Bad TSA Experience? Get the tape!
 

Filing a Freedom of Information Act request is fairly easy and inexpensive. The link below is to the Reference Guide which will walk you through the process. Don’t forget to fill out the Identity Certification form or your request may be denied or delayed. Get the tape of your bad experience and post it on YouTube. This will help to heighten awareness of the TSA problem among casual travelers and the citizenry at large.

Reference Guide : http://www.justice.gov/oip/04_3.html

The contact for TSA requests is:
Kevin J. Janet
FOIA Officer, TSA-20
601 South 12th Street
Arlington, VA 22202-4220
telephone number: (571) 227-2300
fax number: (571) 227-1406
http://www.tsa.gov/research/foia/index.shtm

List of various departments for other requests:

http://www.justice.gov/oip/foiacontacts.htm

A couple of points not to dampen your spirits, but to inject a little FOIA reality into the discussion.

1. Be specific. The oldest trick in the FOIA book is to respond to the requester that their request is "too vague" or "not specific enough." So, don't request " ...all the video from Dulles Airport on December 21, 2010." Rather, state that you want the video tape of checkpoint lane x on December 21, 2010, from 1645-1700 hours."

2. They can drag their feet as long as they want. The only thing the FOIA requires is that federal agencies respond to a request within 14 days (I think). The response can be as simple as, "Thank you for your request. We received it and are processing it." This type of response meets the requirement.

3. They can claim they have no records that you request. The TSA has a well-documented history of making videotapes "disappear" or "be erased" when there is evidence detrimental to the TSA. They could even assert that the checkpoint video is not an official government record, which is not subject to FOIA. Also, they can say that they aren't responsible for keeping the record you requested. They can cay that another government agency is responsible for keeping the record you requested, but they don't have to tell you which one.

4. They can charge you anything they want to charge you, even if you request that you get the document for free. Expect them to hit you with a big bill if all the other stonewalling techniques have failed.

5. They can claim any number of exemptions. They are too numerous to mention here.

If anyone actually receives a checkpoint video via FOIA, I will be shocked.

Although not free, wouldn't a subpoena be faster and more efficient?

Stacey Armato obtained hers, minus about 20 minutes which probably contained the most damning evidence against the TSA.

I find it pathetic that when someone makes a bogus claim that the TSA did something wrong, Bloghdad Bob posts it on the TSA blog.

When the evidence goes the other direction... the tapes can't be found.

Interesting.

Out of curiosity... how is the video delivered to the requestor? VHS? DVD? wmv on cd? Thanks!

Beta? 5 1/4" floppy disks? Super-8 mm film? ;)

I'd probably die of shock. :D

8" floppies!

<waving handkerchief over face to revive beloved moderator>

FW2M: http://phil.mocek.org/tmp/mocek_albu...re_2009-11-19/

Shocked?

That didn't come from the federal government via FOIA, but from the City of Albuquerque. TSA reported that they didn't have anything responsive to my request. The cameras at ABQ are reportedly controlled by staff at the police command center.

As for the format, they provided video in a proprietary format (I don't remember what codec was used, but VLC won't play it under any circumstances) on CD-ROMs, along with Windows-only software to view them. It's very inconvenient, and probably very profitable for the company who sold them the software.

If you do get the video, be sure to run the video in a sandbox... or a virtual machine. Or even a clean installation of windows that is NOT connected to the internet. The last thing you want to do is allow the TSA to 'secretly' install something nifty on your home computer. Ofcourse they will point to the TOS that you clicked 'agree' on that was written by 500 attorneys is 2,000 pages long, and even their attorneys cant makes heads or tails as to what the damn thing says.

Well, I'd say it's hard for TSA to make sense of anything in the legal realm if Francine the Googling Lawyer is the best they've got. I'd sooner trust legal advice given by Judge Judy and Rusty the Bailiff from the old People's Court.

Personally, though, I'd recommend that everyone who goes through the checkpoint consider filing a FOIA request for their video even if nothing of importance is on it. Let's drown them in requests and force them to spend some time and money to ramp up their staff of contractors to respond to them. More money spent there equals less money available to spend on new pervert-o-vision units. (Besides, if we collectively get enough video we can start stringing it together and post it online to show TSA's super-secret SOP in action to the world. That ought to get their panties in a bind.)

:D :eek:

Do you think they could actually do that? As an agency that closes the barn door after the horse escapes, I doubt they could manage that. However, it is certainly possible..

Heh, heh, RadioBloke suggested that when I was typing the other options. :D