Big Brother sits down next to you on a plane, train, and bus.
The Ministry of Transport is preparing a system under which every movement of yours across the country and abroad will fall into the hands of security forces almost instantly. Not "someday," but within 15–30 minutes after arrival.
Russia's Ministry of Transport has prepared a draft of a new order that significantly expands the collection of data on citizens' travel. Carriers and ticketing services will be required to transmit to the state database not only planned information, but also actual data on each trip. For airplanes and trains — within 15 minutes after a passenger arrives at their final destination; for buses, sea and river transport — within 30 minutes.
The database will include not only passport details and the route. It will also include phone numbers, email addresses, logins and password hashes from personal accounts on carriers' websites, as well as information about the bank cards used to pay for tickets. Each trip will be assigned a unique identifier that will link all of a passenger's actions — from ticket purchase to disembarkation. The data will be stored for seven years. Access to this system will be granted to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the FSB, and the Ministry of Transport itself.
The system has been operating since 2024, but in a reduced form — mainly based on planned information. Now the authorities want to close the "blind spots": to obtain confirmation that a person actually completed their trip, where they made a transfer, and what baggage they checked. Experts interviewed by independent publications say outright: the main goal is operational and investigative. Tracking the movements of case subjects, suspects, and witnesses will become significantly easier and faster — almost in real time.
Officially, the initiative is presented as a measure to enhance security and combat terrorism. Critics see it as another step toward total control: the state gains the ability to know in real time who is moving where and when, both within the country and beyond its borders. And to store that information for years.
The draft has not yet been finally approved, but it has already been published and is being actively discussed. If it is adopted as proposed, the habit of "just buying a ticket and going" will become yet another source of data for law enforcement agencies.
