At its headquarters in the Estonian capital of Tallinn, on the Baltic Coast, a little-known European Union body is building one of the world’s largest biometric identity databases. 

The Central Identity Repository (CIR) is designed to hold the records of 300 million people and will be the centerpiece of a new, integrated system that allows police forces across the EU to search and cross-check the records of immigrants and visitors from outside Europe. Established by eu-LISA, the EU’s cross border IT agency, CIR will cost at least $190 million to establish and $33 million a year to maintain. 

The CIR and its associated systems will not be completed until 2023 at the earliest, but the project, which was conceived as a counter-terrorism measure, has already faced criticism from human rights activists and observers. 

The ultimate aim of the scheme, known as “interoperability” in EU jargon, is to create a single collection of identity records that can be searched by police forces across the bloc. All holders of non-EU nationality will have their details stored, whether they are people with visas, asylum-seekers, undocumented migrants — or, potentially, EU citizens who also hold nationality in a non-EU state.