The law, passed in a global final vote, had votes in favour from opposition party PSD, ruling party PS and the CDS, and votes against by the BE, PCP and ENP parties, and an abstention by the PAN party.

The bill, which follows a directive approved by the European Parliament in 2016, regulates the transfer and treatment by air carriers of passenger name records (PNR) in order to prevent terrorism and serious crime.

In the bill the Government emphasises that "in order to protect the rights of privacy and non-discrimination, restrictions on the transfer, processing and preservation of PNR data are foreseen."

The European directive aims to prevent, detect, investigate and prosecute terrorist offences and serious crime and thereby strengthen the internal security of the European Union (EU).

The PNR requires air carriers to communicate the data of travellers arriving in or departing from the EU to Member States to help prevent and combat terrorism.

Portugal's Council of Ministers approved the proposal in May and in July Portugal was one of the countries advised by the European Commission to report on whether the European directive had already been implemented in national law as the deadline had already expired in May.