More TSA Fun

[PowerPenguin]

URL: http://tinyurl.com/nscn8

SAN FRANCISCO -- Jim Harper left his hotel early Thursday at 5:30 a.m. to give himself more than two hours to clear security at San Francisco International Airport. It wasn't that he was worried the security line would be long, but because he accepted a dare from civil liberties rabble-rouser John Gilmore to test whether he could actually fly without showing identification.

Gilmore issued the challenge at Wednesday's meeting of the Department of Homeland Security's privacy advisory committee in San Francisco, which otherwise lacked much in the way of controversy. An entrepreneur and co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Gilmore recently lost a court battle seeking to unmask the government's secret regulations asking passengers to show identification when flying, and to have those rules declared unconstitutional.

Scolding the DHS committee for dithering over small matters, Gilmore said that it should be investigating the National Security Agency's eavesdropping program and that the committee's real job was to "protect the homeland from mean-spirited officials."

Gilmore then dared committee members to place their driver's licenses in the envelopes he had passed out, mail them to their home addresses and then attempt to fly home without identification.

While signs in the airport and on the Transportation Security Administration website insist that showing ID is mandatory, the official policy, as revealed by the judges' decision (.pdf) in Gilmore's case, is that "airline passengers either present identification or be subjected to a more extensive search." But Gilmore said that's not what really happens in an airport when one refuses to provide identification.

Has anyone tried this yet?

[aries]

Extremely interesting.

[KBCraig]

If you haven't yet done so, please read the full article at the tinyurl provided by powerpenguin. Be sure to check the link to Hasbrouck's story.

Scary stuff!

Kevin

[Dreepa]

I fly on Monday.

[Dreepa]

I can verify with 100% certainty.

I did NOT show ID on Monday when I went to Manchester airport.
They wrote 'NO ID' and SSSS on my ticket.  I was then sent to a pat down. I normally get patted down anyway because I refuse to take off my shoes.

I was smiling he whole time.

Thanks Russell!

[Tom Sawyer]

 

[Kat Kanning]

Dreepa, you rock!!

[Kat Kanning]

Russell caused a stir on Monday when we went to get Kira:
(Note my superior photographic skills)

[Russell Kanning]

A tsa lady got really mad at me and threw a nickle at my feet and said,"You must be looking for a handout"

A deputy wanted to see my ID.

[Tom Sawyer]

  You guys are instigators.

That was no lady.

And the Deputy obviously didn't know who he was dealing with.

[KBCraig]

A deputy wanted to see my ID.

Did you show him your KFP press badge? 

I love it... just keep stirring stuff up!   

[Kat Kanning]

Yeah, he checked out his badge and business card as ID.  When he heard that Russell was the one arrested last year for not showing ID, I think he'd had enough, and left.

[Russell Kanning]

nothing like a deputy with the funny hat to make people look at your sign.

[aries]

The only ID I carry around to show upon request is my middle finger ... print.

[tracysaboe]

I thought TSA stood for TitS and Ass ?

I think many of the agents think that's what it stands for anyway.


Tracy