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ETIAS Central Unit The ETIAS Central Unit shall be operational 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It shall have the following responsibilities: in cases where the automated application process has reported a hit, verifying in accordance with Article 22 whether the applicant’s personal data correspond to the personal data of the person having triggered that hit in the ETIAS Central System, any of the EU information systems that are consulted, Europol data, any of the Interpol databases referred to in Article 12, or the specific risk indicators referred to in Article 33, and where a correspondence is confirmed or where after such verification doubts remain, launching the manual processing of the application as referred to in Article 26; ensuring that the data it enters in the applications files are up to date in accordance with the relevant provisions of Articles 55 and 64; defining, establishing, assessing ex ante, implementing, evaluating ex post, revising and deleting the specific risk indicators as referred to in Article 33 after consultation of the ETIAS Screening Board;

ensuring that the verifications performed in accordance with Article 22 and the corresponding results are recorded in the application files; carrying out regular audits of the processing of applications and of the implementation of Article 33, including by regularly assessing their impact on fundamental rights, in particular with regard to privacy and personal data protection; indicating, where necessary, the Member State responsible for the manual processing of applications as referred to in Article 25(2); in cases of technical problems or unforeseen circumstances, facilitating where necessary the consultations between Member States referred to in Article 28 and between the Member State responsible and Europol referred to in Article 29; notifying carriers in cases of a failure of the ETIAS Information System as referred to in Article 46(1); notifying the ETIAS National Units of the Member States of a failure of the ETIAS Information System as referred to in Article 48(1); processing requests for consultation of data in the ETIAS Central System by Europol as referred to in Article 53;

providing the general public with all relevant information in relation to the application for a travel authorisation as referred to in Article 71; cooperating with the Commission as regards the information campaign referred to in Article 72; providing support in writing to travellers who have encountered problems when filling in the application form and have requested assistance through a standard contact form; maintaining a list of frequent questions and answers available online; ensuring follow-up and regularly reporting to the Commission on reported abuses by commercial intermediaries as referred to in Article 15(5). The ETIAS Central Unit shall publish an annual activity report. That report shall include: statistics on: the number of travel authorisations issued automatically by the ETIAS Central System; the number of applications verified by the ETIAS Central Unit; the number of applications processed manually per Member State; the number of applications that were refused by third country and the grounds for the refusal; the extent to which the deadlines referred to in Article 22(6) and Articles 27, 30 and 32 have been met.

general information on the functioning of the ETIAS Central Unit, its activities as set out in this Article and information on current trends and challenges affecting the conduct of its tasks. The annual activity report shall be transmitted to the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission by 31 March of the following year.