Under the Swiss authorisation concept, who is allowed to read the fingerprints in a Swiss e-passport?

Only countries (or bodies like airlines) the Swiss authorities have explicitly authorised — granted only to countries whose data-protection level is deemed equivalent to Switzerland's.

Reading fingerprints from Swiss e-passports requires a special reading certificate subject to strict criteria. The official explanation: "Fingerprints are specially protected: for another country to even read the fingerprints, it must have authorisation from Switzerland. The department grants this only to countries whose data-protection level is equivalent to Switzerland's." The department can also authorise other bodies (e.g. airlines) that need to verify identity in the public interest.

Open critical questions: How is "equivalent data-protection level" verified in practice? Which countries currently have access? How is ongoing compliance monitored? What happens to the data after being read abroad? Is there a central list of authorised readers?

Tip: This is EAC's certificate infrastructure made concrete: "authorised terminal" becomes a diplomatic/legal decision about which countries get reading certificates — and enforcement of what they do with the data afterward is the hard, unanswered part.