Date: Thu, 15  Jan  2004 09:36:59 -0500
From: "The American Civil Liberties Union" <belmonte@MIT.EDU>
To: "The American Civil Liberties Union" <belmonte@MIT.EDU>
Subject: stop CAPPS II

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Message sent to the following recipients:
Senator Kennedy
Senator Kerry
Representative Capuano
Message text follows:

Matthew Belmonte
[address]


January 15, 2004

[recipient address was inserted here]


 [recipient name was inserted here],

I urge you to oppose the CAPPS II program and enact
legislation that would prevent it from being implemented. I am deeply
concerned that this program will put the government on a path toward
ever-more intrusive background checks, and hinder the security at the
nation's airports.

The Bush Administration plans to proceed with CAPPS II despite serious
concerns raised by Congress, airlines and privacy advocates.   The most
intrusive and dangerous element of CAPPS II -- the construction of an
infrastructure for conducting background checks on people who fly -- would
depend on shadowy intelligence and law enforcement databases.  The use of
these secret databases would remove meaningful public oversight and
control over these un-American background checks.

Innocent people have already been stopped and banned from flying because
their name appeared on government "no fly" lists -- and have been unable
to clear their names in the federal bureaucracy. This national system
would only increase the delays and blacklist even more innocent Americans
-- regular people travelling for work or holidays.  The Transportation
Security Administration's request for further comments on CAPPS II
(DHS/TSA-2003-1, page 6) admits that "in a small percentage of cases,
passengers may be found to present an... 'unknown risk' of terrorism."
Because authentication will rely on the presence of passengers'
identifying information in commercial databases, the people identified as
"unknown risks" will likely include those people who particularly value
their privacy and have therefore purposefully kept their information out
of such databases -- for example, people like me who refuse to hold credit
cards.  This system of identification risks creating a permanent
underclass of travellers who will receive intrusive scrutiny every time
they travel, even if they travel very frequently on business.

Once again, I urge you to oppose this invasive and untrustworthy system.

I look forward to hearing from you on this important matter.

Sincerely,


Matthew Belmonte