CIÉ and Facit’s Identity Cloak

Introduction

Córas Iompair Éireann (CIÉ) is Ireland’s state-owned public transport group and is the organisation behind Irish Rail, Bus Éireann and Dublin Bus. Established in 1945, CIÉ has been at the heart of Ireland’s transport evolution for nearly eight decades. Today, it plays a vital role in connecting communities, enabling economic growth and supporting Ireland’s transition to a sustainable, low-carbon future.

But in an era in which data protection is just as important as passenger safety, CIÉ has a modern problem: how to protect personal information – especially in video footage – while meeting legal and ethical obligations to the public.

About CIÉ: The Backbone of Irish Public Transport

The CIÉ Group operates as a holding company for three major subsidiaries:

• Iarnród Éireann (Irish Rail) runs the national rail network, including the DART and InterCity services.

• Bus Éireann manages intercity, regional and city bus services across Ireland.

• Dublin Bus provides the majority of public transport within the Greater Dublin area.

Together, these companies carried over 350 million passengers in 2023, supported by more than 12,000 employees.

Data Redaction in the Transport Sector

Video evidence is key to accident investigations and passenger claims. Other subject access requests received are for less serious matters such as lost property cases or, in what is becoming an increasingly litigious world.

The majority of requests are handled by the individual train or bus operating companies but when a claim is attached, they are referred to the holding company, CIÉ.

However, fulfilling SARs in the transport sector can be complicated.

Many cameras are mobile, installed on buses or trains that move between routes and depots. In some instances, retrieving and locating the correct footage can take time, which shrinks the already tight 30-day window for GDPR compliance response.

Delays in finding footage sometimes compresses the time available for redaction, which puts pressure on staff and systems. As SARs became more frequent - and sometimes more contentious - this process risked becoming a bottleneck.

The public’s growing expectation for fast, cost-free responses only added to the pressure, which turned what should be a routine compliance task into a major operational challenge.

The Solution: Automating Redaction with Facit’s Identity Cloak

In 2023 CIÉ introduced Facit’s Identity Cloak, an AI-powered video redaction platform that automates the masking of sensitive data.

According to Paul Whelan, the results were immediate:

“It’s made an unbelievable difference - like night and day. Even in complex scenes, Identity Cloak finds and redacts the vast majority of sensitive material automatically and minimises the need for manual intervention.”

Where a single video might have taken four hours to process manually, Identity Cloak now takes around 30 minutes - a 90% reduction in redaction time.

The reduction in fulfilment time has freed up staff to focus on other governance tasks and has reduced the need for expensive outsourcing.

Results: Faster, Safer, Smarter Compliance

Automated redaction has helped CIÉ not only meet GDPR deadlines but also build public trust by demonstrating a proactive approach to privacy.

With the backlog of SARs significantly reduced, Paul’s team can now handle new requests more efficiently, even those with complex datasets that might have previously slowed operations significantly.

Beyond compliance, there is a bigger shift for CIÉ in how it approaches digital transformation by using technology to improve transparency, accountability and service delivery.