Oppose CAPPSII by FAX'ing the major airlines

spy1

http://www.aclu.org/Privacy/Privacy.cfm...X=1179&H=1

At the bottom of that page, click where it says to "Click here.." and fill out the form - it'll fax all the major airlines with your concerns. Pete

spy1 · Posted: Wed Apr 28, 2004 9:38 am Post subject:

"Airport security failures justify snoop system"

Register article (2 pages)

NOTE: I "bolded" a couple of the things that jumped out at me in this one - Pete

"Recent government reports on the failure of American airport screeners to detect threat objects at security checkpoints may provide ammunition for proponents of the controversial Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System (CAPPS II) database solution, which is currently stalled by myriad snafus too numerous to mention.

Human error

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Inspector General and the Congressional General Accounting Office (GAO) have both submitted reports on the competence of airport passenger and baggage screeners, and found, not surprisingly, that they are no more effective today than they were before the security frenzy brought about by the 11 September atrocities.

In testimony before the House Aviation Subcommittee, Inspector General for Homeland Security Clark Ervin and GAO Managing Director Norman Rabkin said that the Transportation Security Administration's (TSA's) well-paid screening personnel are no more effective than the inexpensive rent-a-cops provided by private contractors. A comparison between federal screeners and those participating in a pilot program for private contractors called the PP5 Program.

According to Ervin, federal and private screeners "performed about the same, which is to say, equally poorly." He added that "this result was not unexpected, considering the degree of TSA involvement in hiring, deploying, and training the [private sector] screeners."

It's believed that TSA's interference in the PP5 Program and its bureaucratic inertia are important reasons why the private-sector screeners failed to outdo their civil-service counterparts. Both reports are biased against the TSA. They assume that TSA is a lost cause, although, ironically, it had originally been touted as a much-needed fix for the incompetence of private contractors, upon whom blame for the 9/11 atrocity was conveniently fixed in the immediate aftermath.

It now appears that TSA is seen as the chief source of security incompetence and failure. "TSA's tight controls over the pilot program restricted flexibility and innovation that the contractors may have implemented to perform at levels exceeding that of the federal workforce. TSA needs to establish a more robust pilot program that allows greater flexibility to test new innovations and approaches," Ervin said.

Defective detectives

Indeed, passenger screening is no better than it was 17 years ago. Covert testing conducted in 1978 - back when screeners were reasonably polite and quick and unobtrusive about their business - found that 13 per cent of threat objects passed undetected. Today, in the wake of post-9/11 security hysteria, and its attendant aggressive bullying of the public and punishment-strip searching of anyone daring to pass a sarcastic comment, the figure is 20 per cent.

TSA Administrator Admiral David Stone defended his outfit and took issue with the reports. "Testing in the Nineties was in no way even comparable to what we do," he said.

While it may be true that today's covert testing is more sophisticated, detection equipment has also improved to make the screeners' jobs easier, though he neglected to emphasize this fact. The red teams and the blue teams have both got better tricks up their sleeves, so there's certainly nothing unfair about the penetration tests, as Stone tried to imply. Still, bad news for human screeners may well be good news for technology.

Database Hell

Stone showed little enthusiasm for the PP5 Program, but he is a big proponent of CAPPS II, having touted it before the same House committee back in March as a scheme promising to deliver "vital impact ... on aviation security."

He has studied the vendor's PR boilerplate with great care. CAPPS II is a "second-generation prescreening system [that] will be a centralized, automated, threat-based, real time, risk assessment platform ... expected to employ technology and data analysis techniques to conduct an information-based identity authentication," he gushed.

The system is a product of aviation defense contractor Lockheed Martin Corporation, promoted by US Transportation Secretary and former Lockheed Martin Vice President Norman Mineta, Stone's boss.

At present, the grand "risk assessment platform" is mired in failure. What little of it currently works has not been tested adequately because carriers are withholding passenger data in fear of a public backlash on privacy grounds.

The accuracy of the many databases that CAPPS II will scour for its incriminating evidence has not yet been established. Procedures for passengers to detect inaccurate data, and get inaccurate data and false positives resolved, have not been implemented. Major privacy threats inherent in the system, particularly those involving restrictions on access, have not been addressed. The potential for malevolent identity thieves to impersonate innocent travelers remains high.

False consciousness

This is all good, because CAPPS II is one of the worst possible solutions to airport security. It won't prevent terrorists from flying; rather, it will increase the probability of another successful attack using commercial aircraft.

The reason is painfully obvious: a group can very conveniently use the system to pre-screen its members and discover which of them have profiles that result in extra scrutiny. Thus CAPPS II is a superb tool for terrorists to use in assessing airport defenses. A group of unarmed terrorists can board two or three flights in succession and observe how the system reacts to them. If, after a few trial runs, they discover that they're allowed to board unchallenged, they can assume that their profiles do not trigger a warning. Armed with that information, they'll stand a good chance of mounting a real attack.

CAPPS II is a disaster for two reasons: first, it will create a false sense of security among airline staff and provide further excuses for screeners to perform poorly; and second, it offers terrorists an excellent training device that they can use to assemble a group of people who can get onto airplanes without arousing suspicion. Ironically, the closer CAPPS II comes to achieving its stated goals, the more effective it will become as a terrorist tool.

So it is indeed good that its development is going poorly. The problem, however, is that the recently publicized failures among human screeners will provide rationale to rush it into service. CAPPS II may well find itself on a fast track, pushed hard by those who would exploit the popular misconception that computers and other high-tech gizmos can compensate for human fallibility. Ž"

If you haven't already used the link in my first post to contact your reps AND the airlines themselves, you should. Pete

spy1

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TRAVEL/04/29/ai...index.html

"WASHINGTON (AP) -- The government wants $435 million more from the airline industry for passenger screening, but the airlines said Wednesday they don't think they should have to pay it.

Air Transport Association President James May said the carriers already give the government about $2 billion every year to prevent terrorist attacks.

"It's a tax, a new tax, and one we will vigorously oppose," May told reporters.

Homeland Security Department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said the Bush administration simply wants the airlines to pay their fair share for national security.

"Since September 11, the federal government has significantly improved aviation security in a very short period of time, with nearly all the costs associated with security improvements being borne by the taxpayers," Roehrkasse said.

The Bush administration asked for more than $5 billion for commercial aviation security next year.

May said financially struggling airlines can't pass new taxes onto passengers because of intense competition. The $435 million could mean the difference between the industry breaking even and losing money this year, he said.

Air carriers now tack a $2.50 security tax onto passenger tickets, which amounts to about $1.6 billion that goes to the government annually. Airlines are also assessed $315 million every year for passenger screening, a responsibility the government assumed from the airlines soon after the September 11 attacks.

As part of the law that federalized screening, Congress ordered airlines to reimburse the government the amount that they spent on screening in 2000.

The airlines and the government don't agree on how much that was.

Office of Management and Budget spokesman Chad Kolton said it's $750 million.

"All the budgets since then, including the 2005 budget, have included $750 million in fees based on the information provided by the TSA," Kolton said.

The ATA said the $315 million figure was reached after TSA sent questionnaires to all air carriers about how much they spent on security.

The airlines were given a four-month reprieve last year from both the passenger security tax and the annual assessment because the war in Iraq was expected to hurt their business."

Pete

spy1

http://www.aclu-wa.org/ISSUES/otherissu...lease.html

Saying Government List Violates Passengers Rights

A member of the military, a retired Presbyterian minister, and a college student are among seven U.S. citizens who have joined the first nationwide, class-action challenge to the governments No-Fly list filed today by the American Civil Liberties Union.

This case is about innocent people who found out that their government considers them potential terrorists, said Reginald T. Shuford, an ACLU senior staff attorney who is lead counsel in the case. For our clients and thousands like them, getting on a plane means repeated delays and the stigma of being singled out as a security threat in front of their family, their fellow passengers and the flight crew, Shuford added. Whats worse, these passengers have no idea why they have been placed on the No-Fly list and no way to clear their names.

The ACLU lawsuit, filed today in federal district court in Seattle, was announced at news conferences in Seattle, St. Louis, and Washington, D.C. Named as defendants in the lawsuit are Department of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge and Transportation Security Administration Director David M. Stone and their respective agencies.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is part of the Department of Homeland Security. DSH Secretary Tom Ridge is the featured speaker at a town hall forum at Seattle University today.

The No-Fly list is compiled by the TSA and distributed to all airlines with instructions to stop or conduct extra searches of people suspected of being threats to aviation. Many innocent travelers who pose no safety risk whatsoever are stopped and searched repeatedly.

The ACLU is asking the court to declare that the No-Fly list violates airline passengers Constitutional rights to freedom from unreasonable search and seizure and to due process of law under the Fourth and Fifth Amendments. The ACLU is also asking the TSA to develop satisfactory procedures that will allow innocent people to fly without being treated as potential terrorists and subjected to humiliation and delays.

The individual plaintiffs named in the class-action lawsuit are:
Michelle D. Green, 36, a Master Sergeant in the U.S. Air Force;
John Shaw, 74, a retired Presbyterian minister, from Sammamish, Washington;
Mohamed Ibrahim, 51, a Coordinator for the American Friends Service Committee in Philadelphia;
David C. Fathi, 41, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU National Prison Project in Washington, D.C.;
Alexandra Hay, 22, a student at Middlebury College in Vermont who is studying abroad in Paris;
Sarosh Syed, 26, a Special Projects Coordinator at the ACLU of Washington in Seattle; and
David Nelson, 34, an attorney from Belleville, Illinois.

I am joining this lawsuit today because I have been publicly humiliated and ostracized due to the governments mistake about my identity, said Michelle D. Green, a Master Sergeant in the United States Air Force who has served for 16 years. As someone who serves her country and obeys the laws of the land, I was shocked to learn I was on the No-Fly list. I was even more disturbed to find that there is no way to get off the list.

The individuals represented in the lawsuit, the ACLU said in legal papers, are innocent of any wrongdoing and pose no threat to aviation security. Indeed, even after several obtained letters from the TSA stating that they were not a threat, they were still subject to delays and the stigma of enhanced searches, interrogations and detentions.

The No-Fly list has been the subject of intense media scrutiny. Yet the TSA denied its existence until November 2002, shortly before the ACLU of Northern California filed a Freedom of Information Act request on behalf of two local anti-war activists who were told they were on such a list. When the government failed to respond, the ACLU filed a lawsuit in April 2003 and obtained documents that reveal a shoddy process in which government agents expressed uncertainty about how the lists should be shared. The documents also failed to answer basic questions about the No-Fly list, including how names are selected for the list. For more information on the documents the ACLU obtained, click here.

Many passengers on the No-Fly list have expressed concern that they may have been singled out because of their ethnicity, religion or political activity. Their concern is heightened by the fact that the lists appear to have been shared widely among U.S. law enforcement agencies, internationally and with the U.S. military.

Attorneys in the case are Shuford and Catherine Kim of the national ACLU; Aaron Caplan of the ACLU of Washington; Jayashri Srikantiah of the ACLU of Northern California; and cooperating attorney Michael E. Kipling of the Summit Law Group in Seattle.

The ACLU complaint in todays case is available here.

Have you been barred from flying because of your political views? The ACLU wants to hear from you. Click here to complete our online complaint form.


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