We’ve been reading the Jetsetting Terrorist blog (highlighted last week by Boing Boing) to see what we can learn from the anonymous author’s chronicles of his experiences traveling on commercial airlines, within the U.S. and internationally, after being convicted of a nonviolent misdemeanor criminal offense the U.S. has since defined as “terrorism”: Since 2009, I’ve […]
Argentina has promulgated regulations which will require operators of all flights in or out of the country to send copies of both Advance Passenger Information (API) and Passenger Name Record (PNR) data for each passenger and crew member to the government before any flight departs. The new regulations are to be fully implemented within six […]
In a self-assessment published this week by the DHS on the integration of DHS programs for surveillance, profiling, and control of airline passengers (the TSA’s Secure Flight for domestic flights and the CBP’s Automated Targeting System for international flights), the DHS says it is reducing to 15 years the length of time for which DHS […]
A Congressional hearing last week on the so-called “Secure Flight” system for “screening” domestic air travelers confirmed that the TSA has completed a shift from blacklist and whitelist matching to a comprehensive real-time pre-crime profiling system that assigns each air traveler a “risk assessment” score on the four-step scale we’ve previously described and which is […]
Time and time again, the TSA has acted as though its middle name was “secrecy” rather than “security”. Case in point: Sai v. TSA. There’s a lot at issue in this case, but here are some of the problems with the TSA that it has exposed: Sai poses no threat to aviation security. He has […]
A lawsuit filed today in Federal District Court in Michigan challenges “the widespread government practice of placing names on watch lists without providing individuals with any notice of the factual basis for their placement and without offering a meaningful opportunity to contest the designation.” According to the complaint: This lawsuit is an expression of anger […]
The Intercept has published the March 2013 edition of the US government’s Watchlisting Guidance. This 166-page document, previously kept secret as Sensitive Security Information (SSI), provides standardized but not legally binding “guidance” to Federal executive agencies as to how, on what basis, and by whom entries are to be added to or removed from terrorism-related […]
The TSA has assessed a $500 civil penalty against “Naked American Hero” John Brennan, who removed all his clothes at a TSA checkpoint at the Portland, Oregon, airport in 2012 to show that he wasn’t carrying any weapons or explosives and in protest of the TSA’s practices. Mr. Brennan was arrested at PDX airport by […]
The decision last week by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in Arjmand v. DHS sets another challenge to a DHS “watchlist” on track toward a trial on the merits in Federal District Court, this time in Los Angeles. Equally or more importantly, this decision reaffirms and extends the rejection by the Courts of Appeals, […]
In a live online question-and-answer session last month, NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden gave this explanation of what’s wrong with pervasive, suspicionless tracking and logging of our activities: What’s the worst and most realistic harm from bulk collection of data?… The worst and happening-right-now harm of bulk collection — which again, is a euphemism for mass […]