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Ask Slashdot: How To Determine If One Is On a Watchlist?
An anonymous reader writes: On Slashdot, we joke about it all the time: 'I did a Google search for 'pressure cooker' and I connected a bunch of times to the Tor network to download some Linux distribution .torrent files... I must be on some sort of watchlist now.' There have been news articles about people being questioned in airports and given special attention for being political activists. How can one determine is one is on a watchlist of some sort? Are there any Slashdot users who are knowingly on a watchlist? What sort of suspicious special attention have you received?
Board a plane for a domestic or international flight, and you will definitely find out.
I've had you on my watchlist for the last few months because your apartment is across the road from mine and you don't close your bedroom curtains at night. In case it matters, you're in the 10:25-10:35 time slot.
Don't ask if you're on the watch list. If you weren't before, you are now.
Alternatively: Realize that everyone is on a watch list and nothing will happen to you unless you stir up some shit. If you're a journalist investigating this shit your life will be hard. If you're a nerd who likes to Google a lot of shit and post about how you hate the government they'll just laugh at you.
The US is not a free country. As much as I think it is good to try and restore our freedoms, I think people need to stop and think before asking too many questions. Most of us have families and careers or want to have... this isn't the 1960s when you could protest the government and assume that the FBI record keeping was so bad that in a few years nobody gave a shit. Once you get on a watch list for being uppity in the 20 teens you are fucked for life. So unless you want to make a career of being against the man and holding up a cardboard sign as the world actually is ending around you, then you should work towards policy changes with polite suggestions made through your elected representatives or actually staying below the radar and becoming part of government and not annoying public officials who may abuse their power over you just because they can.
In my particular case, I first learned I was on a terrorist watch list in 2004, when I renewed my drivers' license.
The lady at DMV informed me of it, and said there would be an additional three-week wait for my license while they did a background check on me.
Ever since, every time I've flown, I've been pulled aside for additional searches and questioning,
The fun part is that there's no way to get off the list. I've now have three Congressman and a Senator from two different States tell me this.
The really infuriating part is that I suffer from an anxiety disorder. The only danger to those around me is if I go off my meds and then fly to pieces so fast people get hit by the shrapnel.
Microsoft leads to Bluescreen; Bluescreen leads to downtime; downtime leads to suffering.
Why were you downloading torrents through the TOR network? Its pointless and clogs exit nodes.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
In fairness, there is no standard of evidence to be put on these lists. Damned near anybody in law enforcement can put someone on a list, just because they feel like it or have a hunch, or because they don't like you.
And then you're on a list managed by idiots who have no real idea why you're on the list. Then the idiocy becomes self-fulfilling, because if you're on the list, it must be for a reason.
If you are on a list, there is a very good chance the people who maintain that list have no idea why. Which means without evidence, documentation, or recourse your life can get somewhat screwed up, and the idiots who maintain the list don't know or care how you got there; which means there's not a damned thing you can do to fix it.
Really, as long as it's so trivial to put people on the list, there's probably tons of people who are there for no reason at all.
This whole bullshit notion of you have nothing to fear if you have nothing to hide is just that ... bullshit. If using Tor is enough to get you on a watchlist, the people who run those lists are idiots, and ignoring things like evidence and probable cause.
Fascists just love things like that.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
The sign is when they won't let you check-in online.
My neighbor's kid has the same name as an IRA terrorist ... so they had to go through loads of crap every time, to explain that he's 3 ... he might be a terror, but he's not a terrorist.
I don't know if they still have problems flying with him or not. (He's now in high school)
This is part of the reason why the 'there are only (x) number of people on the terrorist watchlist' is problematic -- you have (x) people with (y) permutations of their aliases which means (z) people are stopped every time ... except for the people who we deem *so* dangerous that we don't want them to find out they're being watch ... so they're allowed to fly.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
"it's has the 3 letter code SSSS"
I'm going to be a little skeptical of anything written by someone who can neither spell nor count to 4.
After all these years of Slashdot's misleading headline and trolling torture I honestly thought I could see 5 S's on my boarding pass.