IP: more on CAPPS II

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A34738-2002Sep3.html

  Air Security Focusing on Flier Screening
  Complex Profiling Network Months Behind Schedule

  By Robert O'Harrow Jr.
  Washington Post Staff Writer
  Wednesday, September 4, 2002; Page A01

  From the moment the Transportation Security Administration was formed,
  agency officials have been consumed by the idea of a vast network of
  supercomputers that would instantly probe every passenger's background for
  clues about violent designs.

  The agency has spent millions of dollars and innumerable hours studying
how
  the secret profiling system known as CAPPS II could enable them to "deter,
  prevent or capture terrorists" before they board an airplane, government
  documents show.

  In recent months, the agency hired four teams of technology companies that
  have honed their expertise in profiling for casinos, marketing companies
and
  financial institutions. Their mission was to demonstrate how artificial
  intelligence and other powerful software can analyze passengers' travel
  reservations, housing information, family ties, identifying details in
  credit reports and other personal data to determine if they're "rooted in
  the community" -- or have an unusual history that indicates a potential
  threat.

  Now transportation and intelligence officials believe that CAPPS II --
short
  for the second-generation Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System
--
  will form the core of a new framework in aviation security: a far more
  intense focus on people rather than baggage. They intend to extend its use
  to screen truckers, railroad conductors, subway workers and others whose
  transportation jobs involve the public trust.

  Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta, who oversees the TSA, recently
  described CAPPS II as "the foundation" on which all other far more public
  security measures really depend.

  But after a nine-month-long crash program, CAPPS II remains a promising
yet
  unfulfilled idea that won't be ready for live testing until next year,
  months later than agency officials had hoped. It is still unclear when the
  system will have a meaningful impact on security at the nation's airports.
  "We're still between the conceptual and the reality," one senior
government
  official acknowledged.

[snip]


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