So I am really looking forward to the Liberty meeting up in Vancouver. I am working on buying an Amtrak Ticket for Brian and I back to Portland for OSCON the following week. To purchase a ticket I must give them my full name, birth date, and travel document information - this is my actual passport number.
I talked to customer service and was like - what do you do with the data. She gave me platitudes about how no one in there office was interested in my information. I was like - I work in the computer industry I am asking what happens to the data - what is your data destruction policy. She said they retain all data associated with my reservation on microfich at there head office for an undetermined number of years. I really would like to know from someone at Amtrak (if they read blogs) WTF happens to my data. Cause I know that customer services lady didn't really know.
What does the boarder patrol do with it? That is an even more difficult question. I can accept presenting my 'travel documents' at the boarder when I cross but this data being inputed before we cross in the reservation systems is really crossing the line of acceptability. With all we know about how the US Government has been collecting data about us. I really don't want to let them to collect any more. This is not Europe (or Canada) where there is a much higher trust of government in the population. The thing I really like about America is its freedom and the deep values laid out in the constitution. We must maintain these and I am afraid government surveillance is not a good. I hope we can get stickers that say 'stop police state creep' and actually do something about it.
Related posts:
Unconference.net
