Drones are being used by the Greek government to track down tax evaders taking boat trips on the Aegean. The Greek coastguard has been launching the drones in order to spy on the operators of the boats out at sea, to check whether they were issuing legal receipts to all their passengers. With the black economy by some accounts representing about a quarter of national output in a country which depends hugely on tourism, Greek authorities are turning to the technology to clamp down on undeclared earnings. Based on data from the drones, authorities were able to establish how many passengers were on board, then cross-referenced this figure with declared receipts and on-site inspections. The initiative was instigated by finance ministry tax inspectors with drones being launched from Santorini, an island highly popular with tourists. “We used the drones for the first time on an experimental basis to monitor how many tourists were on board,” an official at the Independent Authority for Public Revenue said while speaking to Reuters. “The results were excellent”, he added. Nine tourist vessels checked were alleged to have not issued a number of receipts, totalling about €25,000 (£22,377) and their owners now face fines. Tourism is a much-needed motor of growth and tax revenue for the economy, accounting for about a fifth of Greek gross domestic product.
The Greek coastguard is using drones to monitor boats at night in a move to tackle tax evasion . The Greek economy relies heavily on tourism , and with some estimates that undocumented commercial activity accounts for 25 % of national output , clamping down on taxes for tourist boats may prove lucrative . The drones , which fly over boats and determine the number of passengers , have been trialled on the island of Crete . When checking the number of passengers on board against the receipts submitted , nine tourist boats were found to have under - paid tax by a total of € 25,000 ( $ 28,000 ) .