Thursday, 2 July 2009
"Clear" shuts down its registered-traveller system
Verified Identity Pass, Inc. ("VIP") shut down its Clear traveller registration and airport fast-lane scheme last week. Under the Clear scheme, and two much smaller competing ones run by other companies, air travellers could get access to dedicated lanes leading up to TSA checkpoints in airports, in exchange for payment... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 4 June 2009
"Enhancing" the drivers license
I'm on a panel this afternoon at CFP to discuss the "enhanced" drivers' licenses (EDL's) being issued in some U.S. states and Canadian provinces: Border-line ID: "Enhancing" the drivers license - for security or surveillance? This session will examine technical and political contradictions in the development of "enhanced" drivers licenses... (...Read Entire Entry)Wednesday, 3 June 2009
Congress to vote on virtual strip searches at airports
I'm spending this wek in Washington, DC, at one of my favorite annual events, the Computers, Freedom, and Privacy conference. There's live streaming video of the conference plenaries, although I don;t think it includes the breakout sessions such as the one Thursday where I'll be talking about the Western Hemisphere... (...Read Entire Entry)Monday, 1 June 2009
"Today we're all prisoners in the USA"
I've posted an important alert today in the Identity Project blog about a change in U.S. government rules that could trap you inside (or outside) the borders of the USA, unable to leave the country or to return -- even if you're a U.S. citizen.... (...Read Entire Entry)Sunday, 10 May 2009
What does Air France do with reservation data?
Air France and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines present quite different "corporate cultures", despite being owned by the same French parent corporation , the Air France-KLM Group . Unfortunately, my latest experiments have shown that these two airlines have in common a disregard for the privacy and data protection laws applicable... (...Read Entire Entry)Saturday, 2 May 2009
"Secure Flight" data formats added to the AIRIMP
How soon will we have to get government permission to move around the USA? My analysis today in the Identity Project blog: Secure Flight data formats added to the AIRIMP... (...Read Entire Entry)Monday, 20 April 2009
New developments in government control of travelers in the USA
Over at the Identity Project blog, I have a pair of reports today on the latest developments in government control of air travellers in the USA: TSA claims new powers of detention, search, and interrogation Secret Secure Flight 'vetting' algorithm now in use by 4 US airlines... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 19 March 2009
AmEx continues to spam me ... after closing my account
As I've previously reported, American Express closed my account because I objected to the new terms they proposed that would have required me, in order to keep my AmEx card after 2 April 2009, to "consent" (on behalf of myself and anyone else whose phone I might ever use to... (...Read Entire Entry)Wednesday, 18 March 2009
Air France puts digital fingerprints in RFID boarding passes
I've often said that there's an unfortunate convergence of interests between travel companies' desires for business process automation and collection of marketing data, and governments' desires for surveillance and movement tracking and logging. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Air France's deployment this week, in operational beta testing, of... (...Read Entire Entry)"All Things Considered" on RFID chips in passports
Today’s edition of “All Things Considered” includes a puff piece on e-passports with embedded RFID chips, based entirely on government propaganda. They quoted not a single critic of RFID chips in passports or other travel and identity documents, even though members of the public who submitted comments on the proposal... (...Read Entire Entry)Saturday, 7 March 2009
Say it ain't so, Chuck Schwab
Following my own advice after American Express cancelled my card, I applied to Charles Schwab Bank for a new credit card to use when travelling abroad. (I used to have a different Charles Schwab Bank credit card, but it had a 3% surcharge for foreign currency transactions, and the bank... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 5 March 2009
"Notes from the Electronic Cottage"
Welcome to listeners to today's segment of Jim Campbell's "Notes from the Electronic Cottage" on community radio WERU-FM in Blue Hill and Bangor, Maine. It's archived online and worth a listen. (And it put me back in touch with a long-lost relative who now lives near Blue Hill, heard the... (...Read Entire Entry)Sunday, 1 March 2009
AmEx cancelled my card. Now what should I do?
A week ago today I reported on the announcement by American Express of new terms effective 2 April 2009 for personal AmEx cards issued in the USA, under which, in order to obtain or retain an AmEx card, you will have to "agree" that AmEx has your "consent" to send... (...Read Entire Entry)Sunday, 22 February 2009
Urgent warning to American Express cardholders
If you have an American Express card, you need to take action now: Unless you cancel your card and close your account, or unless AmEx is persuaded to withdraw changes it has announced (effective 2 April 2009) to the terms of its agreement with cardholders, you will be deemed to... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 3 February 2009
Drive-by reader for RFID drivers licenses and passport cards
Hacker and researcher Chris Paget has posted a viedo demonstrating what I and others have been warning people about for years: the ability to read the globally unique serial numbers on RFID chips in passport cards and electronic drivers licenses in the purses and pockets of pedestians on the street,... (...Read Entire Entry)Saturday, 10 January 2009
How to request your travel records
By popular demand, I'm posting updated forms to request your PNR's and other records of your international travel that are being kept by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) division of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Privacy Act request form in OpenOffice format Privacy Act request form in... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 8 January 2009
Quick trip to Brussels
I'll be in Brussels and Paris from January 14th through 20th to participate in the annual conference on Computers, Privacy and Data Protection This year's theme is "Data Protection in a Profiled World", and I'll be talking about some of the issues with surveillance and control of travelers, and the... (...Read Entire Entry)"World Travel In Troubled Economic Times"
I'll be speaking at Get Lost Travel Books in San Francisco on Thursday evening, January 22nd, on "World Travel In Troubled Economic Times": Jump-start your next international journey with this talk by Edward Hasbrouck author of "The Practical Nomad". Back in San Francisco after a 13 month, 6 continent, 80,000... (...Read Entire Entry)Wednesday, 7 January 2009
"The Amazing Race" resumes February 15th
I don't pick the schedule (or the contestants, despite hundreds of comments in my blog from people wanting to be in the cast), but The Amazing Race reality-TV show about travel around the world will be back for its next series much sooner than usual: the first episode of The... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 30 December 2008
Crossposting at PapersPlease.org
I'm continuing to work with the Identity Project as a technical expert, policy analyst, and consultant on travel-related civil liberties and human rights issues. I've often posted pointers here to the Identity Project blog and Web site at www.PapersPlease.org , and will probably continue to do so occasionally. But I'd... (...Read Entire Entry)Can you really see what records are kept about your travel?
One of the big differences between American and European attitudes is that people in the USA tend to be much less willing to trust that the government is doing its job in accordance with the law. Many Europeans have told me this, and it's also what I've observed in the... (...Read Entire Entry)Wednesday, 17 December 2008
TSA to require bar-coded boarding passes
Buried in the notice of the final rules for the Secure Flight airline passenger ID, surveillance, and control scheme is notice that the USA Transportation Security Administrations (TSA) intends to require airlines to add machine-readable codes to all boarding passes for flights in the USA: To ensure the integrity of... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 13 November 2008
"Secure Flight" and the Right to Travel
I've been getting too many questions to answer individually about the regulations issued last week for the so-called Secure Flight program to require ID and permision for air travel in the USA: What does it mean? How will it work (and will it work)? When will it go into effect?... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 23 October 2008
Radio hour today on "Secure Flight"
I'll be on the Katherine Albrecht Show today from 2-3 p.m. Pacific time (5-6 p.m. Eastern Time, 2200-2300 GMT/UTC), talking about the final rules issued yesterday by the USA Transportation Security Administration for the Secure Flight scheme for control and surveillance of passengers on domestic airline flights in the USA.... (...Read Entire Entry)Wednesday, 22 October 2008
Secure Flight, "Watch-List Service Providers", and more
Today the TSA and DHS released their final rule for the so-called Secure Flight program to require each would-be airline passenger, even on domestic fligths within the USA, to get individualized per-person, per-flight prior permission from the TSA before they would be "allowed" to board a plane. The final Secure... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 8 August 2008
Foreigners now need USA permission to leave their home countries
Since I got home, I've spent much of my time (aside from unpacking and moving back into our house from storage) analyzing the Electronic Sysem for Travel Authroization (ESTA) and preparing formal comments on the ESTA filed this week by the Identity Project. You can read the summary or our... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 8 July 2008
Another round of illegal USA travel controls
Recently, while I've been travelling, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) of the USA Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has issued a press release announcing new, illegal, identity verification procedures for travellers at airports in the USA, while the DHS Customs and Border Protection (CBP) division has published a formal proposal... (...Read Entire Entry)Sunday, 3 February 2008
Will you really need a "Real-ID" to fly?
There's been a lot of confusion in the last few weeks as to (1) whether the USA Federal "Real-ID Act" will change the requirements for personal identification documents for airline passengers in the USA, and (2) if and when the Real-ID Act is fully implemented, will it be impossible to... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 25 January 2008
New travel document requirements for USA citizens
Under new regulations and procedures announced to take effect over the next month, citizens of the USA will, for the first time, be required to obtain USA government permission in order to return home to their own country from abroad -- from anywhere else in the world, by air or... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 20 December 2007
Back in Brussels
Six months into my current year-long trip around the world, I'm spending this week in Brussels (Belgium). Some of the high points of our trip so far include English House in Buenos Aires (Argentina), Potosi (Bolivia), driving across the Atacama Desert and down the desert coast of northern Chile, Brazilian... (...Read Entire Entry)Monday, 29 October 2007
Deadline for public comment on "Secure Flight" extended to 21 November
Just a quick note that by popular demand, the USA Transportation Security Administration has extended the deadline for public comments on the so-called Secure Flight scheme for surveillance and control of domestic and international travellers until 21 November 2007. You don't have to be a citizen or resident of the... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 21 September 2007
Results of requests for my "targeting" records
Following the disclosure in late 2006 of the USA government's illegal Automated Targeting System (ATS), which has been secretly keeping dossiers on tens of millions of innocent international travelers to and from the USA, I and several other activists requested our ATS files under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 13 September 2007
Public hearing in Washington on "Secure Flight"
An obscure notice buried in the Federal Register on 5 September 2007 announced a public meeting in Washington, DC, on Thursday, 20 September 2007, to hear comments on the Department of Homeland Security's "Secure Flight" scheme for additional control and monitoring of domestic air travel within the USA. The current... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 21 August 2007
German press on airline reservation privacy
I'm quoted at some length in this article in "heise" online (with audio) on the lack of privacy protection for PNR's (airline reservation data), especially when they are stored or processed in the USA. The article notes the problems that result when European airlines "share" data with agents, contractors, and... (...Read Entire Entry)Sunday, 12 August 2007
ICAO schedules next workshop on RFID passports and biometrics
The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) has scheduled its third annual symposium on biometrics and RFID chips in passports for 1-3 October 2007 at ICAO headquarters in Montréal, Québec, Canada. ICAO has also posted the latest report of its technical advisory group (TAG) on machine readable travel documents (MRTD's), including... (...Read Entire Entry)Another USA-EU "agreement" on airline reservations
Wendy Grossman has a good story today in The Register on the latest "agreement" between the USA and the European Union on transfers of Passenger Name Record (PNR) data from the EU to the government of the USA. I haven't posted much about the latest PNR "agreement", largely because I... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 9 August 2007
Revised USA government schemes for traveller surveillance and control
Today the USA Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced the latest converging and ever-worse versions of its plans for surveillance and control of both domestic air travellers within the USA ("Secure Flight", formerly CAPPS-II) and international air and sea travellers to, from, or via the USA (the intenational "Advanced Passenger... (...Read Entire Entry)Wednesday, 8 August 2007
KLM claims it doesn't know what happens with passengers' data
In March of this year, I flew on KLM Royal Dutch Airlines (one of the subsidiaries of the merged Air France KLM Group) from San Francisco to a hearing in Brussels before the European Parliamant and a meeting of privacy and data protection supervisors of European Union (EU) member countries.... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 7 August 2007
"Automated Targeting System" redux
In November 2006, the USA Department of Homeland Security (DHS) revealed the existence of a so-called Automated Targeting System (ATS) of lifetime government dossiers on millions of international travellers to and from the USA, including airline reservations obtained (by unspecified means) from international airlines, as well as a wide range... (...Read Entire Entry)Sunday, 24 June 2007
USA government refuses to learn from passport problems
From the day they went into effect in January of this year, the new USA government rules requiring passports for all travel by air between the USA and Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean (even for citizens of the USA returning home from abroad) have been a disaster. I told them... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 18 May 2007
Does the Chicago Convention authorize government demands for PNR's? No.
In his testimony before the European Parliament on Monday, USA Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff claimed that the authority for governments to demand access to passenger name records (PNR's) is expressly provide by the Chicago Convention (the 1944 fundamental international civil aviation treaty). I was susprised by Chertofff's statement,... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 17 May 2007
Chertoff pledges to prosecute crimes against the Privacy Act
Thanks to the heroic efforts of EFF's Erik Josefsson and others in Brussels to obtain and upload gigabytes of video, I've been able to watch the entirety of USA Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff's testimony before the LIBE Committee of the European Parliament on Monday. Chertoff's actual testimony was... (...Read Entire Entry)Who will police the privacy police?
A newly-released report by the Government Accountability Office finds that, as I've been complaining, the DHS has failed to give the public the notices required by the Privacy Act as to what information the government is keeping about U.S. citizens and residents, and how that information is being used. Without... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 15 May 2007
Did Chertoff lie to the European Parliament?
USA Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff was in Brussels Monday to testify before a hearing of the European Parliament's LIBE [Civil Liberties] Committee about Chertoff's department's desire for access to Passenger Name Records (PNR's) for flights between the USA and the European Union. After initially trying to ignore the... (...Read Entire Entry)Monday, 14 May 2007
TSA shows how well it protects personal data
Public Statement on Employee Data Security Incident WASHINGTON -- On Thursday, May 3, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) became aware of a potential data security incident involving approximately 100,000 archived employment records of individuals employed by the agency from January 2002 until August 2005. An external hard drive containing personnel... (...Read Entire Entry)USA-EU "Open Skies" agreement signed but won't go to the Senate
On 30 April 2007, representatives of the USA and the European Union signed a so-called Open Skies agreement revising the rules for airline flights between the USA and the EU. As I've noted in my analysis of the agreement and in my testimony to EU legislators and data protection authorities... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 11 May 2007
While I was away
I had a great time with Evan Korth's students at NYU, and at CFP in Montréal. But the hard disk on my home computer failed while I was out of town, and I'm still working on recovering as much as possible of my data. A friendly reminder: How recent are... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 3 May 2007
"Your Reputation Precedes You" (CFP 2007)
I'm on a panel entitled "Your Reputation Precedes You: The Transfer of European Union Passenger Name Records to the U.S. and Canada" today at the conference on Computers, Freedom and Privacy . Here are links to some of the topics and previous articles I may mention in my talk: Freedom... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 27 April 2007
Identity Project comments on European Union CRS regulations
I've mentioned previously that the European Commission has been conducting a public consultation on whether to revise or entirely repeal the European Union's Code of Conduct for Computerized Reservation Systems (CRS's). Because there are no similar rules in any other jursidiction, but all the major CRS's do business in the... (...Read Entire Entry)Thursday, 19 April 2007
What's wrong with "Open Skies"?
"Open" is good, right? And what could be wrong with a new civil aviation treaty between the USA and the European Union that would "liberate" trans-Atlantic flights from the bogeyman of government regulation? Actually, quite a lot is wrong with the proposed Open Skies treaty, although you wouldn't guess that... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 17 April 2007
On Internet radio Wednesday; in New York next Wednesday
I'll be talking about similar issues of privacy and travel in an Internet radio interview this Wednesday morning (18 April) and in a guest lecture at New York University next Wednesday afternoon (25 April): Wednesday, 18 April 2007: Guest on the inaugural broadcast of "Uncovering the Truth" with Katherine Albrecht... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 10 April 2007
Privacy advice for travel managers
I'm featured in the cover story on How to protect travelers' personal data on pages 28-32 of the April 2007 issue of T & E [Travel and Entertainment] Magazine , a leading trade journal for corporate travel managers. (If you don't like the funky page viewer on the magazine's Web... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 23 March 2007
European Parliament hearing on PNR's
I'm off to Brussels for this hearing on Monday (agenda , additional background documents ) on the transfer of passenger name record (PNR) data from the European union to the USA, and for a meeting of the "Article 29 Working Party" of E.U. national data protection authorities on the same... (...Read Entire Entry)Sunday, 4 March 2007
Europe reconsidering rules for reservation systems
The European Commission (the executive branch of the European Union) has opened a two-month public consultation on possible revision or repeal of the EU Code of Conduct for Computerized Reservation Systems (CRS's). The outcome of this obscure and technical-seeming regulatory proceeding could have important effects worldwide -- not just or... (...Read Entire Entry)Sunday, 18 February 2007
The Amazing Race 11 (All-Star Edition), Episode 1
Miami, FL (USA) - Quito (Ecuador) - Cotopaxi National Park (Ecuador) The cast of The Amazing Race , which started its new All-Star season tonight with relatively short flights from Miami to Quito, Ecuador, typically spend about two weeks of the month-long race around the world on airplanes or in... (...Read Entire Entry)Monday, 12 February 2007
Un/Welcome in Washington
I arrived in Washington, DC, yesterday evening (after speaking at the memorial for my dear departed friend Eric Weinberger Saturday in Boston, which made the trip to the East Coast not a complete waste) to what I can only describe as a mixed welcome. At the downtown D.C. hostel, the... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 23 January 2007
New USA passport rules frustrate last-minute travellers
Effective today, the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI) requires passports for all air travel between the USA, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Latin America. Today the New York Times reports on the problems the new rules has caused for would-be last-minute travellers from the USA, especially business travellers, who find... (...Read Entire Entry)Tuesday, 9 January 2007
RFID passports in the wild in the USA
I've just received my first report of a regular (non-diplomatic) USA passport with an RFID chip in it (with data fields already allocated on the chip for logs of the passport holder's movements): I applied for my passport in September 2006 and received it December 07, 2006. It has the... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 29 December 2006
More illegalities in the “Automated Targeting System”
Even while trying to defend the Automated Targeting System that is being used to deny travelers their rights on the basis of secret "risk assessments" that give each of us a terror score from secret databases of third-party and government information about us, the USA Department of Homeland Security (DHS)... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 15 December 2006
Congress, EU, and businesses question "targetting" of travellers
Questions are beginning to be asked by members of the U.S. Senate , the European Commission , the European Parliament , and business travellers about the illegal "Automated Targeting System" (ATS) that the USA Department of Homeland Security has already used to deny more than half a million people their... (...Read Entire Entry)Sunday, 10 December 2006
The Amazing Race 10, Episode 12
Barcelona (Spain) - Paris (France) - Caen (France) - Bayeux (France) - Paris (France) - New York, NY (USA) - Garrison, NY (USA) (Warning to readers: If you didn't like last week's column because you didn't think it had enough to do with The Amazing Race television show, you probably... (...Read Entire Entry)Half a million people denied their right to travel
As I noted in one of my previous articles about the USA Department of Homeland Security's "Automated Targeting System" (ATS): I find it somewhat strange that the assignment of scores or "risk assessments" seems to have gotten more attention than the earlier DHS announcement of its intention to require individualized... (...Read Entire Entry)Friday, 8 December 2006
Chertoff thinks it’s “righteous” to give each traveller a terror score
Everywhere he goes this week, USA Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff is being dogged by questions about the illegality of the Automated Targeting System (ATS) first pointed out in the comments I filed with the DHS Monday on behalf of the Identity Project . Today in Atlanta, Chertoff had... (...Read Entire Entry)USA to continue targetting travellers
By a notice today in the Federal Register , the USA Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has resumed accepting public comments (search for docket 2006-0060, scroll through the list of documents on that docket to DHS-2006-0060-0062, and click on the "add comment" icon in the right-most column) on the Automated... (...Read Entire Entry)Link |
Posted by Edward, 8 December 2006, 07:56 (