3 ms·

How is this interesting? Any old school travel agent can look up names and follow their travel history anyway? (No matter how it is booked btw) You could call

How is this interesting? Any old school travel agent can look up names and follow their travel history anyway? (No matter how it is booked btw) You could call one up and ask if X has got on the flight and they can check. I've done it before to check if I wanted to know the persons flight was delayed and made it to the airport on time.

tyingq 6y ago
It's more complicated than that. Most tickets aren't in a GDS, but only in an individual airline's CRS. And a travel agent wouldn't have broad SQL like ability to query. They would need at least 2 of name, record locator, or flight/date. And travel agents don't typically have access to every airline CRS and all GDS systems...some subset is more common.
- perennate 6y ago
  Presumably there is some travel agent with access to the data. I think it's concerning that one company maintains so much information, but in terms of government access, if the FBI is going to go through the trouble of getting a court-issued order like this [1] (which is specific to one person for one particular six-month period), then finding the right travel agent to serve the order to doesn't seem like it'd slow things down much (it took at least three days to get the order since some "Judge Huff was not in chambers"). [1] https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6989724-All-Writs-Act-Order-on-Sabre-to-Give-Real-Time.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6989724-All-Writs-Ac...
  - tyingq 6y ago
    You used to be able to fly without an ID...you could fly as John Smith or whatever. Certainly has turned.
raxxorrax 6y ago
It is interesting because it lets you reflect on asine practices. If this level of distrust by government towards citizens is accepted and normalized because of terrorism and subjective security needs, don't cry if people think government wants to intentional feed lead to your kids.

tyingq 6y ago

It's more complicated than that. Most tickets aren't in a GDS, but only in an individual airline's CRS. And a travel agent wouldn't have broad SQL like ability to query. They would need at least 2 of name, record locator, or flight/date. And travel agents don't typically have access to every airline CRS and all GDS systems...some subset is more common.

perennate 6y ago
Presumably there is some travel agent with access to the data. I think it's concerning that one company maintains so much information, but in terms of government access, if the FBI is going to go through the trouble of getting a court-issued order like this [1] (which is specific to one person for one particular six-month period), then finding the right travel agent to serve the order to doesn't seem like it'd slow things down much (it took at least three days to get the order since some "Judge Huff was not in chambers"). [1] https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6989724-All-Writs-Act-Order-on-Sabre-to-Give-Real-Time.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6989724-All-Writs-Ac...
- tyingq 6y ago
  You used to be able to fly without an ID...you could fly as John Smith or whatever. Certainly has turned.

raxxorrax 6y ago

It is interesting because it lets you reflect on asine practices. If this level of distrust by government towards citizens is accepted and normalized because of terrorism and subjective security needs, don't cry if people think government wants to intentional feed lead to your kids.