JetBlue Gave Defense Firm Files on Passengers

New York Times
September 20, 2003

JetBlue Gave Defense Firm Files on Passengers
By PHILIP SHENON


WASHINGTON, Sept. 19 - JetBlue Airways acknowledged publicly today
that it had provided a Pentagon contractor with information on more
than one million of its passengers as part of a program to track down
terrorists and other "high risk" passengers. That data, which was
turned over in violation of the airline's own privacy policies, was
then used to identify the passengers' Social Security numbers,
financial histories and occupations.

JetBlue, a three-year-old discount airline, sent an e-mail message to
passengers this week, conceding that it had made a mistake in
providing the records last year to Torch Concepts, an Army contractor
in Huntsville, Ala., for a research project on "airline passenger risk
assessment."

"This was a mistake on our part and I know you and many of our
customers feel betrayed by it," said David Neeleman, JetBlue's chief
executive, in an e-mail message that the airline, based in New York,
said was sent to about 150 passengers who had written in so far to
complain.

Mr. Neeleman, the founder of JetBlue, which has been a rare success in
the airline industry and has prospered because of its reputation for
low fares and consumer friendliness, insisted that none of the
passenger information was shared with the government. "The sole set of
data in Torch's possession has been destroyed," he wrote. "No
government agency ever had access to it."

Privacy rights groups expressed astonishment that JetBlue had shared
so much passenger information with a contractor, describing the
privacy breach as among the most serious reported by any American
company in recent years.

JetBlue's announcement comes at a time when many civil liberties
groups are warning that privacy rights are becoming victims of the
government's struggle against terrorism and the desire of law
enforcement and intelligence agencies for quick access to customer
information that has traditionally been closely held by corporations.

The airline said it had provided Torch Concepts with records on about
five million individual itineraries, reflecting the travels of about
1.1 million passengers in 2001 and 2002. The records, it said, would
have included the passengers' names, addresses and phone numbers but
not credit card numbers or government identification numbers commonly
collected from travelers like passport numbers.

A lawyer for Torch Concepts, Richard Marsden, said that the passenger
records provided by JetBlue were destroyed by the contractor earlier
this week after the existence of the project was reported by Wired
News, a technology-news Web site. "It's all been destroyed in the last
24 hours," he said in a telephone interview.

But privacy advocates said further investigation was needed. "Five
million is a big number," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of
the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington. "JetBlue
passengers have reason to be very upset. Will the data be destroyed?
Will there be some compensation for the passengers?"

Mr. Neeleman said that the passenger information was turned over last
year as a result of an "exceptional request from the Department of
Defense to assist their contractor, Torch Concepts, with a project
regarding military base security." He said that JetBlue was told that
"this project had no connection with aviation security."

The Pentagon, which was still largely shut down because of Hurricane
Isabel, had no immediate comment on the issue.

Torch Concepts, which describes itself in promotional material as a
"content-management and information-mining" company, was hired by the
Army more than three years ago to determine how information from
public and private records might be analyzed to help defend military
bases from attack by terrorists and other adversaries.

While the company has insisted that the Army study was never intended
to be used to improve security at civilian airports, there was clearly
discussion within the company of whether its research might be of use
to the Department of Homeland Security, which is responsible for
airport security.

In a study prepared in February and released at a symposium sponsored
by the Homeland Security Department, Torch Concepts said that "several
data elements have been identified which best distinguish normal
JetBlue passengers from past terrorists."

The report said that after receiving the passenger information from
JetBlue, Torch Concepts matched the passenger names against a variety
of databases that it had purchased from Acxiom, a large consumer
research company.

"For approximately 40 percent of the passengers," the report said, the
Acxiom databases provided additional "demographic information,"
including a passenger's Social Security number, occupation, income,
gender and home- and car-ownership history, as well as the number of
adults and children living in the passenger's household.

Mr. Marsden said the company and its study had no link to the
Pentagon's broad electronic surveillance project known as Terrorist
Information Awareness, which has drawn harsh criticism from Capitol
Hill and from privacy groups in recent months who consider it an
effort to intrude on the rights of Americans in the name of
counterterrorism.

Nor, he said, was there any link between the Torch Concepts' project
and a huge government passenger-screening program that is now being
developed by the Transportation Security Administration. The
government's antiterrorism program, the second phase in a effort known
as the Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System, has also been
criticized by privacy advocates as overly intrusive.

Gareth Edmondson-Jones, a spokesman for JetBlue, said in a telephone
interview that the decision to provide the passenger information to
Torch Concepts was a clear violation of the company's own policy. "We
have the strongest privacy policy in the industry, which clearly says
that we don't supply customer data to third parties," he said.

Asked if Mr. Neeleman or other senior executives had approved the
sharing of the passenger information, Mr. Edmondson-Jones said he did
not know, adding that there had been no discussion of disciplinary
action against anyone at the company for the policy breach. "That's
not even come up," he said. "We made the decision as a company, at
whatever level it was done."

He suggested that the decision to turn over the passenger information
to the contractor was motivated by the airline's concern with security
in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. "In a post 9/11
word troubled by security issues and terrorists, we had a special
request from the Department of Defense to assist in a military
project," he said. "The decision was made to assist."

For more information on this outrage, see:
http://www.dontspyon.us/jetblue.html

Fly Jetblue, find yourself on a nofly list or extra security check list.
Jetblue's fares come at a price.


"citizen" wrote in message
...
New York Times
September 20, 2003

JetBlue Gave Defense Firm Files on Passengers
By PHILIP SHENON


WASHINGTON, Sept. 19 - JetBlue Airways acknowledged publicly today
that it had provided a Pentagon contractor with information on more
than one million of its passengers as part of a program to track down
terrorists and other "high risk" passengers. That data, which was
turned over in violation of the airline's own privacy policies, was
then used to identify the passengers' Social Security numbers,
financial histories and occupations.

JetBlue, a three-year-old discount airline, sent an e-mail message to
passengers this week, conceding that it had made a mistake in
providing the records last year to Torch Concepts, an Army contractor
in Huntsville, Ala., for a research project on "airline passenger risk
assessment."

"This was a mistake on our part and I know you and many of our
customers feel betrayed by it," said David Neeleman, JetBlue's chief
executive, in an e-mail message that the airline, based in New York,
said was sent to about 150 passengers who had written in so far to
complain.

Mr. Neeleman, the founder of JetBlue, which has been a rare success in
the airline industry and has prospered because of its reputation for
low fares and consumer friendliness, insisted that none of the
passenger information was shared with the government. "The sole set of
data in Torch's possession has been destroyed," he wrote. "No
government agency ever had access to it."

Privacy rights groups expressed astonishment that JetBlue had shared
so much passenger information with a contractor, describing the
privacy breach as among the most serious reported by any American
company in recent years.

JetBlue's announcement comes at a time when many civil liberties
groups are warning that privacy rights are becoming victims of the
government's struggle against terrorism and the desire of law
enforcement and intelligence agencies for quick access to customer
information that has traditionally been closely held by corporations.

The airline said it had provided Torch Concepts with records on about
five million individual itineraries, reflecting the travels of about
1.1 million passengers in 2001 and 2002. The records, it said, would
have included the passengers' names, addresses and phone numbers but
not credit card numbers or government identification numbers commonly
collected from travelers like passport numbers.

A lawyer for Torch Concepts, Richard Marsden, said that the passenger
records provided by JetBlue were destroyed by the contractor earlier
this week after the existence of the project was reported by Wired
News, a technology-news Web site. "It's all been destroyed in the last
24 hours," he said in a telephone interview.

But privacy advocates said further investigation was needed. "Five
million is a big number," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of
the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington. "JetBlue
passengers have reason to be very upset. Will the data be destroyed?
Will there be some compensation for the passengers?"

Mr. Neeleman said that the passenger information was turned over last
year as a result of an "exceptional request from the Department of
Defense to assist their contractor, Torch Concepts, with a project
regarding military base security." He said that JetBlue was told that
"this project had no connection with aviation security."

The Pentagon, which was still largely shut down because of Hurricane
Isabel, had no immediate comment on the issue.

Torch Concepts, which describes itself in promotional material as a
"content-management and information-mining" company, was hired by the
Army more than three years ago to determine how information from
public and private records might be analyzed to help defend military
bases from attack by terrorists and other adversaries.

While the company has insisted that the Army study was never intended
to be used to improve security at civilian airports, there was clearly
discussion within the company of whether its research might be of use
to the Department of Homeland Security, which is responsible for
airport security.

In a study prepared in February and released at a symposium sponsored
by the Homeland Security Department, Torch Concepts said that "several
data elements have been identified which best distinguish normal
JetBlue passengers from past terrorists."

The report said that after receiving the passenger information from
JetBlue, Torch Concepts matched the passenger names against a variety
of databases that it had purchased from Acxiom, a large consumer
research company.

"For approximately 40 percent of the passengers," the report said, the
Acxiom databases provided additional "demographic information,"
including a passenger's Social Security number, occupation, income,
gender and home- and car-ownership history, as well as the number of
adults and children living in the passenger's household.

Mr. Marsden said the company and its study had no link to the
Pentagon's broad electronic surveillance project known as Terrorist
Information Awareness, which has drawn harsh criticism from Capitol
Hill and from privacy groups in recent months who consider it an
effort to intrude on the rights of Americans in the name of
counterterrorism.

Nor, he said, was there any link between the Torch Concepts' project
and a huge government passenger-screening program that is now being
developed by the Transportation Security Administration. The
government's antiterrorism program, the second phase in a effort known
as the Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System, has also been
criticized by privacy advocates as overly intrusive.

Gareth Edmondson-Jones, a spokesman for JetBlue, said in a telephone
interview that the decision to provide the passenger information to
Torch Concepts was a clear violation of the company's own policy. "We
have the strongest privacy policy in the industry, which clearly says
that we don't supply customer data to third parties," he said.

Asked if Mr. Neeleman or other senior executives had approved the
sharing of the passenger information, Mr. Edmondson-Jones said he did
not know, adding that there had been no discussion of disciplinary
action against anyone at the company for the policy breach. "That's
not even come up," he said. "We made the decision as a company, at
whatever level it was done."

He suggested that the decision to turn over the passenger information
to the contractor was motivated by the airline's concern with security
in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. "In a post 9/11
word troubled by security issues and terrorists, we had a special
request from the Department of Defense to assist in a military
project," he said. "The decision was made to assist."

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 06:46:00 GMT, (citizen)
wrote:
JetBlue Airways acknowledged publicly today
that it had provided a Pentagon contractor with information on more
than one million of its passengers as part of a program to track down
terrorists and other "high risk" passengers. That data, which was
turned over in violation of the airline's own privacy policies, was
then used to identify the passengers' Social Security numbers,
financial histories and occupations.

snip
The airline said it had provided Torch Concepts with records on about
five million individual itineraries, reflecting the travels of about
1.1 million passengers in 2001 and 2002. The records, it said, would
have included the passengers' names, addresses and phone numbers but
not credit card numbers or government identification numbers commonly
collected from travelers like passport numbers.

snip
The report said that after receiving the passenger information from
JetBlue, Torch Concepts matched the passenger names against a variety
of databases that it had purchased from Acxiom, a large consumer
research company.

"For approximately 40 percent of the passengers," the report said, the
Acxiom databases provided additional "demographic information,"
including a passenger's Social Security number, occupation, income,
gender and home- and car-ownership history, as well as the number of
adults and children living in the passenger's household.

I've taken off my tinfoil hat and something still looks wrong.

From Acxiom's privacy policy:

"These databases do not include credit information, medical
information, Social Security Number (or other related information) or
personally identifiable information about children. Acxiom uses the
U.S. Direct Marketing Association's (DMA) Mail Preference, Telephone
Preference and E-mail Preference suppression files, as well as state
do-not-call lists, in the development of these databases. These
databases are provided to qualified businesses for marketing and
customer service purposes only. The information can be used to enhance
customer files and provide lists for prospecting purposes."

OK, so in order for Torch to get SS#s, someone has to be lying. Either
Axciom does publish SS#s or Jet Blue did turn over credit card numbers
and the card companies obligingly crossed them to SS#s. Or maybe there
are other possibilities.

I'm going to ask Axciom. They probably will want my ss# to reply.

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 17:41:02 GMT, Dick Locke
wrote:

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 06:46:00 GMT, (citizen)
wrote:
JetBlue Airways acknowledged publicly today
that it had provided a Pentagon contractor with information on more
than one million of its passengers as part of a program to track down
terrorists and other "high risk" passengers. That data, which was
turned over in violation of the airline's own privacy policies, was
then used to identify the passengers' Social Security numbers,
financial histories and occupations.

Excuse me for replying to my own message, but it appears that Axciom
has different privacy policies for different data bases. I dug deeper
and found this:

Quote
InfoBase and SentricxSM Reference Products—Acxiom develops and
maintains databases containing information about many individuals and
households in the U.S. for reference purposes and provides online
links to other information provider services for use by qualified
businesses and government agencies for lawful and ethical purposes.
These databases are developed from many different sources, including:

Public Record and Publicly Available Information—Telephone
directories; real property recorder and assessor information;
historical drivers license information; current drivers license
information, where allowed by law; historical motor vehicle
information; current motor vehicle information, where allowed by law;
deceased information; and other suppression information

Data from Other Information Providers—Telephone companies, surveys,
questionnaires and consumer-provided contact information

These databases and access to other information provider services
include financial information, Social Security Number and other
related information where permitted by law. This information is
provided only to qualified businesses primarily in the finance,
insurance, mortgage, real estate and retail industries for the purpose
of verifying information about customers, issuing mortgages, speeding
transactions, employment screening and reducing the chance of fraud.
Other reference databases are provided to government agencies for the
purposes of verifying information, employment screening and assisting
law enforcement.

Unquote

Scary group, this Axciom. I asked them to comment on whether providing
data to a DOD subcontractor conflicts with this privacy policy.

Hmmm, they are in Little Rock AK, home of you know who and spouse and
you know who else.

Dick Locke wrote:
I've taken off my tinfoil hat and something still looks wrong.

Americans should have taken off their patriotic glasses before the patriot act
was passed. They should have taken off their patriotic glasses before the USA
invaded Iraq without any UN mandate.

Those patriotic glasses made americans blind to reality. The USA
administration knew that and used this to pass its own orwelian agenda through
all levels of government without any opposition, except from other countries
who were then dismissed as whatever insults Bush made to so many countries.

It is too late now. The USA wants that "total information awareness" thing and
will get it. This Jetblue thing is just another test. The USA government
conveniently forgot international law, they forgot the constitution. They set
about to build a military state that all all controls over the population with
the pretense that such measures were necessary to prevent terrorism. And the
blinded americans not only beleived this, they not only supported this, but
they labeled anyone opposing those moves as anti-patriotic.

This is why any democratic candidate that supported the invasion of irak and
the patriot act should automatically be dismissed from the leadership race.
the senior officials in the Bush administration didn't have those blinding
patriotic glasses on, they were fully aware of the lies and abuses to human
rights they were perpetrating. The democrats who supported them have 0 excuse.
There was strong opposition from everywhere in the world and the democrats had
no excuse not to see what was really going on.

In a state where the press is supposed to be so free, how come the USA
military told the press corps that the only reporting they would support is
from vetted reporters and that they would not garantee that any non-vettted
reporter would not be shot at ? (It isn't just the al-jazeera offices in
bagdhad that were bombed, but the USA also killed other "free" reporters,
including some from Britain if I remember correctly.

When USA policies result in Amnisty International putting its own people in
front of USA INS offices because too many people who was lawfully inside the
USA were captured by INS officials and sent to jails without any charge, and
in those jailes they were tortured (by definition, depriving any prisoner of
sleep by keeping bright lights on 24 hours a day is torture), when USA
policies reult in such actions, how come the USA public didn't rise up ?

The whole "right to bear arms" should have been put into action here. When you
have a rogue government that makes so many abuses, the american public should
have risen and demanded the government be thrown out.

But no !, the american public and media applauded the government's moves and
insulted anyone opposing such moves. Well you get what you support. You
supported a totalitarian government, now you have a totalitarian state who
disregards privacy, jails people without valid charges, disregards
international treaties (but still expects other countries to abide by them
when it is convenient for the USA) etc.


It is amazing that the americans did not wake up to what is happening and that
they supported their government at a time when their own government was
attempting to do exactly what the old communist and/or dictatorial governments
were doing.

Sorry, but the USA is no longer in ANY position to tell other countries about
human rights.

If Bush is thrown out, it will be most interesting to see if his replacement
will have the guts to tear down all that totalitarian stuff or whether this
will continue.

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 14:13:18 -0400, Charles Whitney
wrote:

Dick Locke wrote:
I've taken off my tinfoil hat and something still looks wrong.

Americans should have taken off their patriotic glasses before the patriot act
was passed. They should have taken off their patriotic glasses before the USA
invaded Iraq without any UN mandate.

Hey, pal, many of us did! Much good it did us, with the cowardly
Congress giving Bush (actually his handlers) all the anti civil
liberties legislation they lusted after, obscenely taking advantage of
our national tragedy.

Those patriotic glasses made americans blind to reality.

Not all of us,pal! But who listened to us, in that ***kissing
Congress that's supposed to represent us!

Does anybody remember that there were only TWO votes in Congress
against the cooked-up Tonkin Gulf Resolution that got us into Vietnam?
Wayne Morse and Ernest Gruening.

Take a look at Daniel Ellsberg's site:

http://www.ellsberg.net/writing/chapter1.htm

Account of the supposed attack and Pentagon/Administration
reaction from one who was there.

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme goddam chose!

--

Wesley Clark for President
www.DraftWesleyClark.com

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 18:02:54 GMT, Dick Locke
wrote:

[...]

Hmmm, they are in Little Rock AK, home of you know who and spouse and
you know who else.

Major, major non sequitur.

Any child molesters living in your village? Pot. Kettle.

--

Wesley Clark for President
www.DraftWesleyClark.com

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 18:50:43 GMT, - wrote:

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 18:02:54 GMT, Dick Locke
wrote:

[...]



Major, major non sequitur.


No kidding...just checking to see if the right wing-nuts have a
monopoly on humorlessness. Disappointed to see they don't....

Dick Locke wrote:
No kidding...just checking to see if the right wing-nuts have a
monopoly on humorlessness. Disappointed to see they don't....

It is abundant on both sides of the fence, I'm sad to say. Sadder still to
admit that I think slightly moreso on the left side.

miguel
--
Hit The Road! Photos and tales from around the world: http://travel.u.nu
Site remodeled 10-Sept-2003: Hundreds of new photos, easier navigation.

On Sun, 21 Sep 2003 03:01:09 GMT, Dick Locke
wrote:

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 18:50:43 GMT, - wrote:

On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 18:02:54 GMT, Dick Locke
wrote:

[...]



Major, major non sequitur.


No kidding...just checking to see if the right wing-nuts have a
monopoly on humorlessness. Disappointed to see they don't....

Humourlessness my fanny. Too many campers around who
think exactly like the message to which I responded.

Abject apologies for not having been able to read your "mind".

--

Wesley Clark for President
www.DraftWesleyClark.com