TSA plan to gather more data protested
 

Wow...... I'm speechless...

From USA today.
http://www.usatoday.com/travel/fligh...terstitialskip

Really - read the whole thing. But some highlights...

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) wants passengers to give the additional personal information — as well as their full names — so it can do more precise background checks that it says will result in fewer travelers being mistaken for terrorists. Travelers currently must provide only a last name and a first initial.

AND

People who don't comply could be more easily mistaken for a terrorist and "may be more likely to experience delays, be subjected to additional screening (or) be denied transport," the TSA wrote.

I haven't been mistaken for a terrorist yet at the airport, so I'll pass, thank you very much.

(Is this one of the agencies that Ron Paul would get rid of?)

Why are you speechless?What's the big deal?
As a memeber of M+ UA has already my birthdate.
@:-) In fact I use it to get discounted fares. :)

As for the TSA staff, they wave and greet me by name before each check. :cool: Its the high airfare that I am unhappy about.

Maybe you are happy giving them all of your information ahead of time so they can do a background check on you... but I'm not.

We need to email-bomb United, Continental and Virgin congratulating them for standing up to TSA and ask them to do more. Do the opposite for AirTran and Frontier.

If you've not been hauled over for already being on the watch list, just get dyslexic or something with your birthday or even just refuse to give.

What good is it going to do anyway, as I'm sure that the birth dates of most would-be terrorists are either not known or are incorrect. It's not known for certain when Osama was born, although his birthdate is thought to be March 10, 1957.

Once again, the solution to the problem of finding the terrorist needle in the haystack is to add more hay.

This is a great plan, as long as we can depend on the terrorists to be honest about their names, gender and birth dates, which I'm sure we can.

There is a difference between voluntarily providing personal information to a private company and being compelled by the government to provide it.

Yep. The Government may say "voluntary", it'll be about as voluntary as shoe removal.

Next thing you know, it'll be your SSN for instant background checks.

They can already pull that quite easily after getting your name, credit card and other information from the PNR. Don't assume they're not already accessing that data.

Hum, the Government already has so much info on us, why just not tap those resources???

Maybe they lost the laptops the info was kept on.

Bull Feathers. The airlines don't like it because they would need to make IT infrastructure changes to add this info to the PNR's. It is telling that they aren't complaining about the requirement for full first name instead of initial, because that would require very little in the way of changes (just a validation check).

Here is what I find interesting:

1) It seems like this change will remove the power of the airline to deselect pax, as the selection is now done by the TSA and not the carrier.

2) The implementation of the DOB/Sex is highly likely to be so flawed as to actually provide less security than the current situation. Unless the DOB/Sex is printed on the BP or the ID checker has a terminal to pull up this info, there will be no positive matching of DOB to ID, and therefore a terrorist who would today be stopped can simply provide an incorrect DOB to the airline, and then board using his real ID. Essentially, it will be the equivalent of "No, he's not the Osama bin Laden whom we are looking for - no need for SSSS."

I am certain that they are - and they can get all that other information with a fairly simple process, without my need to give it to them.

But just like I have to bring a document to DMV to "prove" my SSN (even though they can and do check it electronically), I can see TSA requiring us to give it to them "just because" (it makes their life easier). And from their perspective, it also gives them another "proof" to turn you over to LE for providing false info to the government. Bury 'em (us) with paperwork and at some point they'll (we'll) screw up.

"Objection, my social security number's privileged."
"What? How so?"
"I talked to this lawyer about it." **points to random lawyer that's waiting in line**

The birth date info will make it harder for George Foreman and his sons to swap around their airline tickets.


Hmmmm, maybe we should do as the Omni thread and have everybody change their name to Spartacus. ;)

Yes, it is.

In an agency known for dumb ideas, this might be the dumbest.

Timmy Terrorist, born 4/8/84, is on the watch list. Now all Timmy has to do is use the first name "Tim" and a birth date of 8/4/84, and POOF!, he's off the watch list.

And what happens to the non terrorist, born 8/4/48, who accidentally enters 4/8/48 for his/her DOB?

Dumb. Supremely dumb. Pretty par for the course for TSA, don't you think?

Thinking.......... nope that's illegal too didn't you know that? Why I found this so outrageous is that it has absolutely NOTHING to do with international security and everything to do with keeping track of citizens. The TSA can't keep track of the data they have..and haven't finished doing background checks on all of the people they are already supposed to be handling. But they are going to add this too? Major mission creep or ? Who knows why but I do know it's a BAD IDEA PERIOD.

That way, they can go to congress and ..... that they don't have enough money. Congress gives them money and Hawley and Chertoff give themselves a raise while they still pay screeners minimum wage and overextend them.

I dislike Kip as much as the next FTer ;) but he and Chertoff cannot give themselves raises. They are paid via the senior exective schedule and cabinet pay tables and that does not change. Travel per diem or others items can be changed but pay cannot.

Ciao,
FH

Since when did the law get in the Bushies' way?

What does "bushies' " mean? Do you mean Bush's...Or is that just an off colour comment in your response?

As for checks on their salary- for one their IRS forms are reviewewd by the US congress yearly.

Ciao,
FH

You know....like the Bush Administration. As for the IRS, just like OCC, FTC, CPSC and congress, it can be paid off.

I know the admin ref-but Bushies ? IS that a bean?

You should take the tin-foil hat off a second...You seem to give the government you dislike so much to much credit. Their is no conspiracy.

The bureaucracy is too large to allow such non-sense. There is too much money to be made post government work to jeopardise that for a few extra dollars now, with all the "conspiracy" work involved to boot.

I have colleagues in this business who quintupled their salary post goverment work as a first year lobbyist. I know the money is much better on this side, having "worked" for the US government, multi-national orgs, state and city governments. These SES and cabinet level folks stand to lose to much later trying to steal a bit of money now via some data mining operation. As bad as the idea is (It is bad, we have similar non-sense in some JAA operations here in Europe) it has no bearing on Kip or Chertoff upping their salary by buying off congress or the IRS- To many career officers of both parties to make it happen anyway.

EDIT- I realise it is the current flavour of the month to say "fire everyone" "TSA" sucks etc etc., but any kickbacks to these folks has to be cash under the table. They cannot up their salary. The US treasury does not work that way. And the whole concept you suggest is basically absurd. I am sure you will want to fire someone now...

Believe it or not, not everyone in the US government is out to get you personally...besides there are bigger fish to fry.

Criticise the program's merits or lack thereof to further the discussion. Provide your view on a solution, other than "firing" everyone, which is not realistic.



Ciao,
FH