IP: Airports Push for 'Smart Cards'

[R. A. Hettinga]

--- begin forwarded text


Status:  U
From: "ARNELL" <ARNELL at logicsouth.com>
To: <ignition-point at theveryfew.net>
Subject: IP: Airports Push for 'Smart Cards'
Date: Tue, 30 Oct 2001 08:42:58 -0500
Sender: owner-ignition-point at theveryfew.net
Reply-To: "ARNELL" <ARNELL at logicsouth.com>

http://wire.ap.org/APnews/center_story.html?FRONTID=NATIONAL&STORYID=APIS7FF
66MO0

OCTOBER 30, 03:22 EST
Airports Push for 'Smart Cards'

By JONATHAN D. SALANT
Associated Press Writer
White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card
AP/NBC, Alex Wong [22K]

WASHINGTON (AP) - Airline passengers who volunteer for background checks
could bypass long lines at security checkpoints under a plan being
considered by the Transportation Department.

The plan hinges on technology to verify a passenger's identity, such as a
retinal scan or fingerprint. Airlines and airports are pushing for
tamperproof ``smart cards'' that passengers would show at the screening
area.

A Transportation Department task force proposed the smart cards as a way to
reduce long waits at checkpoints. At some airports, passengers are being
asked to arrive two hours before their scheduled departure. Passengers who
agree to background checks would get minimal screening at airports while
security officers concentrate on everyone else.

``Our system won't operate if we don't get convenience, as well as security,
back into the system,'' said Charles Barclay, president of the American
Association of Airport Executives and a member of the task force. ``The only
way we're going to get there is technology.''

The Air Transport Association, the trade group for the major airlines, has
endorsed the smart cards.

Federal Aviation Administrator Jane Garvey said the agency was looking at
whether to prescreen passengers.

Other security measures have taken effect as the House prepares this week to
debate airline security legislation.

More passengers are being singled out for extensive screening based on a
computerized profile. Planes are regularly searched for hidden weapons.

Airlines are checking the names of passengers against FBI lists of potential
terrorists, sometimes with software offering alternative spellings of Arabic
names to prevent people from evading detection by using different
translations.

The FBI list also is being used to check the roughly 750,000 airport and
airline employees who can routinely bypass security checkpoints to enter
secured areas of airports.

But problems remain. Airport security screeners in New Orleans failed to
catch a gun in a passenger's carry-on baggage last week, although they
determined that the incident was accidental and no arrest was made.

At Washington Dulles Airport recently, seven of 20 screeners failed their
written exams and were given other assignments, said a Transportation
Department inspector general's report.

``It is a higher level of intensity and scrutiny, but the basic flaws are
still in the system,'' said former FAA security chief Billie Vincent.


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-- 
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R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'



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