Effective January 8, 2025, the United Kingdom began requiring citizens of the USA and most other countries who previously could enter the UK without visas for short visits for tourism and some other purposes to obtain a so-called Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA) as a new precondition for admission to the UK for those purposes.

The UK ETA is significant both in its own right and as a case study in what’s wrong with similar requirements and systems already in effect in other countries, including the USA, Canada, Australia, and in preparation in many more countries including all members of the European Union.

The requirement for an ETA is intended for a pupose fundamentally contrary to international treaties on aviation and the rights of refugees, and has been implemented in ways that facilitate surveillance of ETA applicants and arbitrary control by a few private companies of who can and who can’t travel to the UK.

We hope the EU and other countries will learn from and avoid, not emulate, this bad example set by the UK.

The UK ETA system is not the first of its kind, but it’s the first that most US citizens, except those who have traveled to Australia, will encounter. US citizens don’t generally see what foreign citizens have to go through to enter the US, even as tourists or in transit. And US and Canadian citizens visiting each other’s countries are exempt from the electronic travel authorization requirements that their governments apply to visitors from other countries.

But while it may be a new experience for US citizens, the UK ETA is similar to what’s already required for most tourists and short-term business visitors to the USA, Canada, or Australia. And the UK ETA is similar to the system that the EU plans to roll out for citizens of the US, Canada, UK, and many other countries.

Australia pioneered this concept with its ETA system, beginning in 1996 (and modified several times since them). The USA launched its ESTA system, modeled on the Australian ETA, in 2009. Canada followed with its eTA system in 2016. Now the UK is rolling out its similar ETA system in 2025.

The EU EES and ETIAS schemes were planned to go into operation several years ago, sooner than the UK ETA, but have been postponed repeatedly. The most recent announcement by EU authorities is that EES — a system for collecting mug shots and fingerprints of visitors to the EU, as the US already does with visitors —  will be launched sometime in 2025, and ETIAS — an electonic travel authorization like the US ESTA and the UK ETA — will go into effect six months after the EES launch. (The EU is also considering a related system for a “travel permission app” with problematic implications.)

Acronym soup and national variations aside, what’s an ETA? How do ETA requirements violate international law? What’s wrong with the way the UK has implemented its ETA program? Read More →