Schengen · SIS · Data Rights · Regulation (EU) 2018/1861
An Article 24 alert in the Schengen Information System can close the entire Schengen area at a single border crossing, without warning. The decision is taken by one Member State. The consequences are felt across all twenty-six. We challenge it.
The Mechanism
The Schengen Information System is a centralised law enforcement database shared across all 26 Schengen states. An Article 24 alert — an entry ban — is entered unilaterally by a single issuing Member State and is immediately effective throughout the entire Schengen area. Border authorities in every participating country can see it and act on it.
The issuing state is not required to notify the subject before the alert is entered. There is no adversarial process, no right to be heard in advance, and no automatic review. The first indication many subjects receive that they are listed is a refusal at a border crossing — often in a country entirely separate from the state that issued the alert.
The legal standard for entry into the SIS is set by Article 24(1) of Regulation (EU) 2018/1861, which requires that the measure represent a genuine, present, and sufficiently serious threat to public policy, public security, or national security. In practice, this threshold is frequently applied too broadly. Alerts are entered without adequate assessment of proportionality, on the basis of spent convictions, or in circumstances where the subject holds a current visa issued by the same state that entered the alert — a direct irreconcilability that goes to the validity of the underlying decision.
The consequences are immediate and severe: refused entry at airports and land borders across all 26 Schengen states, visa refusals, and in some cases detention pending removal. Unlike an INTERPOL notice, there is no independent international body to whom a challenge can initially be directed — the primary challenge route runs through the domestic law of the issuing state, with parallel remedies available in data protection law.
Legal Grounds
Each of the following grounds is capable of independently requiring erasure or correction of an Article 24 alert. In practice, multiple grounds frequently apply simultaneously.
The alert must relate to a genuine, present, and sufficiently serious threat to public policy, public security, or national security. Spent convictions, minor offences, or allegations that fall short of this threshold cannot lawfully sustain an entry ban.
A current visa granted by the same Member State that entered the alert is legally irreconcilable with the continued existence of that alert. The irreconcilability is itself evidence of procedural failure in the original assessment and grounds for deletion.
Article 54 of Regulation (EU) 2018/1861 requires that the subject be informed of the existence of the alert and the reasons for it, subject to limited exceptions. Failure to notify is a procedural ground for challenge in its own right.
Even where the statutory threshold is technically met, the measure must be proportionate to the legitimate aim pursued. Family ties, professional connections, and the specific circumstances of the subject are all material to the proportionality assessment.
Our Services
SIS challenge work requires coordinated action across multiple legal frameworks simultaneously. We manage each component of the challenge and align them around a single strategic objective: erasure of the alert.
We have experience acting in cases that present one of the most legally clear-cut grounds for challenge: a client refused entry at a Schengen border despite holding a valid visa issued by the same Member State that had entered the Article 24 alert.
The irreconcilability is structural. Article 24(1) of Regulation (EU) 2018/1861 requires that the individual represent a genuine and present threat. Where the same state has simultaneously determined that person is safe to hold a current visa, it cannot simultaneously maintain that they represent the kind of threat an entry ban is designed to address. The two decisions cannot coexist. One must give way — and the alert, as the more recent exercise of discretion in our favour, is the target.
In parallel, we submit an Article 18 GDPR application for interim restriction of processing at the earliest possible stage, so that the client can move freely while the challenge is pending rather than being repeatedly refused at borders across the Schengen area throughout what may be months of proceedings.
Stradalex
SIS challenges are time-sensitive. An Article 24 alert causes concrete harm at every Schengen border crossing from the moment it is entered — refused visas, refused entry, disrupted travel and business. Every month the alert remains active is a month of ongoing prejudice.
Early instruction makes a material difference. The earlier we can assess the legal basis of the alert, identify the applicable grounds for challenge, and file the Article 18 GDPR interim restriction application, the sooner we can stop the ongoing harm while the substantive challenge is pursued.
We act across all Schengen states and coordinate with local counsel in the issuing Member State where judicial proceedings are required. Our approach is to run the administrative, data protection, and judicial channels simultaneously rather than sequentially — shortening the timeline and maximising pressure on the issuing authority to delete the alert.