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http://litigationcenter.bna.com/pic2/lit.nsf/id/BNAP-5XTL44?OpenDocument&PrintVersion=YesAlso, other info: <snip> No Fly List
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaThe No Fly List contains the names of individuals who are not permitted to board a commercial aircraft for travel in the United States. There is also a selectee process by which individuals who meet certain criteria are set aside for additional screening.<1> Contents
1 Controversy
2 Size
3 False positives and alleged misuses
4 DHS Traveller Redress Inquiry Process
5 ACLU Lawsuit
6 No fly lists in other countries
7 In the Media
8 See also
9 References
10 External links
Controversy
The No Fly List has raised civil liberties concerns, due in part to the potential for ethnic, religious, economic, political or racial profiling and discrimination. Particular concern has been raised about the use of credit reports in calculating the risk score. In response to the controversy, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) stated it would not use a person's credit score to determine his/her risk score, and that it would comply with all rights guaranteed by the First and Fourth Amendments.
Stuart Taylor went on to explain the controversy; Government entities external to the U.S., such as the European Union, expressed concerns about allowing the CAPPS II proposal to be implemented within their respective borders. During the early testing of the No Fly List, and CAPPS II, the TSA privately requested airlines disclose massive amounts of private information about their passengers. Though intended only for testing, this action was likely a violation of the Privacy Act of 1974, which forbids the government from compiling secret databases on Americans. Though spokespeople from several major airlines initially denied these allegations, they later reneged and admitted they had disclosed the information, revealing they had not only lied to their own customers, but also to the government and the public. These admissions were followed by further admissions from the Transportation Security Administration and the United States Department of Homeland Security, revealing the government had inappropriately requested and used this information.
In the midst of this controversy, the Government Accountability Office of the U.S. Congress produced a critical report on the CAPPS II system. The report characterized the proposal as incomplete and seriously behind schedule, and noted that the TSA had failed to address "developmental, operational, and privacy issues identified by Congress". On July 14, 2004, TSA officials said CAPPS II was being pulled from consideration without proceeding to full testing. Critics have alleged that the TSA has merely chosen to start with a less controversial entry point they are calling the "Registered Traveler" program. They have also begun testing of another program called Secure Flight, which is supposed to solve some of the problems of CAPPS I while avoiding the privacy issues of CAPPS II.
Size
It is known that the size of the FBI/FAA list on September 11, 2001 was 16 names. By December 2001, the list had grown to 594 names, and a year later (December 2002), there were over 1,000 names. CBS reported on the 8 October 2006 edition of 60 Minutes that they had obtained a copy of the list dated March 2006 that contains 44,000 names.<2> According to the TSA, as of November 2005, 30,000 people in 2005 alone had complained their names were matched to a name on the list via the name matching software used by airlines.<3> Less commonly known is that the list, while very long, also includes many duplicates. Some are common misspellings and some are different dates of birth.
<MORE>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Fly_List
<snip>
Unlikely Terrorists On No Fly List
Steve Kroft Reports List Includes President Of Bolivia, Dead 9/11 Hijackers
(CBS) This segment was originally broadcast on Oct. 8, 2006. It was updated on June 7, 2007.
Anyone who has passed through an airport in the last five years and has been pulled aside for extra screening knows that the government and the airlines keep a list of people they consider to be security threats. Every time you check in at the ticket counter your name is run through a computer to make sure you are not on something called the "No Fly List." It's part of a secret government database compiled after 9/11 to prevent suspected terrorists from getting on airplanes. As correspondent Steve Kroft reports, if your name is on the list or even similar to someone on the list, you can be detained for hours.
It began as a project of the highest priority. In 2003, President Bush directed the nation’s intelligence agencies and the FBI to cooperate in creating a single watch list of suspected terrorists. A version of that list is given to the airlines and the Transportation Security Administration to prevent anyone considered a threat to civilian aviation from boarding a plane. The government won’t divulge the criteria it uses in making up the list or even how many names are on it. But in the spring of 2006, working with a government watchdog group called the National Security News Service, 60 Minutes was able to obtain a copy of the No Fly List from someone in aviation security who wanted us to see what the bureaucracy had wrought.
The first surprise was the sheer size of it. In paper form it is more than 540 pages long. Before 9/11, the government’s list of suspected terrorists banned from air travel totaled just 16 names; today there are 44,000. And that doesn’t include people the government thinks should be pulled aside for additional security screening. There are another 75,000 people on that list.
With Joe Trento of the National Security News Service, 60 Minutes spent months going over the names on the No Fly List. While it is classified as sensitive, even members of Congress have been denied access to it. But that may have less to do with national security than avoiding embarrassment.
Asked what the quality is of the information that the TSA gets from the CIA, the NSA and the FBI, Trento says "Well, you know about our intelligence before we went to war in Iraq. You know what that was like. Not too good."
"This is much worse," Trento argues. "It’s awful, it's bad. I mean you’ve got people who are dead on the list. You’ve got people you know are 80 years old on the list. It makes no sense."
<MORE>
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/05/60minutes/main2066624.shtml
<snip>
Passenger Complaints
Complaints forwarded by Members of Congress to TSA part 1 (592kb pdf), part 2 (600kb pdf), part 3 (493kb pdf)
Complaints sent to TSA Inquiry Management System (496kb pdf)
Emails sent to TSA (1.1mb pdf)
Complaint letters sent to TSA part 1 (524kb pdf), part 2 (624kb pdf)
TSA Contact Center complaint log, Nov. 2003-Dec. 2004
November 2003-January 2004 (248 kb pdf)
February 2004-April 2004 (636 kb pdf)
May 2004 (1.4 mb pdf)
June 2004-July 2004 (2.5 mb pdf)
July 2004-September 2004 (3.6 mb pdf)
September 2004-October 2004 (4 mb pdf)
October 2004-December 2004 (5.7 mb pdf)
The documents establish that the TSA administers two lists: a "no fly" list and a "selectee" list, which requires the passenger to go through additional security measures. The names are provided to air carriers through Security Directives or Emergency Amendments and are stored in their computer systems so that an individual with a name that matches the list can be flagged when getting a boarding pass. A "no fly" match requires the agent to call a law enforcement officer to detain and question the passenger. In the case of a Selectee, an "S" or special mark is printed on their boarding pass and the person receives additional screening at security. The TSA has withheld the number of names on each of the lists.
The watch list was created in 1990, with a list of individuals who have been "determined to pose a direct threat to U.S. civil aviation." This list was administered by the FBI before the Federal Aviation Administration and the TSA assumed full administrative responsibility in November 2001. The Transportation Security Intelligence Service (TSIS) currently serves as the clearinghouse for the addition of names to the lists. Since the TSA took over, the watch list "has expanded almost daily as Intelligence Community agencies and the Office of Homeland Security continue to request the addition of individuals to the No-Fly and Selectee lists." (TSA Watchlists memo) The names are approved for inclusion on the basis of a secret criteria. The Watchlists memo notes that "all individuals have been added or removed ... based on the request of and information provided, almost exclusively by ."
<MORE>
http://www.epic.org/privacy/airtravel/foia/watchlist_foia_analysis.html
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