I'm republishing this content
(with minor edits)
by Devon Nicholas (beingdevonnicholas)
since I, and my tech friends,
regard his content
extremely important to our
Personal and National Security
-------------------------------------------------------------
Congress forced the sale of TikTok because a Chinese company knew your behavioral data, your viewing habits, and your preferences.
But, here's a company called Amadeus IT Group, headquartered in Madrid, Spain
Amadeus IT Group is the largest travel technology company in the world. They run the global reservation and booking infrastructure that most airlines, hotels, and travel agencies operate on. More than 40% of the global travel distribution market.
Every time you book a flight through a travel agency or booking site, there’s a good chance Amadeus processed that transaction. You just didn’t know it.
Here is what Amadeus collects every time that happens:
- Your name
- Your passport number - Your date of birth
- Your nationality
- Your payment information
- Your itinerary — where you’re going and when
- Your dietary preferences
- Your special requests
- Your hotel loyalty records
- Even your frequent flyer miles
Amadeus’s own privacy documents confirm this.
They currently hold more than 12 billion records. You are in there. Most of us are.
Spain’s data protection agency fined Amadeus €14.4 million.
The reason: They were profiling passengers by
- Combining booking records with hotel loyalty data.
- Cross-referencing your previous travel records with where you stayed.
The investigation found that most travelers had no idea Amadeus was processing their data at all. Because Amadeus is invisible by design.
The airline sees you.
The hotel sees you.
The government sees you.
Amadeus sees all this simultaneously and you never signed anything with them.
Amadeus announced acquired a company called IDEMIA Public Security
for €1.2 billion in April 2026.
IDEMIA is a French company [aka Morpho, Safran, ORGA, Oberthur Technologies]
- The exclusive vendor for facial recognition at US airports.
- Runs the TSA PreCheck biometric enrollment for 17 million Americans.
- Holds the fingerprint and biometric databases for multiple US states.
- Screens every passport and visa applicant — more than 30 million Americans per year.
- In 2009, acquired 81% of the General /electric Company's GE Homeland Protection
- Developed Biometric Bank Cards
- Produced 3 BILLION identity documents (passports, ID cards. etc) worldwide in 2020
The US State Department gave IDEMIA an exclusive contract in 2018 with no competitive bidding
The justification: switching vendors would be too complicated
So they didn’t.
Let me put this together for you.
By mid-2007, Amadeus, a Spanish publicly traded company, had 12 billion records and will, when this acquisition closes:
- When you travel
- where you go,
- How you pay,
- What you eat on planes, and
- What hotels you stay in
- Your face
- Your fingerprints, and
- Your biometric identity. All of it held by a Spanish publicly traded company.
Amedeus’ largest shareholders include BlackRock, Fidelity, and Invesco; any of those sound familiar?
(cough cough* BlackRock) .
The company’s infrastructure was built during Trump’s first term through contracts that were no- bid.
Oh, one more thing…
IDEMIA has a relationship with ICE.
The One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBBA) allocated $5.2 billion specifically for modernizing ICE with real-time facial and fingerprint checks, and $673 million for biometric entry-exit systems at all ports of entry.
IDEMIA is the infrastructure at those ports.
The bill that passed is a direct funding mechanism for their existing contracts.
So when Amadeus closed this acquisition in April 2026, a single Spanish company now holds
1) your travel records,
2) your biometric identity, and
3) a contract relationship with the agency that is currently arresting some people for exercising their constitutional rights.
Source:
OBBBA biometric provisions, July 2025.
IDEMIA/DHS joint webinar, August 2024.
Biometric Update reporting, May 2026.
Congress held emergency hearings about TikTok.
They passed legislation to force the sale
The argument: a foreign company shouldn’t have access to Americans’ behavioral data and personal information.
TikTok knew what videos you watched.
But, Amadeus knows your passport number, your face, your fingerprints, your travel history, your payment information, and your hotel preferences. 12 billion records that can be cross referenced before you finishing packing for your trip.
FOOTNOTE
The acquisition closed in April-2026.
But only if people know this is happening; now you do. Please like, share and repost so we can get the word out.
NO ONE, (not a private company, not a public company, not the government) should have that amount of information about all American citizens.
So let’s stop them.
We the People are the most powerful force on Earth, these companies are no match for us.
Amadeus GDS Privacy Notice —
amadeus.com confirms data collected)
Amadeus | It’s how travel works.
Spain AEPD €14.4M fine — May 26, 2026
(confirms 12 billion records and profiling)
Amadeus acquired IDEMIA Public Security for €1.2B — April 29, 2026 (Amadeus press release)
IDEMIA exclusive passport contract — FedScoop, June 2018
IDEMIA TSA PreCheck contract HSTS0217COIA095
— federal procurement record 2017
IDEMIA exclusive airport facial recognition
— Private Equity Detention and Surveillance Tracker
All of it is public.
All of it was always there.
Someone just had to read it.
Related threads
The system reveals its logic:
Convenience is the alibi,
Integration the reality.
Amadeus fuses booking data with Idemia Public Security to produce a unified biometric subject— Your face as passport, profile, and product.
What appears as frictionless travel is, in truth,
the quiet abolition of anonymity through
infrastructural design.
