INTERPOL Stolen/Lost Travel Document Database (SLTD) was created in 2002 following the 9/11 terrorist attack.

SLTD is a searchable repository for “stolen, lost, revoked, invalid and stolen blank” documents. It is a tool aiming to prevent illicit international travel. Although its initial scope was limited to stolen or lost travel documents, later the categories of invalid and revoked were added to its scope.

A country’s passport issuing authority, through its corresponding National Contact Bureau, is the only entity authorized to enter and modify records in SLTD pertaining to the loss, theft, invalidation, or revocation of its national travel documents.

Although SLTD is a very essential international tool to prevent the usage of stolen, lost, invalid or revoked travel documents, there are several countries that abuse their authority to enter records in SLTD to repress and intimidate their dissidents living abroad.

The Committee for the Control of Interpol’s Files underlines the problems with the SLTD database for years. According to the CCF, the SLTD database shall not be used to locate a person wanted by a member country or to restrict his/her mobility as to force him/her to return to the country of origin.[1] According to the CCF’s 2018 report, “invalid” would mean expired, damaged or destroyed travel documents.[2]  The CCF, however, finds revocation as a vague term and states, therefore, that it is a cause of concern. The CCF also stated the importance and necessity that the General Secretariat of INTERPOL provides with the member states a limited list of appropriate purposes to record data in that database in order to avoid any misuse and asked to be provided with the list of identified appropriate purposes.[3]

As there is still no definition of revoked passport, in case of a request for the removal of data indicating a passport as revoked, the CCF examines whether the concerned NCB acted in compliance with its law with regard to revocation of a passport and whether it was in line with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

As it is indicated in a CCF decision adopted during the 107th session, Article 11(1) of the Rules on the Processing of Data (RPD) provides that “data processing in the INTERPOL Information System should be authorized with due regard for the law applicable to the NCB, national entity or international entity and should respect the basic rights of the persons who are the subject of the cooperation, in accordance with Article 2 of the Organization’s Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to which the said Article refers.” And Article 12 of the RPD requires that data processed in INTERPOL’s files is “accurate, relevant, not excessive in relation to its purpose and up to date”.

It is essential that INTERPOL General Assembly adopts a definition of invalid and revoked travel document to prevent the abusive usage of SLTD database.

Ali Yildiz Legal provides legal service for submission for removal/deletion/rectification of false entries in the SLTD database, and has successfully obtained the deletion of entries in more than twenty cases, after which the persons concerned were able to travel internationally without any problems.

[1] Report No. 3, ACTIVITY REPORT OF THE COMMISSION FOR THE CONTROL OF INTERPOL’S FILES FOR 2017

[2] ACTIVITY REPORT OF THE COMMISSION FOR THE CONTROL OF INTERPOL’S FILES FOR 2018

[3] Report No. 3, ACTIVITY REPORT OF THE COMMISSION FOR THE CONTROL OF INTERPOL’S FILES FOR 2017