- The Transportation Security Administration plans to begin
testing new computerized background checks to determine which airline passengers
are potential terrorists.
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- But in response to privacy concerns, the agency no longer
plans to delve into travelers' creditworthiness or medical records, the
agency said Thursday.
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- Testing will begin almost immediately, using personal
information on travelers collected in airline reservation systems and commercially
available databases, said Dennis Murphy, a Department of Homeland Security
spokesman.
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- "We're trying to determine if this traveler is a
real person as opposed to [whether they are] making it it up," Murphy
said.
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- Information would be used to assign a risk level -- green,
yellow or red -- to all travelers. Those with higher levels would get extra
scrutiny at airports.
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- Testing of the Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening
System could last six months, if everything goes well, Murphy said.
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- It won't be used to make security screening decisions
on real passengers, but as testing progresses, "we'll get closer and
closer to live tests," Murphy said. "If someone pops up who is
on the terror watch list or a no-fly list, we'd probably take action,"
he said.
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- The idea of an advanced passenger screening program began
taking shape shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackings.
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- Earlier this year, the Transportation Security Administration
and Delta Air Lines conducted a very basic test to see whether their computer
systems could communicate with each other, Murphy said.
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- The agency in March awarded a $12.8 million contract
to Lockheed Martin Corp. to link commercial databases, such as a database
of addresses or phone numbers, with airline travel data and government
terrorist watch lists.
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- Airline travel records contain information such as how
travelers paid for their tickets, who else they may be traveling with and
their itinerary.
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- The TSA's decision to leave credit and medical records
out of the system doesn't satisfy all critics, some of whom view the plan
as part of a larger threat to civil liberties posed by post-Sept. 11 security
initiatives.
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- "These are potentially fundamental changes in the
relationship of the individual and the government, to have the government
assigning risk scores to all of us," Jay Stanley, spokesman for the
American Civil Liberties Union, told The Associated Press.
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- Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic
Privacy Information Center in Washington, remains leery.
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- "Unless there's legal restraint, people will find
other ways to use these systems," he said. "These private-sector
databases are notorious for the number of errors they contain."
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- The Homeland Security agency has hired a chief privacy
officer to help address concerns. It also says airline passengers will
be able to complain about incorrect information to an agency ombudsman.
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- The TSA says it will no longer keep information on high-risk
passengers for 50 years, as an earlier policy document indicated. In most
cases, the risk assessment and the information used to create it will be
erased after the passenger's itinerary is completed, in a set number of
days, Murphy said.
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- Airlines generally favor the use of a computer screening
system because it could reduce the current reliance on physical screening
at airports, which slows passenger processing.
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