Flying To the US? Pay In Cash

pin_gween writes to point us to a report in the Telegraph that British travelers using a credit card to purchase their ticket may now have their credit card and email accounts inspected by US authorities. This has been true since October, when the US and the EU agreed about what information the US could demand from airlines and how this information would be handled. But details of the agreement only recently came to light following a Freedom of Information request. The US says it will "encourage" US carriers to reciprocate to any requests by European governments. From the article: "[T]he Americans are entitled to 34 separate pieces of Passenger Name Record (PNR) data... Initially, such material could be inspected for seven days but a reduced number of US officials could view it for three and a half years. Should any record be inspected during this period, the file could remain open for eight years...'It is pretty horrendous, particularly when you couple it with our one-sided extradition arrangements with the US,' said [a human rights activist]. 'It is making the act of buying a ticket a gateway to a host of personal email and financial information. While there are safeguards, it appears you would have to go to a US court to assert your rights.'"

Comments

Just when paying?

[GC]

Some airlines only allow you to do Online Check-in by confirming your identity with your credit card number.
Some express-check-in's require you to either insert your credit card to get your boarding pass printed (or your frequent flyer card).
If I want better fares by booking online I will have to use a credit card too, not seen any airlines accept Paypal etc...

In short it seems that to take advantage of any fast-track system that saves on man-power and hassle for both the customer or airline I now have to give up my life's credit history.

Glum.

Re:Just when paying?

[petes_PoV]

Given the number of invitations and pre-approved credit card forms I get in the post, it would be incredibly easy just to set up a "throwaway" CC account. Use it once for a ticket (same for an email account), pay the balance off in full - maybe in cash at the bank if you're really paranoid - and never use it again.

Repeat as necessary for each transatlantic trip, I'm sure I'll run out of the will to visit the USA before I run out of credit card invites.

fly to canada

[Anonymous Coward]

Instead of paying cash, fly to Canada or Mexico and then take a ground route into the US...

Re:fly to canada

[Anonymous Coward]

I tend to disagree - I live on the Canadian side of the US/Canada border, and have travelled across the US/Canada border in rental cars from the airport more times than I can count - until recently I lived on the west coast of Canada, and would fly to Toronto, pick up a rental car and drive into the US to visit friends and relatives during my trips back to the east. I do not have a Canadian passport and am not a Canadian citizen. I was never searched, never really extensively questioned, and have many times had people in the car with me of US, Canadian, and a few times other foreign citizenships, and the hassle was always minimal. Friends of mine are British, and fly to Toronto every summer to spend time at their cottage on a lake north of Toronto. They often pop over to the US side for some shopping, sightseeing (trips to NYC, Buffalo, Vermont, and Pennsylvania), etc. and have never had one ounce of trouble with those trips in their airport rental cars. So by all means, please fly to Canada, spend a little money and time while you're here, then head south over the border to visit the states.

Re:fly to canada

[Anonymous Coward]

as someone who lives on the U.S.-Canadian border. let me offer you some free advice: it ain't that easy. nothing is more likely to end in you spending some quality time with the friendly folks of the Border Patrol.

You may live near the Canadian border, but it sounds like you rarely cross it. Having crossed the CanUSA border probably 50-60 times at 8 different land crossings since 2001, I can tell you that you rarely get more than 3 questions from the comfort of your car and then they wave you across.

or don't travel period

[Anonymous Coward]

Looks as though the EU will have similar access on US citizens. The entire world is descending into fascist utopia created by government think tanks and multinationals.

Police State Logic

[HappySqurriel]

I could be wrong ...

But I thought the standard logic in Police States (we can argue whether the US is a Police state another time) was that if you were unwilling to lose your privacy you must have something to hide. Hypothetically speaking, if you (heaven forbid) were a minority which could perhaps be from a Terrorism supporting country and you payed by cash wouldn't that ensure that you got the long trip through security?

umm,...

[zxnos]

dont you need, like, a passport or something to fly into and out of the u.s.? doesnt that sorta ruin your privacy? i mean, like, they know you are entering the country as soon as you get here.

sounds like they are trying to be informed about 'bob the nutcase who wants to kill you becuase you are different' before he hits the u.s. soil.

Re:Places to avoid

[VJ42]

I don't know where you're from, but I think you should add my country, the UK, to that list. It's only when people stop coming to these shores due to overly restrictive laws will our government realise the real damage that it's doing to this country. We have to hit them where it hurts: in the pocket.

That would not help

[Anonymous Coward]

The ATnT NSA spying case shows all email is monitored anyway and ATnT will cooperate for their own benefit. It isn't just the emails of the passengers that is captured, everyone's is and they filter for anyone they care to.
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/04/29/04 0225

The Vodaphone Greece spying case shows that mobile phones can be tapped with simple software at the switch.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6182647.stm
http://www.mindfully.org/Technology/2006/Bove-Tsal ikidis-Bugging22aug06.htm

The recent FBI case shows the mobile phone is a microphone that can be turned on at any time, it means they don't just monitor telephone calls, but all conversations. The greek spying case was probably much bigger than announced, and may well have been more than just telephone calls.

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/12/04/04 56220

The SWIFT case shows that any large corporation will hand over any information is it is threatened in any single market. That means that SWIFT may be handing information over to the Russians, but we would never know unless it leaked out.

(EU condemns swift spying)
http://cryptome.org/eu-swift-hit.htm

Re:TO our european friends

[Znork]

"Go look up the term "fascist.""

Ok. Here's the wikipedia description: "the following elements are usually seen as its integral parts: authoritarianism, nationalism, militarism, corporatism, anti-liberalism, and anti-communism."

You were saying?

"we were part of the solution the last time such REAL nasty people took over Europe"

Most of the solution the last time were the Soviet communists under Stalin. Does that make the communists 'good', or that Europe should ignore the rest of what Stalin did?

The sad thing is that it'll be hard to find someone to free the Americans when they need help getting liberated.

Re:Better yet

[VJ42]

What Europe can give you, except for those cheap airline tickets (yay!), is lots of old houses that some mighty rulers/dictators once built. I wasn't just talking about the major, well known attractions; I was talking about much less well known ones, for example Bunhill cemetery, where in, say Iowa, are you going to find so many well know figures all burried in the same grave yard, or where in the whole of the USA are you going to find A pub dating from the 11th century? That's not "some houses some rulers liked", but an actual place still being used. As the link in my last post showed, there are many such buildings around the UK; I'm sure the rest of Europe is much the same.

They read my email, why not yours?

[twitter]

Nothing is going to be "inspected" by US authorities, and if anything is "inspected", it's not at-will and not arbitrary.

It's already inspected arbitrarily. The Patriot Act, and several later court decisions gives the US government the ability to read anyone's email at will. It would be nice if other governments did not help themselves in the same way, but they do. Princess Dianna's cell phone was tapped by the CIA ten years ago, do you really think your email is private? The criteria of inspection is as arbitrary as politics will always be - a decision is made based on someone's OPINION of what is dangerous. That opinion can be coded or forced onto clerks who get to do the dirty work themselves or by reviewing what carnivore spits out.

All of the above is unconstitutional, illegal and immoral but ongoing. The US has given up the Bill of Rights for it's own citizens, and cares even less about others. It is violating the private papers, homes and conversations of it's citizens. It has curtailed the right to bear arms. It has launched religious based policies but thwarted legitimate religious expression. It has censored the New York Times, created agencies to flood the news with disinformation and thereby shown itself an enemy of truth itself. It has imprisoned and tortured it's own citizens, which shows the regard it really has.

In spite of all that, you think the demand for information is harmless?

Even if you have the proverbial, "nothing to hide," you need to think twice before you give over those who might. You benefit from the efforts of those who "leak" the truth and do other things the current government might not like. As the Irqui insurgence shows, no real security is gained by all of these repressive measures. Peace and security only comes through respect and justice.

Re:Demonstrably FALSE

[Anonymous Coward]

Thai New Year's Eve celebrants in Bangkok

Speculate much, do you?

Prime Minister Surayud Chula-nont said yesterday that supporters of Thailand's toppled regime rather than Muslim insurgents were likely behind bombings in the capital that killed three people and ruined New Year's Eve festivities for thousands of revelers.

farm subsidies

[falconwolf]

If we were to become entirely dependent on outside food sources, you'd see the same problems with food that we see with oil today. You want Mexico or Brazil to have that kind of control over us?

This is exactly what is happening in Mexico, and why we have so many "illegal immigrants" trying to get into the US. Because of farm subsidies to big agrobusinesses in the US and NAFTA, they are able to ship and sale food to Mexico cheaper than Mexican farmers can grow it. This drives Mexican farmers off their farms and into Mexican cites as well as north to the US. Then those who go into Mexican cites drive others north as well.

Falcon