Northwest Gives Personal Data to NASA

Tree writes "Following four months on the heels of JetBlue's confession that they released passenger data to the Feds against their stated privacy guidelines, the Washington Post is reporting that Northwest has now admitted that they've done the same thing during a time period when they said they weren't. Nice. They were once my favorite airline."

Comments

Not NSA but NASA?

[TheAngryArmadillo]

I was sure the submitter meant the NSA but looking at the story it really was NASA.

Are they going to be sharing this info with the Martian Immigration Service?

Re:Not NSA but NASA?

[Zocalo]

Indeed. I thought that MSN had simply mistakenly put NASA instead of NSA and the poster hadn't picked up on it too. The clincher however is the reference to "Ames Research Center" which is indeed a NASA facility. I guess they don't want Marvin the Martian visiting the US anytime soon...

Re:Not NSA but NASA?

[_Sprocket_]

Interesting how a seemingly unrelated government entity can become part of the story.

NASA shares its expertise in different ways. I worked with an engineer who normaly developed various tools for use in space (one of his favorite was an emergency device used in case an astronaut got seperated from the structure during EVA). He also worked on a university research project to help develop a continuous flow heart pump.

Re:Not NSA but NASA?

[cyclist1200]

I think they're trying to keep out illegal aliens...

Re:Not NSA but NASA?

[phliar]

NASA is the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Before space became cool, they used to be called NACA -- the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. (Only newbies pronounced it "nacka" -- cool people said N A C A. The name was changed in 1958.) Just about all aviation research for US WW2 airplanes came from NACA, for instance. NASA still has the responsibility for aviation research.

One of the cool programs that NASA Ames (at Moffett Field in Mountain View, Silicon Valley) has is the Aviation Safety Reporting Program for crew. If there's a safety issue on any flight, crew members are encouraged to send in an ASRS report. If you screw up in some way and cause an unsafe condition, and file an ASRS report, you get immunity from any FAA enforcement action related to the incident. Anonymised versions of these incidents are available in the ASRS newsletter "Callback." This program has done many orders of magnitude more for safety than any TSA Code Yella (or whatever the hell it is today) ever did.

Of course this present hysteria-driven incident is repugnant. There is no way to be utterly safe, and infringing on citizens' privacy for some dubious profiling benefit is complete crap. I don't see how it's even constitutional to require gummint-issued photo ID from passengers. In a free society one is not expected to have "papers" to move about in one's own country. It doesn't even increase security: any high-school kid will be able to tell you how to get a fake drivers' license.

Re:Not NSA but NASA?

[the_mad_poster]

Interesting how a seemingly unrelated government entity can become part of the story.

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NASA is, undoubtedly, most well known for its space initiatives. However, they have their fingers in everything from complicated probes on other planets to medicine here on earth. They help develop commercial technology that you use every day of your life and they do cutting edge research into any number of scientific fields that you may well not hear about for another decade or more, if ever.

Frankly, NASA is probably second only to FEMA for underestimation of agency influence within the country. Those two agencies are either known only for very specific things, or never even thought about, but they have exceptionally broad, far-reaching powers and their fingers are in pretty much anything you can think of, even if you don't notice it.

It's the lying that hurts...

[blackdefiance]

Like my parents used to say... "It's not that we're so angry that you did [insert bad thing here], it's that you lied to us about it.

Re:It's the lying that hurts...

[buelba]

Depending on what happens to Northwest's stock price on Tuesday, this one may really hurt. Under the Securities Act of 1934 and rule 10b-5 promulgated thereunder:

It shall be unlawful for any person, directly or indirectly, by the use of any means or instrumentality of interstate commerce, or of the mails or of any facility of any national securities exchange,
To employ any device, scheme, or artifice to defraud,
To make any untrue statement of a material fact or to omit to state a material fact necessary in order to make the statements made, in the light of the circumstances under which they were made, not misleading, or
To engage in any act, practice, or course of business which operates or would operate as a fraud or deceit upon any person,
in connection with the purchase or sale of any security.

In practice, what this means is that if a company (whether or not through a director or officer) lies about something material to the stock price, people who buy during the period of market manipulation (essentially, from the date of the lie until the truth is revealed) can recover for their damages (generally but not always what they paid minus the "true value" of the stock when they bought it).

Setting the "true value" of a stock on a given date, absent the market manipulation, is obviously an excursion into the hypothetical. One strong indicator, however, is how much the stock falls when the truth is revealed. So watch Northwest when the market opens and, if it falls a lot, expect to see securities lawsuits as well as privacy lawsuits.

Bad news, Mr. al-Hassan.....

[Anonymous Coward]

We're sending you to Mars because of your ties to terrorist groups. Nothing personal, you understand, right?

Repeat after me...

[lisany]

We do not live in a police state. The Government trusts us. Donald Rumsfeld is infallable. All hail Bush.

Privacy Implications

[barenaked]

So what will you when every toll road you travel on by car passes your travel details automatically to law enforcement based on your license plate? Or when one day every intersection has a camera collecting this kind of information? Or when there's a camera doing face recognition on every street corner, evaluating whether you are a terrorist or not? Will you just stay at home all day? I think a more proactive stance is needed here. Getting the general public to understand the privacy implications of these systems so they stop voting for people that put them in place is probably a lot more effective.

Re:Privacy Implications

[0123456]

"Getting the general public to understand the privacy implications of these systems so they stop voting for people that put them in place is probably a lot more effective."

But over 50% of the population have _already_ figured out that there's no difference between voting for the control-freak Democrat candidate or the control-freak Republican candidate, and don't vote for either.

Re:Privacy Implications

[bennomatic]

Unfortunately, the general public has a mentality that these sort of tools are only used against criminals. "If you don't do anything wrong," they say, "you have nothing to fear from these things."

It's long been understood by leaders from the smallest tribes to the most bloodthirsty dictatorships that these sorts of means of control can be put in place by demonizing a small enough sector of society that a majority is willing to go along with the program.

How about a database of privacy violaters?

[Genghis9]

Somewhat akin to that project at MIT (Government Information Awareness) detailing public figures, there should be one for public companies noting when, where, what.

Then it should be easy to boycott and avoid them.

Silly Northwest airlines!

[xankar]

If Jetblue jumped off a bridge, would you?

Airlines in an impossible position

[Anonymous Coward]

To those who make jokes about "Martian Immigration" and the like, remember that it's the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The agency has a large role in promoting aviation safety.

On a separate point, remember that an airline that is pressed by the Government to violate its passengers' privacy is likely in an impossible position: "turn over your passenger records, or we have the security people strip-search all your passengers at the gate and we start safety inspections on every one of your planes 5 minutes before departure. You'll never have a customer again."

Air travel isn't what it cracked up to be

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

They were once my favorite airline.

With all the paranoid hoops the feds make travelers jump through to board an aircraft, I must admit my favorite airline is Amtrack these days, for shorter journeys.

They probably all did this...

[stefanlasiewski]

I'd bet that nearly all of the of the major Airlines have done this. Northwest and JetBlue just happened to get caught...

surprise, surprise...

[tuxette]

Privacy policies in the US aren't worth the bandwidth they waste. And they will continue to be worthless unless they're backed by strong national (not just state) privacy legislation similar to the Norwegian Personal Data Act or the EU Personal Data Directive.

That way, people don't have to be worried about "loopholes" in privacy policies such as the one indicated in a NYT article on the same subject:

The company said in a statement: "Our privacy policy commits Northwest not to sell passenger information to third parties for marketing purposes. This situation was entirely different, as we were providing the data to a government agency to conduct specific scientific research related to aviation security and we were confident that the privacy of passenger information would be maintained."

According to for example Norwegian law, this transfer would be unlawful unless the data subjects consented to the transfer.

Somebody needs to get their story straight

[Quixote]

From the article:
.... news media quoted Northwest officials responding to the JetBlue incident. "We do not provide that type of information to anyone," Northwest spokesman Kurt Ebenhoch was quoted as saying in the New York Times on Sept. 23.

An article in the following day's St. Paul (Minn.) Pioneer Press said: "Northwest Airlines will not share customer information, as JetBlue Airways has, Northwest chief executive Richard Anderson said Tuesday in brief remarks after addressing the St. Paul Rotary."

Somebody should ask Dick Anderson, what exactly did he mean by his statement? If that is not a bald-faced lie, then I don't know what is.

I hope the shareholders hold this guy accountable.

As the former owner of a Nortwest Frequent Flyer card (which I just cut up on reading this story), I'd just like to say "sayonara!" to Northwest. It was not the sharing of the data that was bad; it was lying about it and the "cross my heart, swear to God we don't do that" that pissed me off.

I can understand the need for exploring new security options. How hard would it have been to anonymize the data? Just run it through a one-way hash function, and you can provide the data without invading anyone's privacy.

This ineptitude and lying really irritates me.

Re:Somebody needs to get their story straight

[geekoid]

"Somebody should ask Dick Anderson, what exactly did he mean by his statement? I"

why not you?

With codesharing it's hard to avoid the bad ones

[wike]

I had a flight last week on Delta (not my favorite airline either) but when I showed up to the airport and had problems with Delta's (we don't want to talk to you so we make you deal with a machine) self-check in kiosk I found out that I was actually flying on Northwest. Huh? Apparantly even though I booked Delta, they codeshare with Northwest. I wonder if my passenger information is now in Northwest's database.

Not the NASA!

[Dark Lord Seth]

Really, the FBI can come over and arrest me, the NSA can deploy a task force in the North Sea standing by to obliberate most of Northern-Europe and the CIA can drug my beer but not the NASA! Dear Eris, they might decide to drop that Saturn V on my house, do you have any idea how much that blasted things weighs?

Re:Northworst?

[ari_j]

At least you have options. I lived in North Dakota for 21 years, and Northworst essentially has a monopoly there. I had to drive 2 hours to get on a damn DC-9 to Minneapolis (another of NWA's hubs, along with Detroit and Memphis) and take a transfer from there. While in college, I was prone to drive the 4 1/2 hours to Minneapolis and fly Frontier or Sun Country from there.

That said, I flew a Northworst/KLM combination flight to Athens and back. KLM is no comparison to Northworst - wonderful service; attractive, friendly stewardesses; better seats; and more. If you have to spend 2 hours on Northworst to get 10 hours on KLM, do it.

But for domestic flights that go over or near Denver en route, I now prefer Frontier. Especially with their revamped fleet of Airbuses. I recently flew with them on a plane that had only been in service for 2 weeks since it was brand new, replete with DirecTV in every seat-back. (I didn't pay the $5 because I had a book, but I watched the moving map a lot.) A little more expensive than other 'budget' airlines, but worth it in terms of service and comfort.

Re:For a good reason

[geekoid]

everybody has something to hide.

If you don't agree, please post all you credit card numbers, with expiration dates, checking account number, with routing information, all logon and passwords to any thing you have. If you have nay children, please post there names birthdate, secret words, and schedules. Please post you employeer, employee number, annual salary/income.

Also please put a web cam in every room of your house so we can watch whatever you do. Be sure to post your drivers liscense information, all ID numbers.

So, you still got nothing to hide?

They lied. Someday people are going to get Fried.

[leoaugust]

Pure, and simple lying.

• An article in the following day's St. Paul (Minn.) Pioneer Press said: "Northwest Airlines will not share customer information, as JetBlue Airways has, Northwest chief executive Richard Anderson said Tuesday in brief remarks after addressing the St. Paul Rotary."
• Northwest officials responding to the JetBlue incident. "We do not provide that type of information to anyone," Northwest spokesman Kurt Ebenhoch was quoted as saying in the New York Times on Sept. 23.

They lied.

Their sorry excuse ?

"Northwest Airlines had a duty and an obligation to cooperate with the federal government for national security reasons," the airline said.

It sounds just like what Adobe was saying when they got busted for the Currency Detection Algorithms that they had added as (semi) spyware. And then of course we find out that many other Graphics Programs Vendors had done the same ...

Their sorry excuse ?

Adobe had a duty and an obligation to cooperate with the federal government for national security reasons.

Really makes you wonder how many of these Corporations are already in-bed-with-the-feds ...

Is it already 1985 ?

If you switch to US Airways...

[mellonhead]

...be sure to wake up prior to initial approach:

http://www.sptimes.com/2004/01/17/Tampabay/Snippy_ flight_attenda.shtml

It's the National AERONAUTICS and Space Admin.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

I was sure the submitter meant the NSA but looking at the story it really was NASA.

Are they going to be sharing this info with the Martian Immigration Service?

NASA is the National AERONAUTICS and Space Admin. The space program gets all the press. But they do a LOT of work on all aspects of commercial air flight.

And while their work on cutting edge aircraft design (civilian, military, and research platforms) gets most of the press on their airflight side, they're involved in a lot of other stuff: Flight simulation, air traffic control, baggage searching devices...

And, as you can now see, stealth people-tracking databases for the "war on terror".

I'd suggest you contact your legislator if you object. But that might get me a heavy fine. (Follow this link {cloned from my current signature} to see what I'm talking about.)

Re:For a good reason

[jeffkjo1]

And the government, and the people within it, have never misused their powers or information that has been provided to them.

Nixon jumps out at me, for some reason here.

Since I submitted this first -

[teamhasnoi]

and I live in Minnesota, I had done quite a bit of reading on this. Apart from Northwest justifying it by saying, "We don't sell information to marketers - but this wasn't for marketing..", I find the most asnine thing to be NASA wanting to 'give the information back'.

Now, this info is on 5 CDs. How can *anyone* believe that it stayed on those CDs, and din't make the rounds from FBI to NSA to CIA to DHS to whatever other 3 letter acroymn that is supposed to 'protect us'?

That information is everywhere you don't want it to be - and you won't know what they're doing with it until it bites you in the ass.

I guarantee that this will be abused - everything else has, why would this be anything different.

I wonder if good ol' boy George would be allowed to fly if the CAPPS2 system had access to his military AWOL status, his DUI, his credit scores, and his drug abuse.

Oh, wait. Invasive and ineffective programs like these are only for the 'commoners'.

Re:Bush AWOL ! OT like a mo-fo.

[teamhasnoi]

AWOL

DUI

Cocaine (from a right wing puplication!)

I'm sure you can find more sources if you look, I just went as fast I could, and tried to pick sources that are generally trusted to be accurate.

There will always be those who say 'if the records aren't there, how can it be true?', but when you are in charge of who keeps them, where they are kept, and who has access to them, you can certainly manipulate them.

Does the head IT guy at a company ever get busted for looking at porn?...

Re:For a good reason

[tuxette]

Well, my travel habits are personal and the airline tickets I buy are between me and the airline only. My shopping habits are personal, what I read is personal, who I associate with is personal, etc. For others, including and especially the government, this information is none of your fucking business.

If the government/police want information on my habits, they better damn well be using it in connection with a real investigation on me, with specific charges. And this information had better damn well benn obtained via court order.

Canadian Laws

[iantri]

We just got a new law up here that makes it a legal requirement for businesses to notify you of EXACTLY what they are doing with your data, and forbid them from doing anything else without your permission.

It sounds like such a law could be useful for you Americans right now..