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?

What’s an Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA)?

An “electronic travel authorization” isn’t called a visa, but the distinction is purely semantic. An ETA has all the attributes of a visa. The only reasons not to call an ETA a visa are (1) to maintain a diplomatic fiction that citizens of certain countries are being  allowed “visa free” entry for some types of visits, and (2) to dampen foreign visitors’ objections to being required to having to get a visa for the types of visit for which a visa formerly wasn’t required. Some other countries including Türkiye impose essentially the same requirement for an electronic visitor permit, but call it an “e-visa” rather than the euphemistic “ETA”.

An ETA is not a guarantee of admission to the country, but neither is a visa or e-visa. A visa or ETA is one step of several, including examination at the airport or border, in one of several alternate pathways to applying for admission. People with valid visas, e-visas, or ETAs can be, and are, turned away every day on arrival in the US, UK, and other countries. Conversely, not having a visa or ETA doesn’t mean that someone won’t be admitted to the country. Asylum seekers, in particular, arrive and are legally admitted to the US, UK, and other countries every day without visas or ETAs, and often with no ID or papers at all. Not having or being able to obtain ID documents from a government from which you are fleeing may be evidence, on arrival in a place of refuge, in support of your asylum claim.

Another way to conceptualize an ETA is as a “visa lite”. The application process for an ETA is usually simpler and quicker than that for a visa, and the fee less. Typically, citizens of more favored nations are allowed to apply for short visits for tourism or other limited purposes with only an ETA, while citizens of less favored nations, or those wanting to stay longer or get permission to work, are required to get full visas. Citizens of the most favored nations may still be allowed to enter for certain puposes with neither visas nor ETAs.

For example, citizens of the nation most favored by the US for immigration purposes, Canada, are allowed to enter the US as tourists or in transit with no visa or ESTA. Citizens of countries in the US Visa Waiver Program (VWP) can enter the US as tourists or for other limited purposes with only an ESTA and not a visa. Citizens of all other  countries must obtain a US visa (which requires a much higher fee and much more supporting documentation than an ESTA, an in-person interview at a US consulate or embassy, and often months of waiting for a decision) for even a short visit as a tourist, to attend a conference, or merely to change planes in the US in transit between other countries.

Similarly, citizens of the nation most favored by the UK for immigration purposes, Ireland, can enter the UK without a visa or ETA. Citizens of certain other favored countries including the US (as of January 8, 2025) and member states of the EU (as of April 2, 2025) can enter the UK for short visits for limit purposes with an ETA. Citizens of other countries must go through the process of obtaining a standard UK visa, even for short visits as tourists.

An ETA is an electronic travel authorization, meaning that it’s applied and paid for over the Internet, through a website or smartphone app. That’s represented as a convenience for applicants. It also means, though, that the government issuing the ETA,  and possibly also commercial intermediaries involved in issuing and paying for it, are able to link your passport details to Internet identifiers, the form of payment (credit or debit card or bank account number or digital wallet) you use, and device identifiers if you use an app to apply.

Even if the application form for an ETA is much simpler than the one for a standard visa, the ETA application process links your passport to financial, Internet, and telecom identifiers and intermediaries. That can enable more surveillance and profiling than a standard visa applied for in person or by mail through an embassy or consulate and paid for with cash or a postal money order purchased for cash. The UK ETA implementation exemplifies that problem.

How do ETA requirements violate international law?

Both visas and ETA are entry requirements to certain countries, by citizens of certain countries, for certain purposes, types, or durations of stay.

As it says on the tin, though, an electronic travel authorization is intended to control travel, not just entry. The goal of an ETA scheme is to restrict and control travel, including departures from other countries, before a would-be entrant arrives at a border or port of entry and has a chance to apply for admission. An ETA is a travel permit, not an entry permit. Entry decisions are still made only after arrival at the destination.

If an ETA were intended solely as an entry requirement, it could be requested, and granted or denied, on arrival — at a kiosk or counter in the immigration hall, for example. Those who wanted to save a little time on arrival, or find out the decision in advance, could be given the option to apply in advance, without making pre-departure applications or approvals mandatory. ETA decisions are largely automated, and generally made in seconds or minutes, so any time saving from requiring applications before departure would be minimal.

ETAs make sense only as departure controls. The explicit or implicit intention  of a national government that imposes an ETA requirement for foreign visitors is that airlines won’t allow anyone who doesn’t already have an ETA to board a flight to that country.

The problem with this is that, as the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights has pointed out, it’s entirely illegal. Denial of boarding to an otherwise-qualified paying passenger on the basis of entry requirements of the destination country violates both aviation and human rights  treaties to which the USA, UK, Canada, Australia and all or almost all other countries that have implemented ETA schemes are parties.

Article 13 on “Entry and Clearance Regulations” of the Chicago Convention on Civil Aviation — the fundamental treaty governing international air travel — provides that entry requirements of a state that is a party to that treaty apply only “upon entrance into or departure from, or while within the territory of that State”.

Entry requirements of a destination country such as possession of a visa or ETA have no extraterritorial applicability in any other country, such as when you are boarding a flight in some other country, regardless of its destination. An airline cannot legally deny you boarding in country X because it thinks you don’t meet the entry requirements of country Y.  And as the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights has also pointed out, it’s impossible to adjudicate an asylum claim or determine whether you are or will be admissible on that basis until after you arrive in a destination country.

If you are deemed inadmissible to country Y, country Y can deny you admission when you arrive — and not before — whether or not you have a visa or ETA, unless you are entitled to protection as a refugee pursuant to the  1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, another treaty to which the USA, UK, Canada, and Australia are all parties.

That “unless” is the key to the real purpose of ETA programs. By inducing airlines to illegally deny passage to would-be travelers without ETAs or visas, national governments hope to frustrate the right to asylum by preventing refugees from reaching the border of, or an airport in, a country of refuge.

If refugees are prevented from leaving other countries (including those where they are under threat of persecution) and traveling to another country, that destination country won’t have to adjuducate their applications for asylum. Every time a refugee reaches a place of sanctuary or is granted asylum, that’s a victory for human rights. But to those who oppose freedom of movement and the right to asylum, keeping refugees an ocean away through extraterritorial attempts to control who can board flights at foreign airports seems like a solution to the “problem” of asylum seekers.

But that’s a “solution” that violates the rights of asylum seekers and the obligations of countries that are parties to these treaties. Article 31 of the Convention Relating to the Staus of Refugees, made aplicable by the 1967 Protocol, provides that:

The Contracting States shall not impose penalties, on account of their illegal entry or presence, on refugees who, coming directly from a territory where their life or freedom was threatened in the sense of article 1, enter or are present in their territory without authorization, provided they present themselves without delay to the authorities and show good cause for their illegal entry or presence.

ETA requirements, especially when coupled with carrier sanctions imposed on airlines that do their duty as common carriers to transport all would-be passengers including asylum seekers, are an illegitimate and overreaching assertion of extraterritorial jurisdiction over departures from other countries. Their intended victims are asylum seekers.

What’s wrong with the way the UK has implemented its ETA program?

Even within this framework of a fundamentally unlawful and malevolent program, the UK ETA program is considerably worse than it needs to be, in ways that serve to enable greater surveillance and control of travelers by governments and private communications and financial intermediaries involved in ETA processing.

To be fair, we should note that most of the problems with the UK ETA scheme also afflict the US ESTA scheme. And we should also note that the UK ETA application process is marginally better than the Australian one. You can only apply for  an Australian ETA on a smartphone (so that your passport can be linked to a phone number and device identifiers),  through an app distributed only through Google or Apple, with location services enabled (so the Australian government and Google or Apple can tell where you are when you apply), and with near-field communications enabled so that your phone can read and transmit to the Australian government (and possibly Google or Apple) all of the information including the digital mug shot encoded on the RFID chip in your passport.

The UK Home Office tries hard to persuade you to use their ETA app, but at least for now you can apply for a UK ETA through a website, not just through an app, and without reading the RFID chip in your passport (although all US passports now include RFID chips).

The fee for a UK ETA is only £10 (US$12), although legislation has already been introduced in Parliament to raise the fee to £16 (US$20). But you can’t apply in person or by mail through a UK consulate or embassy, pay the fee over the counter or by mail,  or pay in cash or with a postal money order. You can only pay the ETA fee though the ETA app or on the ETA website using Google Pay, Apple Pay, VISA, or Mastercard.

This means that (1) you have to link your ETA and passport info to your Google Pay, Apple Pay, VISA, or Mastercard account info, enabling ID-linked surveillance of movements and financial transactions — especially if you use the same form of payment while traveling in the UK — by the UK government and whichever of those four companies you use to pay for your ETA, and (2) if Google Pay, Apple Pay, VISA, and Mastercard decide they don’t want you as a customer (they reserve the right to refuse service to anyone) or decide not to process a payment from you to the UK Home Office, you can’t get an ETA.

The UK government undoubtedly has bank accounts in the US for its embassy and consulates, but it hasn’t chosen to make those available for ETA payment acceptance, as it could easily do if it allowed you to apply for an ETA at an emabssy or consulate or by mail.

Is there any way to separate your payment to the UK Home Office for an ETA from the bank, credit, or debit card accounts you use for other purposes?  If there is, we haven’t found it.

Our first thought was to try to pay for an ETA with a prepaid VISA or Mastercard debit card purchased anonymously for cash. Cards like this are readily available, including at many US Post Offices. But because of “know your customer” (KYC) financial surveillance mandates imposed on financial institutions by the US government, none of the debit cards we found available for cash sale in the US  are valid for payments to merchants outside the US.

There are prepaid VISA or Mastercard debit cards that can be purchased in the US for cash and used for payments to at least some UK and other non-US merchants. The most popular of these, the Chime VISA card, which can be topped up with cash at any Walgreens, has more than seven million US customers. But (1) activating or using a Chime card (or any other prepaid debit card valid for international use by a US customer) requires providing ID information, typically a selfie and a copy of your passport or other ID, and (2) Chime, other similar card issuers, and their customers are at the mercy of merchants and payment processors, many of which choose not to accept these card at all, or not for payments to international merchants, out of fear of US government sanctions.

What does this mean for ETA payments? The UK Home Office uses Worldpay to process all VISA or Mastercard payments for ETAs for US citizens. In effect, this gives Worldpay — a privately-held US company — veto power over who in the USA can or can’t get a UK ETA.If Worldpay chooses not to process your payment, the UK Home Office won’t get your application or even know that you’ve tried to apply.

ETA payment options vary accoridng to your citizenship. JCB, a Japan-based competitor to US-based VISA and Mastercard, has been appointed to process ETA payments for citizens of some Asian countries, but not the US. Workdpay is the only option for US citizens.

We tried, but Worldpay won’t process ETA payments to the UK Home Office from Chime VISA debit cards. So far as we can tell, Worldpay won’t process international payments from any cash-funded debit cards issued in the US.

The most you can do to partially delink your ETA payment details from any credit or debit card number you might use for other purposes or while traveling in the UK is to use a card that allows you to request a virtual card number for one-time use. But that gives only limited protection, since the issuing bank always knows which accounts one-time numbers are associated with, and can use that information or provide it to governments.

You could get someone else to pay for your ETA, using their credit or debit card. But that would permanently link them and their finances to you in UK government (and Worldpay) files, and set them up for additional surveillance.

Your only option as a US citizen if you can’t get an ETA — perhaps because Worldpay decides not to process your payment  — is to apply for a Standard Visitor visa to the UK, for a fee of  £115 (US$140 ). You might be able to pay that Standard Visa fee in cash or with a money order at a UK consulate or embassy, but maybe not — the UK Standard Visitor visa application is also online, and it might also have to be paid through Worldpay.

If Worldpay decides it doesn’t like you or your form of payment, you can’t travel to the UK.

Who are these guys, and how and why were they given this unique power?

We have many questions about the UK Home Office’s choice to appoint Worldpay as the sole gatekeeper for ETA payments and thus for travel to the UK, and Worldpay’s choice not to accept cash-funded debit cards for international (or perhaps for any) payments. But neither Worldpay nor the UK Home Office resonded to our repeated requests for comment.

We emailed Worldpay repeatedly, starting more than a week ago, but have received no response. A spokesperson for the UK Home Office asked us to submit our questions by email, which we did. But a week later, we’ve received no reply, despite follow-up voicemail and email messages.

If you’ve tried to obtain a UK ETA without setting yourself up for even more surveillance of your movements and  finances, please let us know what you tried and how it went.