EFF launches campaign against biometric surveillance at US airports

The American civil rights organization Electronic Frontier Foundation has launched a campaign against a bill that would allow extensive biometric surveillance at US airports. The EFF calls on citizens to object.

With the campaign, the EFF is objecting to the TSA Modernization Act. That is a bill that gives the Transport Security Administration and US Customs more options to apply biometric surveillance to citizens.

According to the organization, this concerns facial recognition, fingerprints, retinal scans and other forms of biometric data. Under the bill, TSA and Customs will be given the opportunity to use such techniques to identify passengers at airports. Not only at a checkpoint, but also when people are queuing to, for example, drop off their luggage.

Facial recognition is already being applied to travelers going to certain destinations abroad, says EFF. Under the new bill, biometric surveillance could be applied on a much larger scale, including on domestic flights. Also, the frequency with which data is scanned would increase, which would happen several times per trip.

The EFF calls the vision outlined in the bill alarming. The far-reaching collection of biometric data is an infringement of the right to privacy of citizens, according to the organization. That is why the organization is calling on American citizens to send a letter to their senator and request that the bill be stopped.