Married womanizers should stay away from these types also!

I think a lot of this so called "public" data should not be so public.

M8

I'm not as hard core, and have actually relented on occasion to get something I want from the government. Notable on the list are several state issued CCW permits (license to carry concealed firearms, or whatever your locale might call them).

I use one of these when asked for ID for a rare CC purchase. The reaction to that alone usually overcomes my irritation about being asked in the first place .

It's a infrastructure ready-made for abuse: for tracking and surveilling "unAmerican" folks, or for hassling, harassing, or even restricting the travel of "subversive" types who are not in favor with the government power. Has the government gone that far yet? No. But it's a basic principle of good civic hygiene that you try to avoid creating a system pre-built for pushbutton civil liberties infringements. The temptation to abuse the system is so great, that mere existence of such a system is a danger to freedom. It makes it too easy for a future government inclined towards a police state to impose, in the future, restrictions that we would find abhorrent. I don't want to set up a situation that would allow an evil government to seize power, and hold it. The best way to prevent that is to avoid creating an infrastructure that makes those abuses as easy to set up as the "flip of a switch".

I also hate the precedent. IDs are spreading all over, and the argument I hear is "well, you have to show ID to fly, so why shouldn't you have to show ID to (X)?", where (X) can be things as crazy as "get on a public bus and ride across town". The photo ID requirement creates a "papers, please" society where the public is habituated to demands to see their ID, and that's not a good thing.

Oh, yeah? How do you know? For all I know, airlines might be saving all PNRs. (You might say that they didn't save the "ID", but when they check that the name on your ticket matches the name on your ID, and then save the name on your ticket in a database, well, the difference is academic.)

Keep in mind the recent revelations that AT&T has a giant database with records about every call that has been placed through their network over the past few decades. A decade ago, would you have guessed that AT&T was recording all this information? Would you have guessed that AT&T would turn it over to the NSA to allow them to do data mining, even of US citizens, even lacking probable cause or a warrant or court oversight? How do you know something similar can't happen to the airline databases? How do you know it hasn't already happened? I don't think it is overly paranoid to be concerned that this information could be abused.

I want to retain control over my personal information, and I don't appreciate a government that forces me to relinquish control for no good reason.

Well, not quite. I have to tell my real name to the airline. That's not flying anonymously. That's very different from a system where I can make up any name I like to put on my ticket, and fly without getting hassled about ID.

As Adam Corolla wisely says: "More mystery, less history"

Ok, given your European upbringing, here is an analogy you may understand. You may be aware that in many European countries, for a long time the phone bill did not report the phone numbers you had called. (I don't know whether this is still true today.)

Do you know why?

The answer is instructive, and if you happen to know the answer, perhaps the analogy to airline privacy will be clear. (If you don't know the answer, just ask, and I will gladly oblige.)

I don't understand the distinction you are trying to draw. The two are two sides of one coin. If you are forced to show ID, you cannot fly under an assumed name.

I'm not saying I feel the need to fly under an assumed name for my everyday travel. I'm just saying that I prefer to know the option is available -- say, when I want to fly to attend that demonstration in favor of some cause that is "unpopular" among those currently in power.

So what do you do when travelling internationally? There are several countries where hotels must keep records of who their guests are - including passport information. Do you refuse to show your passport in such a case as well?


Assuming, of course, that you do travel internationally.

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry7290/4.0.0 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1)

When I travel abroad, I know I must obey the laws of the countries I am visiting. In some countries, I have fewer rights and civil liberties. It is my choice to visit such places. I've shown my ID for hotels and credit card purchases, especially in Germany. However, the US does not have such requirements and in my country it is my priviledge and pleasure to decline to show ID whenever possible.

i have no problem letting the airline know who i am. i have no problem with them making sure that the person on the ticket is the one flying, and that person is actually on the plane.
if the worst happen and the airplane crash, i would not want to put myloved ones through the gruesome process of waiting for someone to find one of my teeth for identification. i would want the airline to tell them without a shadow of a doubt that i was indeed on the aircraft.

Another thread that reminds me of my 4 year old son yelling at his 5 year old sister, "You're not the boss of me!"...

Perhaps someday your daughter will learn to treat him with respect? Or don't you think he's entitled to it.

But that's just ... ludicrous. You're taking the most extreme scenario possible and disproportionately worrying about it! It's so improbable that you don't even need to think about it.

It seems like forever that airlines have asked for ID before providing a boarding pass. Not that it bothers me to provide it, but why do they need it?

Revenue protection. If they didn't require ID, anybody could fly on anybody else's ticket, and that would kill the airlines' entire pricing model.

For example, you or I could buy a bunch of $200 transcons and sell them for $300 to last-minute business travelers who needed a seat.

Of course in the time period between the present and when US airlines routinely (and widely) started demanding presentation of ID for domestic travel hasn't even covered close to two decades. And by the time a similar time period passes from the present going forward, we're going to be living a de facto public life whether we want our privacy or not -- unless something is legally done about this.