A couple of weeks ago I was offered a free year membership in the Clear airport security program for registered travelers.  Though my home airports of Ft Lauderdale and West Palm Beach don't yet offer Clear access, I fly enough in airports that do like Denver and Regan that I thought for free, what do I have to lose.  I filled out the forms on line and last time I was in Regan airport I handed it in along with fingerprints, Iris scans, passport, etc.  This past week my Clear card came in the mail and I have been looking forward to using it.

I thought that with my background check and all, they knew that I was a low risk for terrorist or other type of activity and therefore would not be subject to the same scrutiny and testing that we all endure when we have to fly.  Turns out that I don't think that is exactly the case.  However what it does do is allow you to go right to the front of the line in security, much to the dismay of others waiting on those lines.

The experience was great.  I went to a special entrance for Clear members where I was met by a very helpful young lady.  She escorted me to a Clear machine where we inserted my card and did a fingerprint scan.  After that was done she escorted me to another young lady who walked me past all of the people waiting on line (and a long line it was).  At the head of the line, the Clear lady gave my boarding pass and ID to the TSA person.  The TSA person checked my id and pass, same as always and they passed me through.  Than my Clear escort brought me to a special metal detector line which had no one on it, just waiting for me.  Again skipping another line.  I put my computer and other metal objects in the same old grey bin, took off my shoes and went through the metal detector.  I thanked the Clear escort came out the other side, scooped up my stuff and proceeded to my gate.  The entire process took less than 3 minutes I bet!  That was great!  The looks on the faces of the people I bypassed on line also gave me a perverse pleasure as well, I will admit.

After finishing this though I sat down and thought about it.  What security did bypass?  They still checked my ID and boarding pass. I still went through the metal detector and took off my shoes.  In fact if anything security was added to my check in, as they now did a fingerprint match.  So fact is, with all of the background checks and everything, having the Clear program did not relieve me of any security obligations and tests. In fact it added to them.  What it did give me was a "first class" personal escort to the front of the line and than a first class que for the metal detectors.  Because I was willing to pay some money and have a background search, I got the first class treatment.

To me this is not a scalable solution.  As more Clear passengers come on board, having a dedicated person walking me through the security line is just not going to work.  Also, lets be clear (no pun intended), this is not about going through less security.  Why the background check and all?  This is about paying money and skipping the line, but still going through the same security procedures that everyone else goes through.  Just faster.  Hey, don't get me wrong.  I loved it!  But I was wrong to think this was about bypassing security, this is a "first class" traveler lane.  As long as you are "clear" with that, it is good by me!

A couple of weeks ago I was offered a free year membership in the Clear airport security program for registered travelers.  Though my home airports of Ft Lauderdale and West Palm Beach don't yet offer Clear access, I fly enough in airports that do like Denver and Regan that I thought for free, what do I have to lose.  I filled out the forms on line and last time I was in Regan airport I handed it in along with fingerprints, Iris scans, passport, etc.  This past week my Clear card came in the mail and I have been looking forward to using it.

I thought that with my background check and all, they knew that I was a low risk for terrorist or other type of activity and therefore would not be subject to the same scrutiny and testing that we all endure when we have to fly.  Turns out that I don't think that is exactly the case.  However what it does do is allow you to go right to the front of the line in security, much to the dismay of others waiting on those lines.

The experience was great.  I went to a special entrance for Clear members where I was met by a very helpful young lady.  She escorted me to a Clear machine where we inserted my card and did a fingerprint scan.  After that was done she escorted me to another young lady who walked me past all of the people waiting on line (and a long line it was).  At the head of the line, the Clear lady gave my boarding pass and ID to the TSA person.  The TSA person checked my id and pass, same as always and they passed me through.  Than my Clear escort brought me to a special metal detector line which had no one on it, just waiting for me.  Again skipping another line.  I put my computer and other metal objects in the same old grey bin, took off my shoes and went through the metal detector.  I thanked the Clear escort came out the other side, scooped up my stuff and proceeded to my gate.  The entire process took less than 3 minutes I bet!  That was great!  The looks on the faces of the people I bypassed on line also gave me a perverse pleasure as well, I will admit.

After finishing this though I sat down and thought about it.  What security did bypass?  They still checked my ID and boarding pass. I still went through the metal detector and took off my shoes.  In fact if anything security was added to my check in, as they now did a fingerprint match.  So fact is, with all of the background checks and everything, having the Clear program did not relieve me of any security obligations and tests. In fact it added to them.  What it did give me was a "first class" personal escort to the front of the line and than a first class que for the metal detectors.  Because I was willing to pay some money and have a background search, I got the first class treatment.

To me this is not a scalable solution.  As more Clear passengers come on board, having a dedicated person walking me through the security line is just not going to work.  Also, lets be clear (no pun intended), this is not about going through less security.  Why the background check and all?  This is about paying money and skipping the line, but still going through the same security procedures that everyone else goes through.  Just faster.  Hey, don't get me wrong.  I loved it!  But I was wrong to think this was about bypassing security, this is a "first class" traveler lane.  As long as you are "clear" with that, it is good by me!

Among other things, the paper identifies six principles for identification systems:

• Achieve real security or other goals
• Accuracy
• Inclusion
• Fairness and equality
• Effective redress mechanisms
• Equitable financing for systems

From the Executive Summary:

How can these principles be honored in practice? That’s where the "due diligence" process comes into play when considering and implementing identification systems. Due diligence in the financial world of mergers and acquisitions and other important corporate transactions is conducted before a company makes a major investment. Proponents of, say, a merger (or in our case, a new identification program) can err on the side of optimism, concluding too readily that the merger (or new ID program) is clearly the way to go. Thorough due diligence protects against such over-optimism.

In the pages that follow, we apply this due diligence process to some recurring technical problems with current and proposed identification programs. And we discover—as you’ll see toward the end of the report—that ID programs that rely on "shared secrets," such as Social Security numbers or your mother’s maiden name, are becoming more insecure due to the increased use of identification. Similarly, ID programs based on biometrics such as fingerprints or iris scans are not the "silver bullets" that some proponents claim they are, but rather could become compromised rapidly if deployed in haphazard ways.

We then apply our progressive principles and due diligence insights to two current examples of identification programs. The first details why it would be bad policy to require government-issued photo ID for in-person voting. The second shows the basically sound policy rationale for the Transportation Worker Identification Card, used for workers with access to security-critical port facilities. By examining one identification program that is reasonable, and one that is not, our analysis shows the usefulness of the Progressive Principles for Identification Systems.

I participated in the panel discussion announcing this report, along with Jim Harper (Director of Information Policy Studies at the Cato Institute).

Those so-called Afghan National Auxiliary Police (ANAP), all formerly in the service of local warlords, had received two months of training by Dutch and American soldiers and were now the first line of defense against the Taliban.

Arming tribesmen was a risky idea. True, this sort of tribal initiative had been effective in Iraq. But NATO commanders feared that Afghan loyalties to their warlords ran too deep. NATO was “arming people who were not necessarily in line with the [Afghan] government,” U.S. Brig. Gen. Robert Cone told Wired.com.

So, last month, NATO fired the auxiliary cops and scrapped the tribal strategy, leaving gaping holes in Afghanistan's defenses. The fix? Marines, of course, armed with fingerprint pads, iris scanners and electronic databases.

With these biometric tools, the Marines are planning to recruit new cops who have no ties to tribal warlords. “We know there are some shadow police and some militia-type police,” Lt. Col. Ray Hall, the Marine commander, said. “Once we go through the vetting process, we'll have everybody screened … so that problem should go away.”

That means scanning every new recruit's unique iris “eye prints,” logging their thumb prints and feeding it all into a growing, but still very spotty, national database linked to criminal and intelligence records. If a cop has any known warlord ties, he's disqualified from serving.

CIA teams used FBI biometrics while hunting for known Al Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan in 2001, and since then, the military has gathered data on almost every Afghan it comes in regular contact with.

There's one more problem. Not all the military databases can talk to one another. “We haven't standardized,” said Larry Schneider, a Northrop Grumman VP who last year was working on collapsing many biometrics systems into just one.

Until everyone is looking at the same data, seditious Afghan cops will probably keep falling through the cracks.