Passenger information for those who flew in June of 2004 will be
turned over to the government to evaluate a new system designed to help identify terrorists. This data is certain to have anomalies which could potentially lead to innocent citizens being erroneously labeled as terrorists and placed on a perpetual watch-list. Additionally, the fact that the government is collecting data that includes, for example, special food requests opens the door for individuals to unfairly infer things about passengers.

The TSA has posted a Privacy Impacts Assessment (PIA) for the testing phase of the Secure Flight program. See Yahoo News Article for more information.

A few months back I received an email from a person who said they have my medial reports from Blue Cross Blue Shield of NC. This was a person with the exact same name as mine. I was shocked to see the carelessness that was shown on part of the employees at the Student Health Center at my University. On checking with them I found out that my social security number was transferred to the other person’s records and vice versa. It seems to me that at many places privacy and general “best practices” are not being given the regard people expect to see.
On a similar note, recently, an Everett, Washington hospital employee mistakenly faxed confidential patient data to the city’s newspaper when the employee transposed numbers for two physicians with the same last name. More information on this case can be found at :
Hospital works to cut number of fax problems

– Neha Jain