[HN Gopher] CLEAR led a flyer carrying ammo under a false name t...
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CLEAR led a flyer carrying ammo under a false name to TSA, sparking
probe
Author : JumpCrisscross
Score : 12 points
Date : 2023-07-28 17:37 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bloomberg.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bloomberg.com)
| mistrial9 wrote:
| As a US Citizen with "western values" the CLEAR program was
| always suspicious for "slippery slope" reasons. Meanwhile, a
| wealthy South Asian man nearby who lives and does business
| completely in the USA, applied for and got CLEAR ID immediately
| when the program was made public, long ago. We speculated that
| since he is dark skinned with a foreign name, he was concerned
| about being singled out for security ? Post-911 was a bad time
| for the USA. The article here says in the fine print at the
| bottom that there may be little legal basis for a number of
| common TSA practices, but there is literally no choice. Combine
| that with scrupulous license plate readers and the "shoes off"
| ritual, it really does seem like an alternate social system.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| You still go through metal detectors with CLEAR and can still
| be singled out for additional security at that point? Its just
| a fast pass to the front of the line, like TSA Pre.
|
| I have both and I've sometimes waited for CLEAR kiosks/agents
| to open up, and got impatient and went to TSA Pre, and vice
| versa.
|
| edit: okay from the article it suggests at one point they did
| let you skip security completely with CLEAR.
| khuey wrote:
| As far as I know CLEAR has never allowed you to skip the
| actual security check.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _who lives and does business completely in the USA, applied
| for and got CLEAR ID immediately when the program was made
| public_
|
| Are you mixing up Clear and Global Entry? Clear only expedites
| domestic flights. And it never let you _skip_ security, just
| get to the front of the line.
| __derek__ wrote:
| https://archive.is/D7u9l
|
| > In total, the TSA raised concerns about almost 49,000 Clear
| customers who were enrolled despite facial-recognition software
| flagging them as non-matches, and concluded its broader methods
| were inherently inferior to how the government checks travelers'
| IDs, the people said. Enrollment photos seen by Bloomberg in some
| cases didn't show a face at all and instead, for example, a
| shoulder and ceiling.
|
| This seems like it ought to be a huge story.
| landemva wrote:
| Nah, as the people still have to go through screening no
| different than elderly or children (leave on shoes). Ramp
| workers go through separate doors with keypads- no screening.
| Even TSA doesn't screen themselves, as if a TSA government
| employee could not be bribed or coerced to take items around
| screening.
| __derek__ wrote:
| There's no ID check after passing Clear, so this would be a
| way to avoid no-fly lists and other restrictions on travel.
| landemva wrote:
| ID is not required to be shown to TSA. I misplaced my ID a
| couple times and went through.
|
| The ID check was really to stop frequent flier award travel
| resale back when tickets were paper. It's still possible to
| use paper boarding pass today, though to my knowledge few
| people try to fly on tickets with someone else's name. It
| is still possible because showing ID, like the full body
| scan machines, is voluntary.
|
| TSA misleads the public about what is mandatory. Freedom to
| travel is a right in USA. If you closely observe the TSA
| process, they check the ID with the name on boarding pass.
| This is revenue management service for the airlines.
|
| For example if TSA misinformation, they claim full body
| imaging can be required yet they do not have that authority
| in practice. They can't even detain people.
|
| https://twitter.com/TSA/status/679447467922984961
| Hermitian909 wrote:
| It shouldn't because the TSA does not serve a real purpose
| other than to be a jobs program.
|
| There has been a great deal of evidence over the years that the
| safety measures of the TSA are easily bypassed (google "TSA
| security theater" for a wealth of sources) and there's no
| evidence of increased safety since the department was created.
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| For some additional context as to _how_ Clear exists, airports
| have the responsibility for managing passenger flow up to the TSA
| checkpoint. Within the checkpoint, it 's all government-run. This
| is why Clear subscribers still have to take off their shoes.
|
| Clear's business model is to give airports part of the subscriber
| revenue in return for allowing their employees manage the queues,
| which they use to direct subscribers into checkpoints with
| shorter lines.
| Zak wrote:
| I've long held the opinion that the government should ban all
| forms of paying a third party extra for shorter waits in
| security lines, but then wealthy frequent travelers would start
| pushing back on the security process itself.
| bonestamp2 wrote:
| * * *
| profile53 wrote:
| Wouldn't that be a good thing given that much of it is
| security theater?
| Zak wrote:
| From my perspective, yes, but the people making the
| decisions about this do not care about my perspective.
| suthakamal wrote:
| The author of this doesn't fly much, and probably isn't actually
| a clear member. Nobody who pays for clear uses it because they
| don't want to show ID: any frequent traveller has ID (probably a
| Real ID, too) and uses Clear to jump to the front of the PRE
| line. Also, and frequent traveller probably encounters non-Clear
| airports so has yet another reason to ensure they've got ID.
|
| As for one of the more bizarre comments here: No minorities are
| signing up for clear to skip TSA, it doesn't do that... it merely
| puts you at the front of the TSA line.
|
| This just seems like a rebel-without-a-clue ranting about ...
| something?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Nobody who pays for clear uses it because they don't want to
| show ID: any frequent traveller has ID...uses Clear to jump to
| the front of the PRE line_
|
| The author concludes as much: "There's been a lot of
| speculation that the requirement to show ID somehow undermines
| the usefulness of CLEAR. But maybe not showing ID is an
| ancillary benefit at best to the customer, even if it's how the
| program is sold. We pretend it's about identity verification
| when really it's about priority in getting through security
| faster. It still does that. The usefulness of the service would
| change not at all."
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(page generated 2023-07-30 23:00 UTC)