Exclusive: TSA’s Secret
Behavior Checklist to Spot Terrorists
By Jana Winter and Cora Currier
March 27, 2015 "ICH"
- "The
Intercept" -
Fidgeting, whistling, sweaty palms. Add one
point each. Arrogance, a cold penetrating
stare, and rigid posture, two points.
These are just a few of the
suspicious signs that the Transportation
Security Administration directs its officers
to look out for — and score — in airport
travelers, according to a confidential TSA
document obtained exclusively by The
Intercept.
The checklist is part of
TSA’s controversial program to identify
potential terrorists based on behaviors that
it thinks indicate stress or deception —
known as the Screening of Passengers by
Observation Techniques, or SPOT. The program
employs specially trained officers, known as
Behavior Detection Officers, to watch and
interact with passengers going through
screening.
The document listing the
criteria, known as the “Spot Referral
Report,” is not classified, but it has been
closely held by TSA and has not been
previously released. A
copy was provided to The Intercept
by a source concerned about the quality of
the program.
The checklist ranges from
the mind-numbingly obvious, like “appears to
be in disguise,” which is worth three
points, to the downright dubious, like a
bobbing Adam’s apple. Many indicators, like
“trembling” and “arriving late for flight,”
appear to confirm allegations that the
program picks out signs and emotions that
are common to many people who fly.
A TSA spokesperson
declined to comment on the criteria obtained
by The Intercept. “Behavior
detection, which is just one element of the
Transportation Security Administration’s (TSA)
efforts to mitigate threats against the
traveling public, is vital to TSA’s layered
approach to deter, detect and disrupt
individuals who pose a threat to aviation,”
a spokesperson said in an emailed statement.
Since its introduction in
2007, the SPOT program has attracted
controversy for the lack
of science supporting it. In 2013, the
Government Accountability Office
found that there was no evidence to back
up the idea that “behavioral indicators …
can be used to identify persons who may pose
a risk to aviation security.” After
analyzing hundreds of scientific studies,
the GAO concluded that “the human ability to
accurately identify deceptive behavior based
on behavioral indicators is the same as or
slightly better than chance.”
The inspector general of
the Department of Homeland Security
found in 2013 that TSA had failed to
evaluate SPOT, and “cannot ensure that
passengers at United States airports are
screened objectively, show that the program
is cost-effective, or reasonably justify the
program’s expansion.”
Despite those concerns,
TSA has trained and deployed thousands of
Behavior Detection Officers, and the program
has cost more than $900 million since it
began in 2007, according to the GAO.
The 92-point checklist listed
in the “Spot Referral Report” is
divided into various categories with a point
score for each. Those
categories include a preliminary
“observation and behavior analysis,” and
then those passengers pulled over for
additional inspection are scored based on
two more categories: whether they have
“unusual items,” like almanacs and “numerous
prepaid calling cards or cell phones,” and a
final category for “signs of deception,”
which include “covers mouth with hand when
speaking” and “fast eye blink rate.
Points can also
be deducted from someone’s score based on
observations about the traveler that make
him or her less likely, in TSA’s eyes, to be
a terrorist. For example, “apparent” married
couples, if both people are over 55, have
two points deducted off their score. Women
over the age of 55 have one pointed
deducted; for men, the point deduction
doesn’t come until they reach 65.
Last week, the ACLU
sued TSA to obtain records related to
its behavior detection programs, alleging
that they lead to racial profiling. The
lawsuit is based on a Freedom of Information
Act request the ACLU filed
last November asking for numerous
documents related to the program, including
the scientific justification for the
program, changes to the list of behavior
indicators, materials
used to train officers and screen
passengers, and what happens to the
information collected on travelers.
“The TSA has insisted on
keeping documents about SPOT secret, but the
agency can’t hide the fact that there’s no
evidence the program works,” said Hugh
Handeyside, staff attorney with the ACLU
National Security Project, in
a statement announcing the lawsuit.
Being on the lookout for
suspicious behavior is a “common sense
approach” that is used by law enforcement,
according to TSA. “No single behavior alone
will cause a traveler to be referred to
additional screening or will result in a
call to a law enforcement officer (LEO),”
the agency said in its emailed
statement. “Officers are trained and audited
to ensure referrals for additional screening
are based only on observable behaviors and
not race or ethnicity.”
One former Behavior
Detection Officer manager, who asked not to
be identified, said that SPOT indicators are
used by law enforcement to justify pulling
aside anyone officers find suspicious,
rather than acting as an actual checklist
for specific indicators. “The SPOT sheet was
designed in such a way that virtually every
passenger will exhibit multiple ‘behaviors’
that can be assigned a SPOT sheet value,”
the former manager said.
The signs of deception and
fear “are ridiculous,” the source continued.
“These are just ‘catch all’ behaviors to
justify BDO interaction with a passenger. A
license to harass.”
The observations of a TSA
screener or a Behavior Detection Officer
shouldn’t be the basis for referring someone
to law enforcement. “The program is flawed
and unnecessarily delays and harasses
travelers. Taxpayer dollars would be better
spent funding real police at TSA
checkpoints,” the former manager said.
A second former Behavior
Detection Officer manager, who also asked
not to be identified, told The Intercept
that the program suffers from lack of
science and simple inconsistency, with every
airport training its officers differently.
“The SPOT program is bullshit,” the manager
told The Intercept. “Complete
bullshit.”
View
documents
here