository) which aims to provide 1 unique source of data per identity, the MID (Multiple Identity Detector) which is able to compare identities and build links between identities, SBMS (Shared Biometric System), which contains all the biometric data of an identity and CRRS (Central Repository for Reporting and Statistics) which aims to provide a source across all smartborder projects for statistical and reporting purposes.

Interoperability is described in Regulation EU 2019/817.

In addition, Smartborders consists of multiple other projects, which currently have less priority on the European roadmap or are less relevant to DVZ.