Airlines Don't Want You to Know They Sold Your Flight Data to DHS
- Reference: 0178010187
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/06/11/1825215/airlines-dont-want-you-to-know-they-sold-your-flight-data-to-dhs
- Source link:
> A data broker owned by the country's major airlines, including Delta, American Airlines, and United, collected U.S. travellers' domestic flight records, sold [1]access to them to Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and then as part of the contract told CBP to not reveal where the data came from, according to internal CBP documents obtained by 404 Media. The data includes passenger names, their full flight itineraries, and financial details.
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> CBP, a part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), says it needs this data to support state and local police to track people of interest's air travel across the country, in a purchase that has alarmed civil liberties experts. The documents reveal for the first time in detail why at least one part of DHS purchased such information, and comes after Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detailed its own purchase of the data. The documents also show for the first time that the data broker, called the Airlines Reporting Corporation (ARC), tells government agencies not to mention where it sourced the flight data from.
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> "The big airlines -- through a shady data broker that they own called ARC -- are selling the government bulk access to Americans' sensitive information, revealing where they fly and the credit card they used," Senator Ron Wyden said in a statement. ARC is owned and operated by at least eight major U.S. airlines, other publicly released documents show. The company's board of directors include representatives from Delta, Southwest, United, American Airlines, Alaska Airlines, JetBlue, and European airlines Lufthansa and Air France, and Canada's Air Canada. More than 240 airlines depend on ARC for ticket settlement services.
[1] https://www.404media.co/airlines-dont-want-you-to-know-they-sold-your-flight-data-to-dhs/
Next up: Don't trample on my privacy fee (Score:2)
Airlines have bag fees, flight change fees, talk to a real person fees, why not a fee to not sell my personal information?
Auction would be better (Score:2)
Fee? Why not have an auction like they do for upgrades? That way you can get passengers bidding to keep their data private against governments and other companies wanting to know all about you and the airline can make even more money!
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Google outbids me for my data every time.
watch out, Scooby!! (Score:1)
> “If Joe Biden federalizes the National Guard, that would be a direct attack on states' rights. We can’t let them take away our states’ rights too, especially our right to protect ourselves.”
Noem, well-known dog killer and current trump cabinet member, takes quite a drastic turn in response to trump deploying federal troop and her love of states' rights. See if you can spot the hypocrisy.
> We will deploy troops "for the safety of this community.”
I wonder if that was her excuse for murdering puppies? You got to hand it to the puppy skull basher. They don't even try to hide their fascist intent.
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Short to taking states right to extremes of wanting to start another civil war most conservatives are concerned when the federal government tries to expand into areas historically handled by the states, they don't imagine the supremacy clause does not exist.
We did this back in like 2010 when AZ tried do immigration enforcement. The courts made it pretty clear that they could not even carry out black letter federal immigration law, let alone add their own. It is beyond any reason then to assume state and lo
I guess I don't see the point of this. (Score:3)
I understand that it's shady of the airlines to sell this data without disclosing it, although I assume it's somewhere in that fine print. The current digital economy is all about selling data, so that's a revenue stream, and we shouldn't be surprised.
I also understand that it's technically legal for law enforcement to buy data in bulk, so long as it isn't targeting individuals in the purchase. I don't like it, but that's the current law. Congress should change that.
What I don't understand is, the TSA already has all of this information sans perhaps the credit card info. Why is the government, who is already in possession of this data, paying the airline surrogate for it? Are the data systems incompatible between agencies? (rhetorical) And if so, would it cost more to remedy the compatibility than it does to just buy it from this "ARC."?
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> What I don't understand is, the TSA already has all of this information sans perhaps the credit card info. Why is the government, who is already in possession of this data, paying the airline surrogate for it?
My understanding is the government is supposed to destroy the records it collects within a relatively short time frame. Buying the data means they can hold onto it for as long as they want...
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FOIA would indicate otherwise, unless this is some retention policy specific to TSA. Still doesn't make sense. They could just change that rule for free (Congress or otherwise.)
I just fly with ... (Score:2)
... Air America.
Breaking News from the 2000s (Score:2)
Is there anyone who is aware of concepts like Secure Flight and the No-fly List really thinking that prior flight information isn't being kept by DHS and used in evaluating future security stance?
If you fly a one-way, last minute cash ticket to Iran, be prepared for that flight data to be taken into account on future US flights. This should be obvious to everone.
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Came here to say that the only surprising thing is that it was *sold,* I assumed it was just handed over for free since at least 9/11.
TSA? (Score:2)
I guess sure its more data, but is it much more?
I mean the TSA (part of DHS) already had/has access to every boarding pass. At least for the first outbound flight, most trips being round trips, they already had your travel plans. I guess some of the connectors might possible have been unknown to them but realistically they probably already have enough other data sources to figure it out.
To me this speaks more about how ineffective and bad at IT / big data DHS is that would even need/want/bother with buying
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When it isn't actually your money being spent, you'd be amazed at what you're willing to buy.
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I am not sure 'amazed' is the right word!
The only sane reaction to all this is to say: JUST DOGE IT!
Don't care (Score:1)
I don't care if they sold data about me. It would be nice to get a cut, sure. But other than that? Fuck it.
What I am really interested in as far as airlines go is more leg room and comfortable seating in general.
Surpised It's Sold (Score:2)
I always thought that the airlines were providing this information to DHS/TSA under mandate.
I'm surprised that the airlines could sell it rather than just hand it over as part of normal operations.
Buying ticketing data ... (Score:2)
Years ago, I worked for a long-gone regional airline. We routinely gave raw ticketing & flight data to some 3rd party aggregator. We then bought back the same data after they cleaned it up to plug into the ticket pricing engine. Couldn't convince the mgrs. to even consider the possibility of parsing it ourselves. ("We've always done it this way") Don't recall the name of the 3rd party .....
Waitaminute... (Score:2)
> ... at least one part of DHS purchased such information, and comes after Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detailed its own purchase of the data
Our tax dollars paying for this is bad enough, but paying for it multiple times?
I agree with Clinton and Obama... we need an audit of the government to stop this wasteful spending.
because the gov't already (Score:2)
gets it for free
fake news!!! (Score:1)
It is perfectly fine for the government to break laws and trample all over your rights as long as trump and his administration does it.
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> It is perfectly fine for the government to break laws and trample all over your rights as long as trump and his administration does it.
[1]It didn't start this year [slashdot.org]. Stop becoming a meme. No one in government in any party in this country care about you or your privacy.
[1] https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/06/11/1825215/RCenteredintoacontracttoprovidedatabeginninginJuneof2024,andthecontractremainsineffectuntil2029
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Both sides!!!
Re: fake news!!! (Score:2, Insightful)
Rather, you made an incorrect presumption, and he corrected you. What you're doing is even more intellectually dishonest than both sides-ism.
Speak of intellectual dishonesty, it's no wonder you and drinkypoo keep crushing on each other.
Re: (Score:2)
Except he used a fake source and tried to pass it off as real, making him a liar. Now you're trying to both sides again by saying I'm not better than the liar that he is. Things happen chronological, just to let you know. Both of your accounts don't seem to know that. Btw, you're the crazy, creepy stalker, aren't you?
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> Except he used a fake source and tried to pass it off as real, making him a liar.
You're the only one lying here bud. I re-posted with the correct article. Nothing was fake. You're constant claims without anything to back them off looks pretty childish. Just admit you made an incorrect claim (like an adult), and get on with your day. Don't double down on something provably incorrect.
Re: fake news!!! (Score:2)
> Except he used a fake source and tried to pass it off as real, making him a liar.
A liar is somebody who intentionally deceives. He made an error when he posted the link, and later corrected it. The original commentary remains truthful and valid. The fact that you're claiming otherwise is a blatant lie on your part, even without your shitty, substandard reasoning.
> Now you're trying to both sides again by saying I'm not better than the liar that he is.
I never did it even once, which by your own reasoning makes you even more of a liar than he is.
> Things happen chronological, just to let you know. Both of your accounts don't seem to know that.
My other account was replaced with this one. I literally haven't posted on it since 2012. By your own reasoning, you've lied yet agai
Voters!!! (Score:2)
Voters keep voting for tough on crime bullshit and this is what you get when you keep voting for tough on crime bullshit.
Every year crime goes down regardless of the number of police but every year we keep adding more and more police.
The job of a cop is to arrest people or give them tickets. Both of which have numeric values associated with them meaning they have quotas whether anyone likes to admit it or not.
This means you have too many cops and not enough crime.
And that means the cops are g
Re: (Score:2)
Will we see probationers next?
From David Brin's Sci Fi novel Sundiver:
"Then, as now, the Citizens loved the Probation Laws. They had no trouble forgetting the fact that they cut through every traditional Constitutional guarantee of due process. Most of them lived in countries that had never had such niceties anyway."
There were Citizens and Probationers. All probationers were required to carry a surgically implanted transponder. They weren't considered citizens and could not vote, Their movements were closel
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"Tough on crime" for the sake of winning elections is an absolute joke. Their solutions are detrimental and often lead to shifty practices like changing the way crimes are reported. Businesses in our downtown area are angry about having zero police presence. If five businesses are victimized in the same 24 hour period, it gets counted as a single crime. (For some reason "defund the police" caused a huge drop in the number of officers. Now they can't get enough applicants to fill the open positions.) Hell, t
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> You can already see this with a rash of perfectly sober people being arrested for DUI.
Then perhaps we need to make it that DUI is no longer a crime.
I can hear the typing now, "Are you saying we should not have cops take drunk drivers off the road?" No, I am not making that claim. If people are so drunk that they can't keep their vehicle between the lines on the road, obey posted road signs, or otherwise pose a threat of harm to people and property, then they need to be taken off the road. Why make their blood alcohol level a matter of record? I'm quite certain that different people react
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The job of a cop is to arrest people or give them tickets.
And which filthy, unsanitary orifice did you pull that nasty piece of anti-police propaganda out of? No, that's not their job. Their job is to maintain order, and sometimes that can best be done by arresting whoever's disrupting order, or by giving them a ticket. If they can prevent or end a breach of the piece without any arrests or tickets, so much the better.
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You're not smart enough to use the internet, liar. Your link is to this story on slashdot.
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> You're not smart enough to use the internet, liar. Your link is to this story on slashdot.
[1]Correct article [thestreet.com]
You lack proper reasoning skills. Posting the wrong link makes me a moron, not a liar.
[1] https://www.thestreet.com/travel/3-major-airlines-secretly-sold-your-data-to-the-government
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> Posting a fake source makes you both.
Cool story, but nothing to back up your claim that "TheStreet" doesn't exist.
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> [1]It didn't start this year [slashdot.org].
Not according to your link which is dated 2025.
[1] https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/06/11/1825215/RCenteredintoacontracttoprovidedatabeginninginJuneof2024,andthecontractremainsineffectuntil2029
Re: (Score:2)
>> [1]It didn't start this year [slashdot.org].
> Not according to your link which is dated 2025.
[2]correct link [thestreet.com]
Stupid mistake on my part.
[1] https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/06/11/1825215/RCenteredintoacontracttoprovidedatabeginninginJuneof2024,andthecontractremainsineffectuntil2029
[2] https://www.thestreet.com/travel/3-major-airlines-secretly-sold-your-data-to-the-government
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Dated June 10th 2025.
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> Dated June 10th 2025.
That's why you have to read the link. Such actions would help you not look more foolish than the clown who posted an incorrect link
> ARC is apparently selling data to Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which is a part of the Department of Homeland Security. ARC entered into a contract to provide data beginning in June of 2024, and the contract remains in effect until 2029.
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Oh noes! It started last year. Who started the rights trampling organization, DHS? Hint: also, a well known liar and middle name is W
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> Oh noes! It started last year. Who started the rights trampling organization, DHS? Hint: also, a well known liar and middle name is W
So you read a summary, and blame Trump. Then you find out this action started during a different administration, so you blame piece of shit that started the DHS? You do understand that each presidential administration appoints people to run those departments, right? Shouldn't one of the administrations after Bush changed or eliminated the department?
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What about Trump? Why doesn't he change or eliminate the department? Why doesn't he stop the end run around the constitution? It is because trump spends each and everyday figuring out how to rip apart the constitution and violate your rights.
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> What about Trump? Why doesn't he change or eliminate the department? Why doesn't he stop the end run around the constitution? It is because trump spends each and everyday figuring out how to rip apart the constitution and violate your rights.
He should close it, but he won't. He's his own type of corrupt. My point was that his administration had nothing to do with starting the process of buying customer data from airlines. That was the previous administration. Your response to the article was to blame Trump. He can be blamed for tons of shit, just not this, unless he allows it to continue. If that happens, he's just as much to blame as the brain-dead guy before him.
Re: fake news!!! (Score:2)
Probably because DHS is a good thing, regardless of when or who it began under. Prior to that, each federal law enforcement agency was independent, and among other problems, they never shared information among one another, which was found to be the biggest reason why 9/11 wasn't prevented, in addition to a number of other historical cases where it lead to a miscarriage of justice.
Prior to DHS, the US was the only country with law enforcement agencies that would at times work against each other.
Anyways, have
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> Prior to DHS, the US was the only country with law enforcement agencies that would at times work against each other.
So the solution to too many law enforcement agencies is to create one more? How does that logic work out?
As an example, if there's someone smuggling drugs over a border into the USA then that could fall under the jurisdiction of the FBI, DEA, CBP, TSA, or USCG. How many federal agencies do we need to track drug trafficking? Should we even have the movement of marijuana or cold medicine be a crime?
The DEA is clearly redundant as it does nothing that then FBI or ATF doesn't already have jurisdiction over.
So I think you're missing the point (Score:2)
The grandparent is using Trump as a figurehead for general right-wing extremism and panic driven public policy. He's not explicitly saying Trump is the problem he's just using Trump as a stand-in for the entire Republican party, the heritage foundation and project 2025 and the whole sodding mess that is the right wing strategy post Goldwater losing.
But that's a hell of a lot to type out so he just made a flippant comment about Trump and counted on your ability to read context and nuance. Which given tha
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CPB and the government have been collected data directly from the airlines ever since the aftermath of 9/11 through a number of programs, for example to check passengers against watch lists and to verify the identity of travelers on international flights.
What has changed is that by buying data from a commerical broker instead of a a congressionally instituted program, it bypasses judicial review and limits set by Congress on data collected through those programs -- for example it can track passengers on dom
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I have expected that the DHS get my travel data since September 11th 2001, so why is this news now?
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I mean, I too expected that they would already have what flights I took. I didn't have any reason to expect them to know how I paid for it, though.
Re: fake news!!! (Score:2)
"Gas or a$$" comes to mind.
What laws? (Score:4)
> It is perfectly fine for the government to break laws
What laws did your government break? The airlines were not compelled to release the data, they chose to sell the data to the government. If anyone broke the law it was the airlines who sold the private data they held...which is probably why they required the government not to tell anyone how they got it.
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The same ones that trump ignores and tramples all over on a daily basis.
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> What laws did your government break?
We will see if you can follow this story.... let's say I'm a car thief. I want to steal your car, but in my state putting a GPS tracker on your car is illegal. I go to Ford and buy all the telemetrics (GPS) and find out when and where your car will be everyday. I then use this data to steal your car.
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If you're willing to break the law by stealing my car, why are you unwilling to break the law by putting a GPS tracker on it?
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> If anyone broke the law it was the airlines who sold the private data they held...
This is America, not Europe. Your privacy isn't legally protected pleb. Now shutup while we sell every thing we know about you to whomever comes along with a dollar.
So this is disturbingly legal right now (Score:2)
It uses a loophole with law enforcement buys the data instead of obtaining it through regular investigative work.
It's a loophole that absolutely should be closed but you are correct with the current right-wing extremist administration there is basically no chance in hell of that loophole being closed.
It's like how basically everyone agrees that civil asset forfeiture or the practice of cops charging your property with crime instead of you and then stealing it should be illegal but it never gets bann
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You believe this to be a "right wing" thing? I'm certain both sides play this game of civil asset forfeiture. The Left hates the guns, the Right hates the drugs, both use civil asset forfeiture to their advantage. If this bothers you then use the soap box, ballot box, and jury box to work against it. If it gets to that fourth box of freedom, the cartridge box, then things have gone very wrong.
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Trump has been POTUS for only six months, you believe this only started with him?
If you don't want the government to trample on your rights then make it a personal policy to vote for people that want to shrink the size of government. With enough people doing that we can get the government to fit inside the box it came in from 1776.