Coming to grips with the fact there are people out there who would have us dead is difficult. The current flap concerning something called the Automated Targeting System (ATS) underscores just how difficult.

Seems the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has, for the past four years, been testing ATS—keeping very close tabs indeed on personal information of flyers who travel abroad. Not just non-U.S. nationals, but United States citizens as well.

That information is combined and analyzed. Then risk assessments are assigned to flyers.

These tests proceeded with neither the knowledge of Congress, nor frequent flyers.

The Business Travel Coalition (BTC) bridles at the effort, calling DHS's initiative, “historically unparalleled.” Among other things, the government has been data mining all manner of personal information from people, without their knowledge or consent. Don't like that? Tough. Flyers are forbidden from accessing or correcting any information the government may glean.

Gotcha.

To boot, BTC says information can be shared with foreign governments, and retained by the United Sates government for 40 years.

The American Civil Liberties Union's (ACLU) Barry Steinhardt, who's director of the group's Technology and Liberty Project, says, “It's vital that we have a full public debate on this massive traveler profiling system.” ACLU maintains that ATS violates a Congressional proscription forbidding passenger scoring, a prohibition that has been embedded in every recent DHS appropriations bill passed by Congress.

As a result of the uproar, the Department of Homeland Security decided to extend the comment period for ATS from December 4 to December 29. As this piece gets set to go live, that public comment period was still open.

Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont has a few comments of his own. Leahy is livid, claiming ATS “highlights the danger of government use of technology to conduct widespread surveillance of our daily lives without proper safeguards for privacy.”

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff appeared to Address ATS in a December 14 speech at George Washington University when he said, “Having the ability to collect and analyze this kind of targeting information was one of the principal recommendations of the 9/11 Commission…Of late, people seemed to take notice of this.”

In response to critics who “raised concerns that somehow by looking at things like the credit card used to buy a ticket, or the contact number, that we're violating privacy laws or constitutional rights,” the DHS chief responded, “far from it.” Chertoff contends what DHS has been doing is “sensible and totally constitutional.” Without mentioning ATS by name, Chertoff told the George Washington University gathering his department is focusing “in a more risk-managed fashion on those who do potentially pose a threat.”

Chertoff says such analysis has resulted in the denial of entry to this country of some half-million souls in fiscal year 2005, “whether it's because of terrorism links, or because they've got criminal histories, or because they're smuggling people in.”

Business Travel Coalition President Kevin Mitchell is worried this kind of thinking could lead to “mission creep.” 'Will ATS be applied next to all domestic U.S. air travel on the justification that millions of illegal, unregistered aliens living in the United States could do us harm?”

In other words, quo vadis—where is the government going from here?

Most immediately, it would seem, to Congressional hearing rooms. Both Senators Leahy and Susan Collins (R-Maine) vow to investigate the Automated Targeting System.

The hearings should prove instructive.

Jerome Greer Chandler is the winner of 16 Associated Press broadcast journalism awards. He's been recognized by the Royal Aeronautical Society for journalistic excellence in the field of aviation reporting. The 16-year contributor to Frequent Flyer has written about commercial aviation for Popular Science, Travel & Leisure, The New York Times Syndicate and others. His book Fire & Rain - the story of the wind shear crash of Delta Flight 191 - was a bestseller, and was subsequently made into a highly rated television movie. Drawing on his insights on commercial aviation, Chandler has appeared on Good Morning America, CNN and the PBS science series Nova. Jerome can be reached at JerryC1410@aol.com