EPIC TSA FOIA in Wired

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: Marc Rotenberg <rotenberg () epic org>


A news item in Wired today about errors in the Watchlist
system is based on documents that EPIC recently obtained
under the Freedom of Information Act.

Marc.



Due Process Vanishes in Thin Air
By Ryan Singel
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,58386,00.html

02:00 AM Apr. 08, 2003 PT

Asif Iqbal, a Rochester, New York, management consultant, must get FBI
clearance every Monday and Thursday when he flies to and from Syracuse
for business. Iqbal can't get off a government watch list because he
shares the same name as a suspected terrorist.

But Asif Iqbal, the suspected terrorist, is eight years younger than his
Rochester namesake.

What's more, the suspected terrorist Iqbal has been in U.S. custody at
the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, since January 2002 when he
was captured in Afghanistan. In a letter to his congressional
representative, Iqbal of New York said he was first denied the ability
to board a plane on Feb. 18, 2002, almost a full month after the British
Foreign Office informed the suspected terrorist Iqbal's family that he
was being held as an "enemy combatant."

Just as Asif Iqbal of Rochester isn't the only Asif Iqbal, he's also not
the only U.S. resident battling to clear his name from government watch
lists.

The aviation list, intended to catch terrorists before they board
planes, has persistently and widely snagged innocent American travelers,
according to government documents obtained by the Electronic Privacy
Information Center through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.

The documents -- which include numerous e-mails, letters and call logs
detailing the attempts of seemingly ordinary Americans to remove
themselves from the list -- reveal that the lists are only getting
longer. "The FAA/TSA 'watchlist' has expanded almost daily," according
to an internal Transportation Security Administration memo dated Oct.
16, 2002.

Those who objected to being repeatedly targeted include a 71-year-old
retired English teacher, a frequent business traveler with "top-secret"
security clearance, an employee of the Bothell, Washington, city
manager's office, a prominent businessman from Huntington Beach,
California, and a woman whose name is similar to an Australian man 20
years her junior.

Most said they understood the need for heightened security and that they
hope they are eventually cleared to fly when they travel.

But all said they were inaccurately targeted by an overly simplistic
system, and they complained of missed flights and invasive and
embarrassing searches.

The Bothel, Washington, city worker said a National Guardsman aimed an
M16 at him when he refused a request to stand on one leg because he was
recovering from a leg injury.

In the documents, all of the travelers complained about the inability to
clear their names from the list. One person wrote that he must show up
four hours before his flight in order to clear security in time for
departure. Another said government officials suggested he change his
name.

"I've endured too many security checks for this to be 'just a random
search' -- this is harassment. I am a 62-year-old Caucasian grandmother
and law-abiding citizen," wrote one woman, who also said she is screened
on nearly every segment of a flight, including transfers.

Other travelers said they match against the watch list on the basis of
their last name only. An airline pilot who is an American citizen with a
common Pakistani surname complained in a letter to Rep. Jack Quinn
(R-N.Y.) because the scrutiny he faced had caused his employer to nearly
cancel a flight.

"Could you imagine if you were stopped, questioned for over an hour and
almost missing a plane because the name 'Quinn' was in the computer?"
the pilot asked. The pilot's name was blacked out in the document.

Another wrote Congressman Jack LoBiondo (R-N.J.), saying, "the name
'(blacked out)' in the Middle East is as common as 'Jones' is in
America." The writer noted that he or she can't speak a word of Arabic,
has never traveled to the Middle East and had served in U.S. Navy.

Even full-name matches against the list do not have to be exact as the
airlines use software that checks variations in names. But such "fuzzy
matching" can be clumsy.

For example, FBI agent Louie Allen wrote the TSA asking for assistance
on behalf of a woman who was denied boarding because of the similarity
of her name to the alias of a wanted Australian man.

It even seems that having national security clearance doesn't help.

Lawyers for Syracuse Research wrote Congressman James T. Walsh (R-N.Y.)
on behalf of an employee who has "top-secret security clearance" and
frequently flies from Syracuse to Washington D.C. "to conduct business
at the Pentagon."

But the employee has difficulty getting cleared to fly since he shares
the same last name and birth year as someone on the watch list. Each
time he flies, he is detained until an FBI agent comes in to verify his
identity, according to the letter.

The company's law firm sent two letters directly to the TSA in May and
September of 2002, but is still awaiting a response from the agency,
according to attorney Timothy Lambrecht.

"These personal stories underscore the fact that there is no due process
in this system and that there is no established mechanism for people to
clear their names," said David Sobel, EPIC's lead attorney on the case.

Until last fall, the TSA denied the existence of a "no-fly list," but
has since admitted that its list is problematic and that it isn't easy
for people to be removed.

The released documents revealed that there are not one but two lists.

The first list, called the "no-fly" list, requires the ticketing agent
to call law enforcement agents if a match is made. In the case of a name
match against the "selectee" list, the passenger's boarding pass is
prominently marked with an "S," resulting in increased scrutiny by
airport screeners.

The TSA blacked out portions of the memo, which said what criteria was
used for each list, which agencies contributed names to the lists and
how many people were on each list.

Sobel said the two lists look like a "precursor" to the new TSA system
that will color-code passengers -- red, yellow or green -- based on
computerized threat assessments.

In previous interviews, TSA officials said they hope the new screening
system, dubbed CAPPS II, will be more accurate and have a well-defined
process for clearing one's name. The agency has even suggested hiring
advocates with security clearance to help passengers who feel unfairly
singled out.

"Looking ahead to the CAPPS II system, that system will likely have
access to a broad pool of information that is unlikely to be completely
accurate," Sobel said. "We will see an exponential increase in the
number of people who will encounter these problems."

"I'm currently preparing slides that talk about 'due process problems,'"
said Mihir Kshirsagar, an attorney for EPIC. "But those three words
don't capture what these people went through."

The Transportation Security Administration did not immediately reply to
requests for comment for this story.

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