Sept. 11 Commission Wants 'No-Fly' List for Trains, Ships

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Richard M. Smith" <rms () computerbytesman com>
Date: September 9, 2004 3:32:53 PM EDT
To: EPIC_IDOF () mailman epic org
Subject: [EPIC_IDOF] Sept. 11 Commission Wants 'No-Fly' List for 
Trains, Ships

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,131820,00.html

WASHINGTON - The government should check travelers' names against 
terrorist
watch lists before they board passenger trains or cruise ships, the 
Sept. 11
commission  recommended Wednesday.

Airlines now check their passengers' names against such a list, a
responsibility that the Transportation Security Administration plans to
assume sometime next year.

Privacy advocates say the government is too secretive about how it puts
people on the list and that those who are mistakenly identified as
terrorists don't have an effective way of getting off it.

The proposal is one of 94 released Wednesday that expand upon a handful 
of
transportation security improvements the Sept. 11 commission 
recommended to
Congress in July.

The new proposals include giving flight attendants counterterrorism
training, drawing up comprehensive plans to protect all forms of
transportation and expanding the use of watch lists.

"Steps should be taken as soon as possible to convert the "No-Fly" list 
into
a "No-Transport" list that would be provided to transportation 
providers in
addition to air carriers (starting with cruise ships and Amtrak)," the
report said.

The commission said that state, local and tribal law enforcement 
authorities
should have access to the terrorist watch lists.

Privacy advocate Marcia Hofmann said the government shouldn't expand 
the use
of watch lists until it has a proven system of redress for passengers
wrongly flagged as terrorists.

Sen. Edward Kennedy , D-Mass., and Rep. John Lewis , D-Ga., recently 
said
they were confused with terrorists on the list. Kennedy said it took him
three weeks and several calls to federal officials to get off the list.

"If the Transportation Security Administration builds any sort of a
passenger prescreening system without taking into account privacy 
concerns
from the very beginning, it simply isn't a program that could work," 
said
Hofmann, staff counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center.

The commission acknowledged that concern and said the TSA must involve 
the
public and privacy advocates in the debate from the start. It 
recommended
privacy standards, grievance procedures and an independent privacy 
panel to
oversee the system.

The 20-page report stressed that government needs to develop 
comprehensive
strategic plans to protect ships, trucks and mass transit systems as 
well as
aviation, which has gotten the bulk of federal spending and attention 
since
the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

TSA chief David Stone has said such a plan will be finished by year end.

Oregon Rep. Peter DeFazio, the ranking Democrat on the House aviation
subcommittee who made the report available, said the government has done
only about 10 percent of what it should be doing to protect 
transportation.

"No one could look at this and say we've done everything we can do, or 
are
in the process of doing everything we can do, to make the country 
safe," he
said.

Other recommendations include:

- Credentialing and screening people and vehicles that have access to
commercial airplanes.

- Establishing a separate board to investigate terrorist attacks on
transportation, either modeled on or attached to the National 
Transportation
Safety Board, which has a politically balanced membership.

- Determining ideal staffing levels for federal air marshals and airport
security screeners by Feb. 1.

- Transferring responsibility for training flight attendants in 
self-defense
and counterterrorism techniques to the Justice Department if the TSA 
doesn't
do it by year end.


_______________________________________________
EPIC_IDOF mailing list
EPIC_IDOF () mailman epic org
https://mailman.epic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/epic_idof

-------------------------------------
You are subscribed as interesting-people () lists elistx com
To manage your subscription, go to
 http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip

Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/