Edward Hasbrouck, The Practical Nomad; caricature by Rhoda Draws

Travel and Privacy, Surveillance, Civil Liberties, and Human Rights

Articles, presentations, and interviews by Edward Hasbrouck, author of “The Practical Nomad” and consultant to the Identity Project (PapersPlease.org)

“Liberty of movement is an indispensable condition for the free development of a person.” [United Nations Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 27: Freedom of movement; used as the epigraph to the 4th and 5th editions of The Practical Nomad: How to Travel Around the World]

FAQs about Travel Privacy
- Why does the privacy of travel data matter? (intro to my article that won a 2003 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism Award for investigative reporting from the Society of American Travel Writers Foundation)
- What’s in a Passenger Name Record (PNR)? (includes information about the computerized reservations systems that host and store PNR data)
- Advance Passenger Information System (APIS):
  - APIS explainer (2005): USA requires passenger details from international airlines
  - APIS expansion (2006): Permission to travel
  - Further proposed APIS expansion (2023): CBP wants more information to surveil and control air travelers
- PNR examples and data flows from my presentation at Computers, Freedom, and Privacy 2003
- What records does the government keep about my travels?
- What’s happening with facial recognition at airports?
- ICAO expands travel tracking and control through RFID passports (2022 update)
- How to request your travel records (with examples and sample forms)
- “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.” (Not)
- T-Mobile and Deutsche Telekom lie to customers about their privacy policies and practices
- Travel Privacy (chapter by Edward Hasbrouck in the Privacy and Human Rights 2004 yearbook from Privacy International and the Electronic Privacy Information Center)
- Total Travel Information Awareness (winner of a 2003 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism Award for investigative reporting from the Society of American Travel Writers Foundation)
Airline reservations insecurity: “record locators” as passwords for access to PNR data
FAQs about Freedom of Movement as a Human Right
Travel FAQs and white papers from the Identity Project (PapersPlease.org)
Briefings and interviews on travel privacy, surveillance, civil liberties, and human rights:
- Video briefings:
- Public radio interviews:
  - NPR News: Privacy and Airline Reservation Records (4 min.)
  - Texas Public Radio: The REAL-ID Act and the right to travel (15 min.; more background)
  - Southern California Public Radio: The State Department’s proposed ‘long form’ for some passport applicants (7 min.; more background)
  - Public Radio International: DHS plans to gather social media information (7 min.)
- Print interviews:
  - Interview with Business Week on travel data, privacy, and the need for a Federal travel privacy law (2003)
  - Antiwar.com: “Ed Hasbrouck versus the TSA: The Practical Nomad-turned-air security watchdog”
  - Infosecurity Magazine: Fasten your seatbelts: Information security and the travel industry (2009)
- Interviews and articles in other languages:
  - Zeit.de (Reisen): “In dieser Datenbank steht, wer mit wem schläft”
  - Golem.de: “Fluggastdatenspeicherung”: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Video
  - LeMonde.fr (Technologies): “Les boîtes noires de l’accord sur les données passagers”
  - DeCorrespondent.nl: “Dit gebeurt er allemaal achter de schermen als je naar de VS vliegt”
  - Other interviews and news reports in French, German, and Dutch
Testimony on travel privacy, surveillance, civil liberties, and human rights
Edward Hasbrouck v. U.S. Customs and Border Protection
Responses to requests for records about my travel
- U.S. Department of Homeland Security / U.S. Customs and Border Protection
- Air Canada and Canadian Border Services Agency (complaint to the Privacy Commissioner of Canada)
- KLM Royal Dutch Airlines (since merged with Air France)
- Air France
- Lufthansa
Computers, Freedom, and Privacy (CFP) and Computers, Privacy, and Data Protection (CPDP) conferences
- Computer-Assisted Passenger Prescreening 2 (CAPPS-II): “Total Travel Information Awareness” (CFP 2003, New York, NY)
- Travel Data and Privacy (CFP 2004, Berkeley, CA)
- Travel ID and the Travel Panopticon (CFP 2005, Seattle, WA)
- RFID chips in passports (CFP 2005, Seattle)
- Your Reputation Precedes You: The Transfer of European Union Passenger Name Records to the U.S. and Canada (CFP 2007, Montréal)
- Recent Developments in the USA in Relation to the Protection of Travel Data (CPDP 2009, Brussels)
- SWIFT, PNR, and more: European cooperation with USA dataveillance in the “war on terror” (CFP 2010, San Jose, CA)
- A Clash of Civilizations? The EU and US Negotiate the Future of Privacy (Opening plenary, CFP 2011, Washington, DC)
- President Trump, Populist Politics, and the Prospects for Privacy (CPDP 2017, Brussels)
Updates and More

"Don't believe anything just because you read it on the Internet. Anyone can say anything on the Internet, and they do. The Internet is the most effective medium in history for the rapid global propagation of rumor, myth, and false information." (From The Practical Nomad Guide to the Online Travel Marketplace, 2001)

Movable Type Open Source 5.2.13

Pegasus Mail by David Harris

This page published or republished here 1 September 2003; most recently modified 7 January 2024. Copyright © 1991-2024 Edward Hasbrouck, except as noted. ORCID 0000-0001-9698-7556. Mirroring, syndication, and/or archiving of this Web site for purposes of redistribution, or use of information from this site to send unsolicited bulk e-mail or any SMS messages, is prohibited.