Do I have a terrorist score on file with Homeland Security?
December 1, 2006 In a memo-type document released in early November 2006, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) revealed aspects of a targeting program that most citizens and many lawmakers didn’t know about. A computerized profiling program called the Automated Targeting System (ATS), initially implemented in the 1990s to screen incoming and outgoing cargo for drugs and other contraband at border crossings, has apparently been profiling all travelers entering and leaving the United States for the past four years. Since the DHS released this detail, some members of Congress — which rejected an air-passenger-profiling system in 2004 due to concerns about accuracy — have revealed that as far as they knew, the ATS program was still only used for targeting cargo. As it turns out, if you travel internationally, you probably have a “terrorist score” that rates how risky you are. You also probably have a score if you work in the import/export business, the shipping business or the
