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How I Got Through Airport Security with No I.D.
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Thanks to Google Earth and puzzling new TSA rules, all you need to know to get on a plane these days is the color of your house.
Traveling for the holidays? No need to fear missing your plane because you’ve lost your government issued I.D.! You can fly without it—as long as you know the color of your house.
A few weeks ago I lost my wallet, or maybe it was stolen. But I had to fly from Los Angeles to San Francisco, and I didn’t have a single piece of identification—no passport, driver’s license, credit card, work I.D., nothing.
When I got to LAX, I approached the uniformed Transportation Security Administration agent nearest the entrance to the security screening area. She had the power to ruin my day, and we both knew it. But I was sweet, and she was only slightly superior in return.
I was really happy to get on that plane that day. But I wasn’t thrilled to learn that instant access to satellite images is a government tool of airport identification.
“Do you have anything?” she asked. “A library card? A bill addressed to you at your home?”
I shook my head from side to side, pitifully.
The agent summoned the supervisor. He carried a clipboard and something that looked like a cross between a World War II-era walkie-talkie and a 1990s cellphone.
“Please write your name and address on this form,” he said. “Then I have to make a call. The gentleman I call will ask you a series of questions to help us verify your identify.”
I filled out the form super-neatly, so I wouldn’t seem like a nervous terrorist, and the supervisor placed a call on his phone-a-ma-jig to an intentionally unidentified person who I came to think of as the Voice.
The Voice spoke to me directly. “Have you ever lived in the Washington, D.C., area?” the Voice inquired. “Yes, a number of years ago,” I said. “Do you now live in a gated community?” asked the Voice. My neighborhood isn’t technically gated, but there’s only one road in and out, so I answered, “Yes.” That was the right answer.
The final question from the Voice, the one that got me through the backscatter machine, past the shoe swipe-o-meter and onto the plane, was a stunning surprise: “What color is your house?”
“Green,” I told the Voice, who then asked me to hand the phone back to the supervisor. The supervisor and the Voice then began chatting about how nice my house was.
By chance, when I got back home, I had an email waiting for me from Mr. Peter E. Sand, director of privacy technology at the US Department of Homeland Security in Washington. He was inquiring about a book I’d written. I quickly emailed him back about my experience at LAX. How did they know the color of my house? Why did they ask me that? Sand volunteered to put my questions to someone who might know the answer.
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Anita L. Allen is the Henry R. Silverman professor of law and professor of philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania. She writes about everyday ethics, health, and the right to privacy for scholarly journals and the popular press.
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photoshock
Will the real government please stand up! How in the world can someone from the TSA, an agency with the IQ of a slug, make use of Google Earth, and the Atlanta Police Department, get things so wrong?
It must be in the water, things like this don't happen. There has to be some form of shadow government that is using all the technology that is available, and the government that can be seen, using 19th Century tools and grinders.
For my part, hopefully there will be a nice Voice on the end of the line, if not, then my day will surely be ruined.
SantaFromTheNorth
Wow! Great article. You and Bruce Schneier should be the Batman and Robin of the DHS; perhaps we would have less security theater, more respect for civil rights, and more real bad guys caught. You are one of the best!
EastCoastBias
Great story, but really!?! Based on a recent trip to JFK sans wallet, all I had to do was submit to a secondary screening and I was through (I had my ID sent to me for the return trip). I was surprised the TSA was as easy on me as they were, sure they would never let me on the plane, but after a rigorous search it was no problem, and this at the primary NYC airport, where security concerns are paramount.
aallen
Follow up:
Thanks for your comment on my article. The system is seemingly arbitary.EastCoastBias got through with just a secondary screening. I got through after naming the color of my house and then going through a secondary physical screening. For the San Francisco Philly leg of my ID-less trip a few days later, I produced a faxed copy of my passport and a temporary American Express card, then after secondary screening, I was let through. For some reason my shoe swipe for suspicious substances tested "positive" and a supervisor had to be called about that. I would like to stress that all of the TSA people were very pleasant. Its just that the policies under which they operate could use some reassessment. And by the way, the screening process without ID in LAX took so long that I missed my plane. To make sure that didn't happen at SFO, I went to the airport 3 hours early. Cheers!
EastCoastBias
Anita - Couldn't agree more that TSA standards are arbitrary, person to person, airport to airport. They do try, and like any airport job they have to be patient to survive the wrath of even average customers. With so much on the line, it's disconcerting that there isn't more of a standard approach.
girlinSalem
I can do this from my iPod. This is no big deal, everybody has access to these satellite images now, not just TSA.
Bruce135
I think you can pretty much guarantee that now people with no id will be put through the wringer. They were trying to help you out in a way that had obviously worked well in the past, but by publishing it to score some journalistic points, you've managed to screw everyone that will ever follow in your footsteps. I hate to be this way, but would you have claimed some sort of discrimination if they hadn't let you go through? That would have been a great story too!
beezzz
I really don't get your point.
They had the decency to let you through - now you complain about it? You gave them your address and personal details (which they were entitled to have) then feel invaded when they look up commonly available data about where you like!
They were more than helpful. You now moan about it!
Some people are never happy!
aallen
We can all, even the government, l get to Google satellitte images via our iphones and laplops as girlinsalem points out. But should TSA rely on such images to ID passengers?
overdue
I suppose it ultimately depends on who you deal with at the airport.
My Story:
This was in 1996, pre 9/11, but still.....at Salt Lake City airport, I was waved through every security check point, x-ray, etc simply because, being a young "punk rocker" with a penchant for thrift store jackets, I happened to be wearing that day a blue work jacket with reflective strips and a few patches that said things like "chief ground service."
I was never asked for any ID; I was treated like one of them.
In other words, I could've been arrested for impersonating an airport employee.
I just liked the jacket; it could've said, "I heart Johnny Rotten," for all I cared!
Forestroot
I'm sorry but the only thing that immediately comes to mind is that color-blindness is a sex linked genetic condition. There would be all these men (and dogs for that matter) who really could not tell you the color of their home. And blind people better not travel with a couple of forms of ID.
Compton
I'm sorry, but didn't you just compromise security standards for airlines throughout the nation by publishing this? Either anyone will be able to sneak onto a plane after a quick google maps search, or they will stop information based exceptions and people who are caught without an ID like yourself will have to take the train. I don't think getting an article published on a website is more important than national security.
livedog
Ms. Allen,
No doubt that for every great outcome there is an equal horror story. But what's truly illuminated by your article is the dire need for consistant training, or retraining across the board of all those individual gate keepers and their agencies. As we wander into this century with creeps, terrorists, serial killers, and criminals, et al. lurking about, greater access to our personal information could quite certainly be handled appropriately: without jepordizing our bill of rights.
tracyreed
Apparently Southwest, American, and United will all let you on
the airplane with absolutely no ID. You can even get through the TSA
security with no ID although it is a bit more involved and slower.
US Airways, however, will not even let you on their plane without
ID. This caused my wife serious trouble when she accidentally left her
purse on a US Airways airplane and lost her ID and they stranded her
in Indiana. She had to buy another ticket with American Airlines.
This incident really ruined our vacation and cost us $908.20. I have
written a letter detailing the whole fiasco and begun a website:
http://usairsucks.org
Thank you.
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