Q. How can you be against CAPPS II? Anything that makes flying safer is OK by me.

A. CAPPS II does not make flying safer. The truth of the matter is that CAPPS II makes flying more dangerous. How? Because it gives the Bad Guys a system they can probe. Read this MIT research paper or a lay explanation of the paper here.

Q. If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear.

A. Yes, you do. Assuming CAPPS II actually made flying safer (and it doesn't), the system is relying on information from a number of different databases which may or may not be accurate. Assuming the decision to classify you as a Patriot or a Threat made by the CAPPS II system is 99% accurate, you're still talking about a system that will make six million bad calls a year.

Q. If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear.

A. Yes, you do. Collecting a lot of information from a lot of different sources and sticking it in one big database is a recipe for disaster. It increases the possibility of identity theft by several orders of magnitude.

Q. Why are you picking on poor Delta? Everyone's doing it.

A. No, they're not. Delta is the only airline collaborating as a CAPPS II tester.

Q. Why not go after the TSA? Leave poor Delta alone!

A. You can't sell your shares in the TSA. Delta is targeted for several reasons:

1. You can't fight City Hall/TSA;

2. Lockheed-Martin, the software supplier/contractor, produces no consumer goods that we're aware of;

3. Delta is on its own testing this program;

4. The executive branch of government is VERY sensitive to corporate pressure and industry concerns.


Applying market pressure to Delta is the best way to stop CAPPS II. A Delta boycott punishes them for collaborating as a tester, the only airline to do so, in CAPPS II. By making the test fail, we can (hopefully) kill off the entire program.

Q. Anything that makes flying safer is OK by me.

A. Anything? Good, because the one thing that really works are random searches. The Bad Guys can't find a way around a truly random search. Unfortunately, that means long lines at the airport.

Q. Delta is doing this because they care about my safety. Yay, Delta!

A. Delta is also concerned about liability. Implementing CAPPS II, which does not make anyone any safer, does allow Delta to say, 'Well, the system said he/she was a Patriot' and shift the legal blame onto someone else if something Bad happens.

Q. Liability, schmiability: safety first. Yay, Delta!

A. Tell that to the airline pilots and they'll laugh at you. A pilot with A Major Airline wrote the following to Old Ben Franklin:

APSA sweated blood getting two bills through Congress about getting armed pilots into the cockpit. If the Airlines (including Delta) had supported it, the original bill would have sufficed and there would be thousands of armed pilots.

However, the lawyers have advised the airlines that getting behind this effort can make them liable for Torts, even those brought by the perpetrators. Thus, the Airlines are primarily responsible for thwarting the will of Congress but DOT, FAA, and TSA are catching the blame because they are writing rules that make the program a guaranteed failure. The mechanism is a multi step process that contains numerous traps controlled by people who probably have their own agenda.

For example, after an extended background investigation (EBI) appropriate to somewhat holding more than a TOP SECRET clearance, there are two psych exams set at different steps in the procedure. If a pilot "busts" either one, he or she can say goodbye to any FAA ratings (required for his job!) and possibly loosses [sic] his Second Amendment rights for life.

Q. Your credit isn't hurt by a credit check. You're lying!

A. An Indiana-based mortgage broker wrote old Ben Franklin:

There are different ways of pulling credit on a person that does not affect credit score but usually that situation exists when a creditor is determining if they wish to extend credit to a possible borrower. I do not how Delta intends to set up their account with the credit bureaus to pull credit reports.

Even if Delta can set it up so it does not damage a person's credit it still is a bad idea. Credit reports are full errors, especially if the person has a fairly common name. I have seen reports that are all fouled up. A father that has died and his information ended up on his son's credit report (Jr. or II or III). A person with the same first and last name but with a different middle name that lives in the same area, with the other guy's information on his report including an unpaid city assessment and tax liens. Real estate mortgages reported on a husband & wife who have never owned property before, etc, etc.......

Credit scores can be lower because you have too much credit. Not defaults, not late pays, just too many open trade lines (including paid off accounts that still show balances but no activity) . And what if, heaven forbid, a person was force into bankruptcy due to lay-off or dismissal? Your credit score takes a huge hit until you rebuild it. Does this mean you are tagged for life (50 years) as a "yellow or red"? Your bankruptcy only appears on your report for 10 years, does Delta hold this against you 5 times longer than the credit bureau's? And Delta's bad rating is going to be shared??!! A person could be ruined for life.

I could give you additional examples of really messed up credit reports (you should see what a divorce can do to your report) but I think you get the idea. Two further thoughts: Who is going to interpret what all this information means? (depending on how the raw data is presented it can be hard to read) and what happens to the report? Is it stored in some massive data base and who has access to it?

Q. You're nothing but a bunch of Communists/Terrorists/Right Wing Conspiracy Nuts/Iraqis/Liberals/Losers with too much time on your hands. Go get a life!

A. We're Americans who love our country and love our constitutional rights.

Q. Who are you? Where do you live?

A. None of your business. If you send your name, address, telephone number, SSN, date of birth, mother's maiden name, a recent copy of your credit report, latest bank statement, PIN number, military discharge papers, and copies of any and all supporting documentation to totalinformationawareness@boycottdelta.org , we'll happily forward the lot of it over to the appropriate channels for analysis. After reading it, of course.

Q. Don't you have anything better to do? Get a life!

A. Working to preserve our freedoms and liberties is not a life, but a duty that every American has to his or her country.

Q. Why do you hate Delta? Are you some kind of wacko ex-employee? Did they treat you badly when you flew with them? What's the deal?

A. No one on the BoycottDelta team has ever worked for Delta, nor do we own shares in the airline. The purpose of this movement is to punish Delta for collaborating with the TSA as a CAPPS II tester. If Delta were not involved in this Orwellian project, we would have no problem with them.

Q. I'm scared.

A. We're sorry you're scared, but all CAPPS II will do is to give you a false sense of security while increasing the likelihood of something Bad happening. Airline passengers now know that a skyjacking no longer means a free trip to Cuba or Libya, and will act appropriately should anyone be so foolish as to try and take over an airplane.
Osama bin Laden wants you to be scared. He wants you to work as hard as you can to destroy the rights and freedoms that make America great. Don't help him.