Profiling is a selective risk investigation of a person which is carried out by trained personnel to air passengers before they are allowed to board on their flights in aviation industry. Just like the stop and frisk rule which is applied in the streets, when conducting a profiling operation, passengers are analysed according to their behaviour and appearance alongside their travel documents and come up at a decision if these people meets the expectations of international travel requirements. If proven otherwise, the selected passengers are put through a thorough security check. The aim of this exercise is to reduce the risk involved due to the recent upsurge in terrorism activities involving people who pose themselves as passengers. It is a preventive as well as a precautionary measure which has had a lot of success and some drawbacks due to criticism from individuals and various civil rights groups. Behavioural profiling aims at separating the passengers with potential to cause harm from those who are not. Profiling aims at separating the passengers who have the potential to pose threat from others who have no potential to cause danger to other travellers.
Background information
The initial profiling of passengers in aviation industry was carried out in 1994 when the Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-Screening System (CAPPS I) was still on the development stage. The routine profiling got as recommendation after the crashing of TWA flight in 1996 was suspected to have been as a result of bombing activity (Karber, 2002). The use of profiling in Airports has been motivated by the increase in terrorism threats especially after the 911 attacks where hijacked airplanes were used to execute terrorism activities. Profiling of passengers was initiated as an additional measure to screening that is normally carried out on the baggage of every passenger. This was necessitated by the concern of the security experts who argued that there is need to scrutinise passengers more than their baggage. However, this has made the air travel become more and more unattractive to most of customers who feel that their privacy is not being respected. The Computer-assisted Passenger Profiling System (CAPPS) was developed to counter the effects of criticism due to profiling of people on the basis of their origin, race or even colour (Young, Hicks, 2002). According to most of security personnel, the most significant indicator that can be used to identify a terrorist includes characteristics such as nationality, religion, ethnicity, language and sex of the passengers
Profiling process
Any person identified by the SAPPS is taken through an additional security check which includes the following procedures matching of their luggage, which means that the luggage is flown only when it is evident the person who checked in with the luggage has boarded the plane. This is aimed at reducing the chances of a baggage that may contain explosives which might be harmful to other passengers when he himself remains safe by boarding another plane. Inspection of the contents on the baggage is carried out using a certified system for detecting explosives or sometimes simple check using other sophisticated technologies among them the trace detectors or devices that are capable of detecting explosives. CAPPS bases its selection on a number of data which constitute the pre-boarding information randomly and specific basis (Johnson, 1994). This information is used to select passengers who should be subjected to increased security check ups. The basis of this information is maintained at a confidential level.
In addition to the details that are applied by CAPPS I, the CAPPS II requires for the validation of the identity of passengers using commercial airlines. This includes the counterchecking of the full name of the passenger, residential address telephone numbers and even the dates of birth against those contained at the database of the government for any necessary security assessment. After completion of this clarification, the CAPPS II system carries out a review of the passengers identity against those of the intelligence and law enforcement agencies databases.
For those passengers whose identity passes without any matches with the one contained in the law enforcement and intelligence database, they are allowed to proceed boarding the flight. However, for the passengers with more identifiable profiles have to be subjected to an increased search or even lawful action. CAPPS II aims to act as a bridge between the profiling systems applied by the airline and the intelligent and law enforcement database (Tsang, Vidulich, 2003). The CAPPS I was faulted for the 911 attack as it did not help to prevent the attack even though it had positively selected six of the suspects for further screening. If CAPPS II was in application by then, it would have notified concerned authorities when these passengers were selected for screening.
Success of profiling exercises
Profiling of passengers using their certain characteristics such as behaviour pattern has a greater potential of preventing terrorism related activities in the airline industry. This is similar technique that has been used with great success to identify travellers using fake identity documents to carry out drug trafficking and escape from other crimes in airports. The inclusion of this technique to the current screening done on luggage will ultimately increase the success of preventing such crimes.
The greatest advantage of the profiling passengers according to their behaviour pattern is that, it has the capacity to decrease the notion of profiling done on passengers as being subjective or racial based (Sarsfield, et al, 2000). The best way to protect acts of terrorism is to identify them before they carry out their plan and profiling provides the best way to carry out protective measures.
Profiling has had a lot of success in country like Israel which has been a target of many terrorism attacks. After the hijacking of an Israel based flight from Rome in 1968, Israel instituted strict profiling measures and traffic security measures which have prevented any other successful trafficking of Israel planes. Any passenger boarding an Israel flight is thoroughly screened before boarding the flight. Even though the measures have been perceived as discriminatory, their success is averting any possible flight based terrorist activity has been evident.
Many advocates of constitutional order argue that, there is need for this information to be made public so as to remain legal. However, such approach would negate the usefulness of the process. The criteria used to select passengers for further screening involves but not limited to the aspects of the process by which the purchase of the ticket was made. Most of terrorists are known to prefer purchasing their tickets on cash basis. This reduces the chances of them revealing their personal information which can be used to track their movements. The timing of the purchase of the ticket is also applied to identify a passenger to be subjected to increased screening (Ruwantissa, 2002). This is based on the aspect of whether the ticket was purchased just be fore departure or it was an advance purchase.
The identity of travellers also plays a significant role in selection of passenger under SAPPS. This includes the details of the person the passenger is travelling with. Other details include the activity which the traveller has identified as the purpose of his travel and the means of transport to be used after reaching his destination. Other details about the flight schedule such as the origin of the flight and the destination. Specific travel arrangements and the final destination of the passenger are also given important consideration if they differ from those of the flight (Batteau, 2001). The travel pans of the passenger includes whether the passenger intends to make round trip depending on the purpose of his trip. The success of the 911 terrorists laid on the fact that though the CAPPS selected some of them for profiling but their personal information was not counterchecked with any existing data about existing terrorist records.
Case against profiling
From a critical perspective, the profiling of passengers using a computer based profiling system goes against the basic principles of personal privacy. The current CAPPS II intends to use the information collected for the purpose of admission into a flight for other purposes of checking the recorded criminal behaviour of a person. The use of such information without the consent of the person it relates to is one of the contraventions of his rights to privacy. When a passenger gives their private information to a flight or even gets enrolled into a certain flight is because he wants to fly with because he wants to fly with the greatest freedom possible (Tsang, Vidilich, 2003). The increase in freedom to a passenger widens their security in a flight than when they are subjected to rigorous security check up system. There is one very important aspect of protection of personalised information that is being breached by the exposure of such information for other uses.
Even though many tend to come to a consensus that behaviour based profiling will have capacity to counter terrorism, these efforts might end up not achieving their target. This is because, terrorists are in most cases trained for a long time and might also be trained on how to control their behaviour and go pass the screen without being detected. Since there is no existing profile on the behaviour of terrorists, it surpasses logic on how this profiling can work without a preconceived notion about a given individual.
There is also a very high possibility that the intended profiling has the capacity to form an extension of ethnic, religious and racial witch-hunt which might jeopardise the integrity of the aviation industry. In a similar scenario, the application of human profiling by British authorities was met with criticism from Muslim community who saw it as a single stereotyped form of profiling which was targeted at a single religion (Johnson, 1994). The intention of the US authorities to institute similar profiling mechanisms might end up damaging the already shaky relationship that exists between this administration and Islamic community.
In Israel, the Supreme Court ruled the profiling measures applied by the Israel aviation industry as discriminatory against Israel Arabs. This was after a legal suit was filed by the Association of Civil Rights in Israel against the airport security procedures due to their discriminative nature. In the new technology, the application of advanced technologies in profiling of passengers in the basis of their personal information is seen as a greater form of violation of privacy. The greatest of it all being the use of this commercial based personal information for law-enforcement purposes.
The concerns relating to racial profiling of passengers in the airports was raised by delegates from 154 countries who met in 2002 and showed their commitments towards ending any discriminatory profiling. They committed themselves towards implementing their security measures in an objective manner without any discrimination on the grounds of race, nationality or gender. However, things tend to have moved in the other direction than what they promised (Ruwantissa, 2002). Even though someone might not end up being regarded as a terrorist, the actual profiling and being subjected to countless screens due to suspicion causes great psychological damage and trauma to a person.
Current trends
Criticism of CAPPS II has led to major amendments being carried out on its use in profiling and as a post data. There has been agreement on the need to get rid of any data stored by the transport associations after a limited time once the passenger has reached his or her destination. There have also been some mechanisms put in place for passengers to appeal against increased secondary level screening which could have been carried on them for security reasons. This intends to create a balance of fairness where one may be exempted for such higher level security checks during his or her travel. Measures have also been put in place limiting the use of personal information collected from commercial airlines to compile a security profile of a person (Tsang, Vidulich, 2003). The transport system has also managed to restrict the use of personalised information collected only for reasons of confirming the identity of a person. Those requiring such information such as the commercial flight attendants would only get it in order to carry out an evaluation of whether the person who is travelling is actually the one who was presented during the flight reservation.
The secure flight strategy is a measure to address concerns raised from the CAPSS II profiling system. As a part of continuous security efforts, the systems will pass the responsibility of passenger screening from the hands of the commercial airlines to the government. This will help a lot in a preventing the airlines accessing information contained in government databases. By use of the present profiling systems, the airline attendants have the access to the lists of the people who are in the government terrorist watch lists (Sarsfield, et al, 2000). Even though this methods of profiling is seen as a one sided which presents the government with one single duty, the problem lies in the capacity of the government security agents becoming more invasive in using this system.
Conversely, even though profiling of passengers in search of terrorists with the highest degree of certainty might be next to impossible thing, there is need to rely on the information that can help us identify if such person has in the past been identified as a terrorist or not.
Recommendations
Regardless of much resistance that has faced it from civil rights activists, there is a great need to continue carrying out profiling of passengers. It is the only way that can help in reducing the size of the sample being analysed on the basis of facts. Profiling is the only way that can help the aviation industry players to be sure of the safety of the passengers travelling on their airlines rather than be sorry after a terrible terrorism incident has happened. If the computer bases profiling system is being accused of being susceptible to erroneous judgement, passengers should then contend with the human based profiling which will be carried out by trained personnel (Karber, 2002). Such personnel should be in a position to identify the unconventional behaviour in passengers without raising the eyebrows of race, religious or ethnic discrimination. If it has become evident that the largest proportion of passengers who behave in disorderly manner ends up extending their behaviour in flight with ill motives, then there is need to isolate them out before they can cause disaster to others. This system should enhance collection of broad based information by the airline for other reasons in addition to passenger records which will make profiling exercises more open and efficient.
One of most unfortunate fact about the issue of aviation security lies in the notion that has been levelled against profiling of passengers. The measures being employed to make the airways safe for travel by preventing present day and future terrorist activities has ended up creating a civil objection on top of making air travel more expensive for passengers. It is however a common agreement that, the only best form of selection that can work well in identifying and deterring terrorism activities in the aviation industry is the profiling of passengers. This is especially so now that terrorism activities have increased in frequency and intensity.
Background information
The initial profiling of passengers in aviation industry was carried out in 1994 when the Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-Screening System (CAPPS I) was still on the development stage. The routine profiling got as recommendation after the crashing of TWA flight in 1996 was suspected to have been as a result of bombing activity (Karber, 2002). The use of profiling in Airports has been motivated by the increase in terrorism threats especially after the 911 attacks where hijacked airplanes were used to execute terrorism activities. Profiling of passengers was initiated as an additional measure to screening that is normally carried out on the baggage of every passenger. This was necessitated by the concern of the security experts who argued that there is need to scrutinise passengers more than their baggage. However, this has made the air travel become more and more unattractive to most of customers who feel that their privacy is not being respected. The Computer-assisted Passenger Profiling System (CAPPS) was developed to counter the effects of criticism due to profiling of people on the basis of their origin, race or even colour (Young, Hicks, 2002). According to most of security personnel, the most significant indicator that can be used to identify a terrorist includes characteristics such as nationality, religion, ethnicity, language and sex of the passengers
Profiling process
Any person identified by the SAPPS is taken through an additional security check which includes the following procedures matching of their luggage, which means that the luggage is flown only when it is evident the person who checked in with the luggage has boarded the plane. This is aimed at reducing the chances of a baggage that may contain explosives which might be harmful to other passengers when he himself remains safe by boarding another plane. Inspection of the contents on the baggage is carried out using a certified system for detecting explosives or sometimes simple check using other sophisticated technologies among them the trace detectors or devices that are capable of detecting explosives. CAPPS bases its selection on a number of data which constitute the pre-boarding information randomly and specific basis (Johnson, 1994). This information is used to select passengers who should be subjected to increased security check ups. The basis of this information is maintained at a confidential level.
In addition to the details that are applied by CAPPS I, the CAPPS II requires for the validation of the identity of passengers using commercial airlines. This includes the counterchecking of the full name of the passenger, residential address telephone numbers and even the dates of birth against those contained at the database of the government for any necessary security assessment. After completion of this clarification, the CAPPS II system carries out a review of the passengers identity against those of the intelligence and law enforcement agencies databases.
For those passengers whose identity passes without any matches with the one contained in the law enforcement and intelligence database, they are allowed to proceed boarding the flight. However, for the passengers with more identifiable profiles have to be subjected to an increased search or even lawful action. CAPPS II aims to act as a bridge between the profiling systems applied by the airline and the intelligent and law enforcement database (Tsang, Vidulich, 2003). The CAPPS I was faulted for the 911 attack as it did not help to prevent the attack even though it had positively selected six of the suspects for further screening. If CAPPS II was in application by then, it would have notified concerned authorities when these passengers were selected for screening.
Success of profiling exercises
Profiling of passengers using their certain characteristics such as behaviour pattern has a greater potential of preventing terrorism related activities in the airline industry. This is similar technique that has been used with great success to identify travellers using fake identity documents to carry out drug trafficking and escape from other crimes in airports. The inclusion of this technique to the current screening done on luggage will ultimately increase the success of preventing such crimes.
The greatest advantage of the profiling passengers according to their behaviour pattern is that, it has the capacity to decrease the notion of profiling done on passengers as being subjective or racial based (Sarsfield, et al, 2000). The best way to protect acts of terrorism is to identify them before they carry out their plan and profiling provides the best way to carry out protective measures.
Profiling has had a lot of success in country like Israel which has been a target of many terrorism attacks. After the hijacking of an Israel based flight from Rome in 1968, Israel instituted strict profiling measures and traffic security measures which have prevented any other successful trafficking of Israel planes. Any passenger boarding an Israel flight is thoroughly screened before boarding the flight. Even though the measures have been perceived as discriminatory, their success is averting any possible flight based terrorist activity has been evident.
Many advocates of constitutional order argue that, there is need for this information to be made public so as to remain legal. However, such approach would negate the usefulness of the process. The criteria used to select passengers for further screening involves but not limited to the aspects of the process by which the purchase of the ticket was made. Most of terrorists are known to prefer purchasing their tickets on cash basis. This reduces the chances of them revealing their personal information which can be used to track their movements. The timing of the purchase of the ticket is also applied to identify a passenger to be subjected to increased screening (Ruwantissa, 2002). This is based on the aspect of whether the ticket was purchased just be fore departure or it was an advance purchase.
The identity of travellers also plays a significant role in selection of passenger under SAPPS. This includes the details of the person the passenger is travelling with. Other details include the activity which the traveller has identified as the purpose of his travel and the means of transport to be used after reaching his destination. Other details about the flight schedule such as the origin of the flight and the destination. Specific travel arrangements and the final destination of the passenger are also given important consideration if they differ from those of the flight (Batteau, 2001). The travel pans of the passenger includes whether the passenger intends to make round trip depending on the purpose of his trip. The success of the 911 terrorists laid on the fact that though the CAPPS selected some of them for profiling but their personal information was not counterchecked with any existing data about existing terrorist records.
Case against profiling
From a critical perspective, the profiling of passengers using a computer based profiling system goes against the basic principles of personal privacy. The current CAPPS II intends to use the information collected for the purpose of admission into a flight for other purposes of checking the recorded criminal behaviour of a person. The use of such information without the consent of the person it relates to is one of the contraventions of his rights to privacy. When a passenger gives their private information to a flight or even gets enrolled into a certain flight is because he wants to fly with because he wants to fly with the greatest freedom possible (Tsang, Vidilich, 2003). The increase in freedom to a passenger widens their security in a flight than when they are subjected to rigorous security check up system. There is one very important aspect of protection of personalised information that is being breached by the exposure of such information for other uses.
Even though many tend to come to a consensus that behaviour based profiling will have capacity to counter terrorism, these efforts might end up not achieving their target. This is because, terrorists are in most cases trained for a long time and might also be trained on how to control their behaviour and go pass the screen without being detected. Since there is no existing profile on the behaviour of terrorists, it surpasses logic on how this profiling can work without a preconceived notion about a given individual.
There is also a very high possibility that the intended profiling has the capacity to form an extension of ethnic, religious and racial witch-hunt which might jeopardise the integrity of the aviation industry. In a similar scenario, the application of human profiling by British authorities was met with criticism from Muslim community who saw it as a single stereotyped form of profiling which was targeted at a single religion (Johnson, 1994). The intention of the US authorities to institute similar profiling mechanisms might end up damaging the already shaky relationship that exists between this administration and Islamic community.
In Israel, the Supreme Court ruled the profiling measures applied by the Israel aviation industry as discriminatory against Israel Arabs. This was after a legal suit was filed by the Association of Civil Rights in Israel against the airport security procedures due to their discriminative nature. In the new technology, the application of advanced technologies in profiling of passengers in the basis of their personal information is seen as a greater form of violation of privacy. The greatest of it all being the use of this commercial based personal information for law-enforcement purposes.
The concerns relating to racial profiling of passengers in the airports was raised by delegates from 154 countries who met in 2002 and showed their commitments towards ending any discriminatory profiling. They committed themselves towards implementing their security measures in an objective manner without any discrimination on the grounds of race, nationality or gender. However, things tend to have moved in the other direction than what they promised (Ruwantissa, 2002). Even though someone might not end up being regarded as a terrorist, the actual profiling and being subjected to countless screens due to suspicion causes great psychological damage and trauma to a person.
Current trends
Criticism of CAPPS II has led to major amendments being carried out on its use in profiling and as a post data. There has been agreement on the need to get rid of any data stored by the transport associations after a limited time once the passenger has reached his or her destination. There have also been some mechanisms put in place for passengers to appeal against increased secondary level screening which could have been carried on them for security reasons. This intends to create a balance of fairness where one may be exempted for such higher level security checks during his or her travel. Measures have also been put in place limiting the use of personal information collected from commercial airlines to compile a security profile of a person (Tsang, Vidulich, 2003). The transport system has also managed to restrict the use of personalised information collected only for reasons of confirming the identity of a person. Those requiring such information such as the commercial flight attendants would only get it in order to carry out an evaluation of whether the person who is travelling is actually the one who was presented during the flight reservation.
The secure flight strategy is a measure to address concerns raised from the CAPSS II profiling system. As a part of continuous security efforts, the systems will pass the responsibility of passenger screening from the hands of the commercial airlines to the government. This will help a lot in a preventing the airlines accessing information contained in government databases. By use of the present profiling systems, the airline attendants have the access to the lists of the people who are in the government terrorist watch lists (Sarsfield, et al, 2000). Even though this methods of profiling is seen as a one sided which presents the government with one single duty, the problem lies in the capacity of the government security agents becoming more invasive in using this system.
Conversely, even though profiling of passengers in search of terrorists with the highest degree of certainty might be next to impossible thing, there is need to rely on the information that can help us identify if such person has in the past been identified as a terrorist or not.
Recommendations
Regardless of much resistance that has faced it from civil rights activists, there is a great need to continue carrying out profiling of passengers. It is the only way that can help in reducing the size of the sample being analysed on the basis of facts. Profiling is the only way that can help the aviation industry players to be sure of the safety of the passengers travelling on their airlines rather than be sorry after a terrible terrorism incident has happened. If the computer bases profiling system is being accused of being susceptible to erroneous judgement, passengers should then contend with the human based profiling which will be carried out by trained personnel (Karber, 2002). Such personnel should be in a position to identify the unconventional behaviour in passengers without raising the eyebrows of race, religious or ethnic discrimination. If it has become evident that the largest proportion of passengers who behave in disorderly manner ends up extending their behaviour in flight with ill motives, then there is need to isolate them out before they can cause disaster to others. This system should enhance collection of broad based information by the airline for other reasons in addition to passenger records which will make profiling exercises more open and efficient.
One of most unfortunate fact about the issue of aviation security lies in the notion that has been levelled against profiling of passengers. The measures being employed to make the airways safe for travel by preventing present day and future terrorist activities has ended up creating a civil objection on top of making air travel more expensive for passengers. It is however a common agreement that, the only best form of selection that can work well in identifying and deterring terrorism activities in the aviation industry is the profiling of passengers. This is especially so now that terrorism activities have increased in frequency and intensity.
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