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CNN Live At Daybreak

Airline Industry Looks at Options, Including Profiling

Aired November 08, 2001 - 05:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Talking about travel now, there is no mistaking in increased support at airports all over the U.S. In fact the airlines are keeping a close watch on certain passengers -- the ones who fit a profile. More now from Kathleen Koch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A security checkpoint at Chicago's O'Hare Airport missed the knives and stun gun that a man carried in his bag there Saturday, but an aviation industry group says that airline computers did flag Subash Gurung as a potential threat, prompting airline employees to search his bags at the gate and find the weapons. It's an example of passenger profiling and airlines say it's a key security tool.

CAROL HALLETT, PRESIDENT, AIR TRANSPORT ASSOCIATION: That is what we need to be looking for, is who is that individual who is a potential threat to all of the other passengers.

KOCH: The computer-assistant passenger prescreening system flags passengers who, among other things, buy one-way tickets, pay wish cash, or have an unusual travel history. Before September 11th passengers who were identified had their checked baggage screened by explosive detection equipment. Now in addition a passenger's carryon luggage is hand-searched and he or she can be questioned and detained. Another change, the FBI and law enforcement have given the airlines access to their watch list of suspects.

NORMAN MINETA: As soon as the ticket agent puts in your name and terms of your reservation and if it's already in the -- in the machine, then they -- the machine will not even spit out a boarding pass.

KOCH: Mineta insists to avoid discrimination the system does not factor in a person's ethnicity. Some security experts believe it should.

NEIL LIVINGSTONE, SECURITY ANALYST: It's not racial profiling. It's ethnicity profiling that says we're concerned about people from a particular region of the world. They tend to be young, they tend to be male, and we ought to spend most of our time looking for them.

KOCH: Civil liberties advocates, though, insist there are rising numbers of complaints from passengers who say they've been unfairly targeted. Such critics warn profiling opens not closes security gaps.

GREGORY NOJEIM, AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION: Profiles are notoriously under-inclusive. Who knows what the next terrorist will appear as -- it could be a grandmother, it could be a student, we just don't know.

KOCH: But in the current environment many expect the profiling system to become more, not less, intrusive raising concerns that privacy will be increasingly sacrificed for security.

Kathleen Koch, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAGAN: So you might be wondering -- speaking of traveling, where's Leon? He hasn't been with me all week. He is traveling. He's traveling coast to coast this week, and he's spending a lot of time in airports no doubt. We're going to catch up with him now in Colorado where he's been talking with some airline industry experts.

LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Security, there's plenty of concern about it both in Washington, as well as in the airline industry itself, and we're joined this morning by a number of members of the industry who are going to give us some insight as to what the insiders think about the security at the nation's airports and in the system overall.

Now we all know, because we all travel, you all travel more than I do, that's for sure, that there are varied levels of security at every single different airport, every single different airline. Does that concern you as members of the industry?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes I think we need to standardize it and we need to make it more effective. It has to be achievable, and it has to be something that's agile in a changing landscape that can address changing threats, but still be effective and return serenity to the environment.

HARRIS: Now do you all go through the same security that we go through when we go to the airport?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes we do.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes absolutely.

HARRIS: OK.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And you know we go through the same kind of security checks as passengers. They check our bags. They wand (ph) us with, you know, the metal detectors just to ensure it also shows passengers that they're checking crews, and that it's -- security is a concern for everyone, and to ensure -- they're showing the public that the crews are going through the same kind of ridicule as the passengers.

HARRIS: But since you go through it and you're also responsible for maintaining the security system for passengers as well, are the folks that are in charge of changing things -- of updating security, are they talking to you to get your feedback -- and it seemed to me that if I want to learn how to stop bank robbers I'd talk to people who work at banks.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Constantly. We started ever since the 11th of September, we've been -- it went from hourly conferences on up. We get all of our directives from the FAA. Our PSI (ph) in Seattle is constantly keeping us updated and it is changing. It is improving, and aviation security is inherently better today than it was a week ago.

HARRIS: Will federal involvement here make it even better, worse, whatever -- does it matter whether or not the security personnel are federal employees or not ...

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Professional security is what we need. We don't have that today. What we have is the employer of last resort doing it. Now whether it's federalized or whatever else, we have to have professional security at every spot in the airport -- not just the screening checkpoints, but the parameters of the airports, and we're a long way from that right now. We got to get the leadership that does that.

HARRIS: Finally what do you all think about what this means for the future of the airline industry?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not good.

HARRIS: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not good. I mean people are staying away in droves, a 100,000 people laid off. Airlines are heading toward a financial abyss unless they get people back on airplanes and that means getting confidence back.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think to do that we have to do the right thing. It has to be well thought out and it has to be implemented well, and it has to be -- to show that we are concerned and intelligent about our choices.

HARRIS: Are you all confident you'll be working in this industry five, 10 years from now?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Absolutely.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

HARRIS: In that case, then we'll leave it on that positive note.

KAGAN: All right you want trouble, let's check out where Leon is today. Leon is in Las Vegas. Later this morning he'll be talking with hotel workers who have lost their job because of the month-long tours and slump and hopefully our friend there won't be getting into too much trouble in Las Vegas.

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