Obligatory Paperz Pleaze quote here
in the early evening on Friday, the 27th of January 2006 by Chad
Court says ID checks at airports constitutional
Airlines and the U.S government have the right to keep passengers from boarding planes if they refuse to show personal identification, a U.S. appeals court ruled on Thursday.
GilmoreJohn Gilmore, an early Sun Microsystems employee and co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an online civil liberties group, sued after Southwest and United Airlines in 2002 both did not allow him on board their flights when he refused to show any ID.In court filing, he argued that requiring identification from airline passengers was unconstitutional, but a three-judge panel of 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed.
Libertarians are outraged, liberals blame Bush, slashdotters blather on, and so forth.
Please note: He wasn’t arrested, threatened, interrogated, or anything else but politely told no ID, no plane ride.
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January 27th, 2006 at 8:52 pm
..and that means it makes any difference if he would have been arrested or threatened? Why should they check any ID if an American citizen wants to travel from East to West Coast, for what reason? It is simply none of their business to collect travel data for non-international flights.
Don’t you realize that Gilmore also fights for your privacy? For the right to have any control over your own personal data?
January 28th, 2006 at 9:36 am
Oh I do realize that. And on just about every other thing he’s spot on.
But in this case…
1. Airlines are private enterprises. They can do whatever they want to do. And in this case, they want to check your ID just to make sure you’re the person whose name is on the ticket. This is for their security and wellbeing. If you don’t agree with the rules set out by a private enterprise, you don’t have to do business with them. That’s your option, and there are other options for crossing the country.
2. The government has a vested interest in keeping the citizens safe. Ensuring that people aren’t terrorists on aircraft is one of those things. 9/11 wasn’t international flights. It’s bad enough that they had “valid” ID’s anyway when the boarded the planes.
As for it making a difference if he was arrested or threatened, I was merely setting the tone of the conversation, because many people will assume this is a dictatorship, and that he’s off in the gulag now being tortured or something for dissenting with the government. Which is so not the case…
What I would have a problem with? If the government has a database where they keep information on who flew where, etc., and they keep that data for years. That is what I have a problem with, but this isn’t what he was crusading against.
January 28th, 2006 at 1:06 pm
Well, I understand what you meant. But I still disagree in some points.
Private enterprises are for sure free in their decisions but should nevertheless act according to the federal law like the Privacy Act. The contract is: You pay for your ticket, you will be delivered at the airport you like. Nothing said about collecting my personal or business flight data like my favorite vacation places or the town my secret lover lives or the city where the headquarter of my boss’ new partner is located or something like that. This data has a commercial value why should they get it for free? More than 100 million commercial data records containing personal information such as name, date of birth, names of the children, and telephone numbers and even dossiers on passengers are stored. Aren’t you afraid of the invasiveness of this whole system?
If I had the choice I would use the airline not collecting my travel data and not checking who I am. Unfortunately, I don’t have a choice at all as every airline wants to check my ID nowadays. Well, if I had the time I would maybe go by train or car but you have to admit it is not really an option.
And speaking of your second argument I don’t see the point. You already said that all the terrorists had valid passports. And I am sure they will own valid IDs in the future because it lies in the very nature of a terrorist to be inconspicuous before an assault.
On the other hand they are so many no-fly list’s national data base victims that faced questioning and arresting for no reason at all, even young children. (see for example this article http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/story?section=local&id=3771743) If hundreds of innocents subjected to lengthy and extreme searches every time they fly, prevented from flying, or arrested there is something wrong here.
And this no-fly program has been a miserable failure in every respect. Not one terrorist caught, ever, although running since years now. If anybody would have been caught they would be trumpeting it for all to hear..
January 29th, 2006 at 6:11 pm
1. I agree with the point about selling the data. I do fully feel that no company should be able to sell data about ME without my permission. Anonymous bulk data about general trends, I’m not so worried about. But identifying info is a serious no-no. I do try my best to sabotage any collected data when I can.
But checking my ID to make sure I’m the guy on the ticket is a different topic I think, and that I don’t have that much of an issue with.
2. I’ve had to fly several times in the past few years, and it does suck. My business partner was tagged (with his perfectly Irish as they come name) every leg of the flight. That’s crap. Another friend of mine who is dark skinned Greek after passing through security turned and waved at someone. Within 5 seconds he was tackled to the ground, and dragged in for a full body search. Complete with screaming passengers who then had to sit near him on the flight after he was cleared.
Is that crap? Oh yeah, I agree.
Keep a database of known or suspected terrorists, no problem. Just make sure it has pictures.
Profiling users who match the names and physical characteristics, that’s fine too I think, as long as they physical stuff matches. If someone is a false positive, they should have a way to identify themselves as not a match, maybe a secret handshake or something to give security.
I guess what I’m trying to say is he shouldn’t have sued the airlines for exactly what he did. Go after companies selling data, go after random searches, go after things that are serious.
In this case, he went after something that was fairly “reasonable” to most people and LOST. Precendents like this are a bitch and will work against filing suits about important things.
Most importantly, I’m surprised you don’t have a blog. You have great arguments and are very persuasive.
January 29th, 2006 at 7:19 pm
Reading your last posting I guess we are not that far away from each other in terms of privacy aspects..
I think I never really had a problem with showing my ID before flying. In the last months I changed my mind about this fundamentally. There are two main reasons:
First, the planned biometrically enhanced passports showing a digital picture and two fingerprints. It makes me feel like a criminal.
Second is that I do research on data mining. Since I learnt about what is possible to achieve with this technology I am more aware of what is at stake here. You can call it fear or paranoia, I would rather call it wariness.
Maybe most people in the US or elsewhere do not really understand Gilmore’s arguments. He is thinking far ahead, maybe too far.
By the way, I do have a blog. http://46halbe.org/auchblog18.html