FBI Keeping Pre-9/11 Travel Records
Where's the shredder. This isn't right.
If you're among the millions of Americans who took airline flights in the months before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the FBI probably knows about it - and possibly where you stayed, whom you traveled with, what credit card you used and even whether you ordered a kosher meal.
The bureau is keeping 257.5 million records on people who flew on commercial airlines from June through September 2001 in its permanent investigative database, according to information obtained by a privacy group and made available to The Associated Press.
What might the F.B.I. do with the information?
Privacy advocates say they're troubled by the possibility that the FBI could be analyzing personal information about people without their knowledge or permission.
The information was obtained by EPIC from a Freedom of Information Act Request.
EPIC has learned through Freedom of Information Act litigation that the FBI obtained 257.5 million Passenger Name Records following 9/11, and that the Bureau has permanently incorporated the travel details of tens of millions of innocent people into its law enforcement databases. The FBI made the revelation as it explained (pdf) why it made heavy redactions in documents (pdf) it released to EPIC in September. For more information, see EPIC's Passenger Profiling Page.
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