Slashdot Mirror
American Airlines Information Gathering
matt-fu writes "Cory Doctorow posted a story on boingboing.net this morning describing a recent hassle while flying American Airlines. It seems that since he was traveling from the UK to the US with a Canadian passport, he was actually asked to give out the names and addresses of everyone he would be staying with in the US! He has written an open letter to AA in response. Has anyone else had something like this happen to them?"
Trying being a diabetic with an insulin pump. The security people aren't big fans of people with tubes coming out of them strapped to little computers.
This is probably an automated check on anyone with a 3rd country passport.
Yes its standard for all non-US citizens coming into the US, even on a short vacation or business trip. It was that way even before 9/11 too.
Either I've been smoking too much crack or my memory is shot, because I'm pretty sure I've been required to do that every single time I've flown to America (to visit family, first time was in 1999). I have a Danish passport and usually fly via Iceland, with Icelandair, but have also flown via the UK.
There's the usual "I will not commit terrorist acts" but also a section where you list who you will be staying with.
In 2002, I didn't have my cousin's then NY address handy, so I made one up. Good thing they didn't check up on it.
Funny story: On one trip, I had a present with me for a wedding, and had to take a national connecting flight from Boston to Baltimore. They had these things where they check for various trace chemicals that would indicate explosives. It of course went off five times on my suitcase, so the guy had it opened and went through it, item by item.
Finally he got to the present, a bottle of Gammel Dansk (a bitter alcohol), which was wrapped. He asked me what was in it, I told him. He then asked me if I had spent time near or on a farm previous to my flight, all the questions that would explain why I had trace chemicals on my luggage, but there was no apparent reason. He eventually let me go, when I started commentingthat I had to catch the connecting flight.
During the carry-on check, I realized I had a box-cutter in my pencil-case. There were also a couple of blades that were just floating around in there along with the pencils & pens. As the guy was rummaging through literally everything, including the pencil-case, I gotta admit I got a bit nervous that he would cut himself. He didn't find it, though. So much for thoroughness, heh.
My aunt was less lucky. She had her knitting pins confiscated and they almost ruined the cake she was bringing for the wedding.
I lied to immigration. It sucked. I advise aganist it.
:)
I was sent to Jamaica by my previous employer two years ago. Due to the fact that my former company claimed that it took seven months to get a work visa, I was to tell them that my colleagues and I were there on vacation. I wasn't happy about this, but went along with it.
When it turned out that we had to overstay our trip by several days, we went to the local immigration office in downtown Montego Bay to get our stays extended, they stated to ask my team leader who was with me (I was the head honcho on this trip - scary thought there!) and myself about our trip, where we stayed, etc. Something made them hinky (to this day I'm not sure what) and we got passed along from officer to officer, higher and higher up the chain, and in increasingly darker and more isolated rooms. Finally we had the head of the local office interrogating uys on every aspect of our trip - what we had done, who we knew in country, what our daily schedule was, etc. He finally said "What if I were to tell you that we have undeniable proof that you have been working illegally at location *****". Faced with this, we admitted our guilt and promptly flipped into panic mode. (Jamaica is a very friendly place, but imagine that you are a foreigner anywhere and admitting to a alien government offical that you are lying to them and are in their country under false pretenses wheee!)
Very fortunate for us, the people we were working with were very wealthy islanders who did a lot for the local Mo'Bay economy. As so often happens, money greases the skids of both business and government. Once they learned who we were working for, a quick phone call to that party got us the extension we sought and a swift kick out the door. Any other slob without this (unbeknownest to us) safety net would have found themselves in trouble quick.
My advice is threefold:
1) Make sure you pad your imigration form for extra time - you can always go back sooner.
2) Don't work for shithead companies who don't care if you are left to hang out to dry or not.
3) If an immigration offical asks you a question, don't lie and run the risk of pissing them off - it IS their country
"As the intrepid kobold companion continues his journey, he begins to wonder... if priests raises dead, why anybody die?
you are treated like a king if you are Mexican [...] and the cops are not allowed to check if you are legal or not
Yes, in the US it's only royalty and illegal Mexican immgrants that are allowed police protection. [rolls eyes]
The poster might give you the impression that the state of California offers all sorts of special benefits that accrue to illegal aliens. As far as I know, that's not the case; it's just that many government programs help out all people rather than checking to see whether you're a citizen or not.
Personally, as a Cali taxpayer, I'm glad of that. Humanitarian considerations aside, society pays a heavy cost if illegal immigrants are afraid to report crime, or if their children are forced to be sick, malnourished, and ignorant. Whether we should let them come is one question, but as long as they are here to stay we might as well make sure they make it.
I'm a little late for this but it's an area I'm familiar with so I thought I'd contribute it.
The U.S. Customs Department is in the process of moving towards what they call "U.N. APIS" (Advanced Passenger Information System). Details can be found at here in the Word document US Passenger List; UN EDIFACT Message Set.
The U.S. APIS system which has been used for some time does not require destination address information. The U.N. format does. See the linked document pages 60-63 for more details. Eventually this will be required when flying any major airline coming into the U.S., not just American Airlines.