3rd-District Long Beach CA Cyber Council

Published on Saturday, September 20, 2003 by the Oakland Tribune
JetBlue Airways Gave Defense Dept Inineraries of 5 Million Customers
Airline Passengers' Data Used in Study

Violating its own privacy policy, JetBlue Airways gave 5 million passenger itineraries to a Defense Department contractor that used the information as part of a study seeking ways to identify "high risk" airline customers.

The study, produced by Torch Concepts of Huntsville, Ala., was intended to be a proof-of-concept analysis for a project on military base security, titled "Homeland Security: Airline Passenger Risk Assessment."

JetBlue, whose terminal at Oakland International Airport is a major hub for the low-cost carrier's popular cross-country routes, insisted the data was not shared with any government agency and that Torch has since destroyed the passenger records.

New York-based JetBlue said it has taken steps so the situation will not happen again. "This was a mistake on our part," JetBlue chief executive David Neeleman said in an apologetic e-mail sent to angry customers.

Silicon Valley privacy activist Bill Scannell, who first posted details of the study and JetBlue's involvement on his Web site, Don't Spy On Us, said Friday the privacy of anyone who flew JetBlue from its inception until September 2002 was compromised.

"Torch Concepts went and ran basically a 'total information awareness' on (travel records from 5 million customers). They got Social Security numbers, and from that were able to pull out the driver's records ... purchasing patterns, where they've lived," Scannell said.

"Had I been a JetBlue passenger, I would be getting a new Social Security number. I would assume my identity has been stolen."

Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington, said that by violating its privacy policy, JetBlue could be sued for "deceptive trade practices."

Rotenberg said his organization was contemplating filing a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission.

JetBlue "really should have known better," said Richard M. Smith, an Internet security and privacy consultant based in Cambridge, Mass. Smith said the content of the study raises serious questions about whether it was really aimed at military base security.

"It's basically a prototype for CAPPS II," Smith said, referring to the nationwide computer system being developed by the Transportation Security Administration. The Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System, ordered by Congress after the Sept. 11 attacks, will check such things as credit reports and consumer transactions and compare passenger names with those on government watch lists.

The TSA, the federal agency in charge of airline and airport security, said Friday it was not involved in the study.

Torch contacted the TSA last summer for airline industry contacts and the agency complied with the request, but "that was the extent of our involvement," TSA spokesman Nico Melendez said.

The Torch study analyzed the records JetBlue provided in September 2002, as well as other demographic data collected about the passengers, including Social Security numbers and information about their finances and families.

The apparent goal of the study, which was presented at a technology conference in February, was to determine the usefulness of combining passengers' travel and personal information in order to create a profiling system that would make air travel more safe.

One conclusion of the study was that "data elements have been identified which best distinguish normal JetBlue passengers from past terrorists."

Neeleman's e-mail said Torch "developed this information into a presentation, without JetBlue's knowledge, for a Department of Homeland Security symposium" and that he was "deeply dismayed to learn of it."

Neeleman said JetBlue provided passengers' names, addresses and phone numbers to Torch after an "exceptional request from the Department of Defense to assist their contractor, Torch Concepts, with a project regarding military base security."

Torch referred calls to its attorney, Richard Marsden, who did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

"This is a great lesson for all of us," Scannell said. "This is just 5 million citizens. What CAPPS II will do is do this to all of us."

"This is why we need to drive a stake through the CAPPS II vampire now."

More information can be found at Bill Scannell's Web site, www.dontspyon.us

The name "Esselen", the historic self-identification for some of the rancherias, derives from Ex'seien, which means "The Rock". It specifically comes from the declaration: "Xue elo xonia eune" ("I come from the Rock").

"Long ago, it was said that Eagle, Hummingbird, and Coyote watched from the mountain tops the water recede after the great flood. Eagle, the Chief, sent Coyote to look below, and asked him what was there. Coyote said that there were many, many people who were dead. Coyote went forward and seized some earth and from it came his wife. The children from the union of these super-natural beings became many and the first Indian people of central coastal California. The land provided a rich natural environment for all of the animal birds, fish and people to live in harmony within their shared universe."

"So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and its purpose in the service of your people. Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide. Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend, even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all people and grovel to none. When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision. When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home." --Tecumseh

"Beware the leader who bangs the drums of war in order to whip the citizenry into a patriotic fervor, for patriotism is indeed a double-edged sword. It both emboldens the blood, just as it narrows the mind. And when the drums of war have reached a fever pitch and the blood boils with hate and the mind has closed, the leader will have no need in seizing the rights of the citizenry. Rather, the citizenry, infused with fear and blinded by patriotism, will offer up all of their rights unto the leader and gladly so. How do I know this? For this is what I have done. And I am Caesar."

-- Julius Caesar (fiction)

"Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high; Where knowledge is free; where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls; Where words come out from the depths of truth; Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection; Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit; Where the mind is led forward by Thee into ever-widening thought and action- Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake."

-- Rabindranath Tagore