Our “No Fly” list, the one utilized by airport security officials across the United States every day to prevent possible terrorists from boarding an airplane, has as many holes in it as Swiss Cheese (via CBS News):
(CBS) 60 Minutes, in collaboration with the National Security News Service, has obtained the secret list used to screen airline passengers for terrorists and discovered it includes names of people not likely to cause terror, including the president of Bolivia, people who are dead and names so common, they are shared by thousands of innocent fliers.
Steve Kroft’s investigation, in which an ex-FBI agent who worked on its al Qaeda task force says the list of 44,000 names is ineffective, will be broadcast this Sunday, Oct. 8, at 7 p.m. ET/PT. […]
… [T]he names of some of the most dangerous living terrorists or suspects are kept off the list.
The 11 British suspects recently charged with plotting to blow up airliners with liquid explosives were not on it, despite the fact they were under surveillance for more than a year.
The name of David Belfield who now goes by Dawud Sallahuddin, is not on the list, even though he assassinated someone in Washington, D.C., for former Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini. […]
[Former FBI agent Jack] Cloonan, when shown a copy of the list from March 2006, tells Kroft, “I did see Osama bin Laden, both with an “O” in the first name and “U” in the second…I was glad to see that. But some of the other names I see here…I just have to scratch my head and say, ‘My God, what have we created here?‘”
My God, what have we created here?
Feel safer?
My mild-mannered brother-in-law has one of the common names on the list. He goes through hell every time he flies. Every time. It can’t seem to get fixed.
But boy oh boy is it making the world safer.
He must be trying to carry bottled water onto the plane.
A potential terrist if there ever was one.
We must be ever vigilant in our quest to guard ourselves against scientifically impossible attacks!
no. just glad my name is not very common.
It could never work:the names of serious terrorists under surveillance would be too secret to put on a widely accessible list like this.
Security opera.
Not just a no-fly list.. but there are lists of people and groups that have MY name on it. We’re trying to gain access to our files as individuals and groups.
We are being watched.
It’s fucking creepy!!!!!
When they came for me…
They’re coming for YOU.
Welcome to Amerikkka
Actually, there are two types of no-fly lists: one is the “Terrorist” no fly list aims to keep terrorist suspects off airplanes — and a list of lower threat “Selectees” chosen for expanded searches but which appears to be misused to target pro-peace, anti-Bush activists.
A federal “No Fly” list, intended to keep terrorists from boarding planes, is snaring peace activists at San Francisco International and other US airports
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2002/09/27/MN181034.DTL
Nun Terrorized by Terror Watch
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,68973,00.html
Emphasis mine.
WaPo