Sky Marshalls Target Innocent People to Meet Quotas

I discovered an article on Bruce Schneier’s blog that refers to an ABC article about how innocent people are being placed on ‘Watch List’ to meet quota.

From ABC News:

“You could be on a secret government database or watch list for simply taking a picture on an airplane. Some federal air marshals say they’re reporting your actions to meet a quota, even though some top officials deny it.

The air marshals, whose identities are being concealed, told 7NEWS that they’re required to submit at least one report a month. If they don’t, there’s no raise, no bonus, no awards and no special assignments.

‘Innocent passengers are being entered into an international intelligence database as suspicious persons, acting in a suspicious manner on an aircraft … and they did nothing wrong,’ said one federal air marshal….

What kind of impact would it have for a flying individual to be named in an SDR?

‘That could have serious impact … They could be placed on a watch list. They could wind up on databases that identify them as potential terrorists or a threat to an aircraft. It could be very serious,’ said Don Strange, a former agent in charge of air marshals in Atlanta. He lost his job attempting to change policies inside the agency.”