TSA cheat sheet: know your rights!

The TSA Rights (PDF) bust-card is a handy single-sheet list of all your rights at a TSA checkpoint; on the reverse is an airport-by-airport list of TSA supervisors and their direct numbers, along with leaked excerpts from the TSA standard operating procedure manual. (Thanks, Sai!)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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Anonymous

now’s a great time to take the train! lol
Chevan

I love this idea, I think it’s very useful, and I hope people use it.

The only downside I can see is the possibility of TSA agents simply disregarding the cheat sheet’s information, which has happened before when people tried to cite printed out TSA guidelines. But I don’t intend that to be an argument against carrying/using the sheet.
- Anonymous
  
  That’s an even better reason to carry it. You have proof that you’d looked up what your rights and responsibilities are and that the TSA agent is acting outside of those rules. You have a good faith basis for not complying with what he told you.
  
  Zig, it says that there are exceptions to that if they’re understaffed, but apparently they need to tell you that beforehand. What I’d like to know is whether you can request opposite gender screening. I was beaten and abused by my father as a child, and being felt up by a man in any coercive setting could be triggering for me. I’m a bisexual man, so there’s no sexual “bonus” for being felt up by a woman. In fact, my attraction to women is primarily visual and aural, but for men it’s primarily touch.
  Almost makes me glad I’m too poor to fly.
  - scionofgrace
    
    That’s an interesting point. Has the TSA considered people who might be more uncomfortable with same-sex pat-downs? And given their preference for fiddly rules over human common sense, how would they like to verify that someone is being honest about it?
    
    I would make a change to the card, though. I wouldn’t use the phrase it “electronic strip-search”. The TSA agents don’t like doing pat-downs any more than I like being patted down. Saying “electronic strip-search” is going to put them on edge from the get-go. If insisting on my rights is going to inconvenience someone who has no control over the situation, I should have the decency to be polite about it.
    - Anonymous
      
      “If insisting on my rights is going to inconvenience someone who has no control over the situation, I should have the decency to be polite about it.”
      
      But don’t they have a choice? Last I checked no one was required to work for the TSA….I would rather work at McDonalds for less, than to submit myself to an employer who requires me to fondle others.
      
      I would say being polite may or may not help you depending upon the person you are dealing with. Either they can see your politeness as weakness…and exploit it or they will appreciate your subversion as recognition of their control and may not feel the need to exert more control over you thus not being as difficult on you. Those who see your politeness as a weakness will respond better to you being neutral. So, it should be a situation by situation assessment.
Zig

I was rather (pleasantly) surprised that they need to provide someone to pat you down of the same gender as you present.
Anonymous

Do this right apply to non-american citizens flying to the USA?
winkybb

“You have the right to take photos/videos in public areas, and to not delete anything

â€¦ except if the airport, state, county, or city has a rule/law against it”

The exception makes the right a little trivial, doesn’t it? In general, we have the right to do whatever we want, whenever we want unless there is a rule/law against it.

I have not found opting out of the nuderizers to be a problem at all. In my experience a lot of people opt out and there is no hassle, apart from the grope being little “personal” at times. But it bothers me not a whit; grope away, people. Have at ‘er.

But I hate it all only from the perspective that the whole thing is just theatre, providing ineffective protection against a truly trivial risk. Spend the money on saving lives instead.
cellocgw

But yr all missing the point. Neither electronic scan nor pat-down (nor removing shoes, or metal scanner) does anything to reduce the alleged chance of an inflight terrorist action. There is no reason we should hve to go thru any of these procedures. I’d go even further and say this is none of the government’s business. Let each airline decide what security they want to put on their flights, and let the paying customers pick the level of (alleged) security they want to pay for.

disclaimer: I flat out refuse to fly until the TSA is dismantled. I flat out refuse to take any means of transportation (which at the moment only includes airline flight) which requires me to identify myself as a condition of carry. (I’m a US citizen, and talking about CONUS travel only)
cory

I’ve been flying three times. I opted out every time since they made the scanner mandatory, and every time the person patting me down was unfailingly polite, even obsequious. And as someone else has pointed out, “When a man kneeling down in front of me has to touch my balls, it’s not me who’s being humiliated.” It has never taken more than 5 minutes to get through, although my airport (Fresno) is not especially busy.

I think I do it because I’m hoping it’ll convince TSA agents to quit.

I’m flying this morning, in fact; flight leaves in about 2 hours. Let’s hope I didn’t jinx this trip through security. ;-)
lhl

I’ve been flying a lot less since the wide roll-out of the “advanced imaging” and “enhanced pat-down” procedures. I *have* noticed that when opting out (which I continue to always do when necessary), they’ve gotten a lot more polite (night and day between when they first started rolling these out last year and actively tried to bully/abuse opt-outs) and generally more together. I’ve also noticed a more polished soft sell that #5 mentioned. Due to the way the lanes are organized and depending on airport though, I haven’t had to opt out much purely because I don’t have to go through the scanner (maybe 1/4 of my flights this year?)

I’m always amazed by how few people choose to opt out. @tylerkaraszewski, it’s not much of scene. You’re not holding up the next person, and now that it’s streamlined, it takes a couple minutes extra at most, and in many cases is faster than going through the AIT – they’re always sending people back through multiple times, and I’ve seen more than a few poor saps that have gone through the scan and *then* get enhanced patdowns.
Anonymous

My husband is insisting that if you refuse the backscatter, they will take you and strip you down. He flies a LOT for work. He also says he’s never actually seen a man taken for “random” scan, only women in their 20s.
Sai

To respond to comments so far:

1. Foreign citizens do not have an absolute right to enter the US, and can be denied entry at the border for essentially any reason that customs (not TSA) feels like. Non-citizens also don’t really have standing to complain to a US Senator / Representative.

Otherwise, rights *should* be the sameâ€¦ but IANAL and specifically I don’t know much about rights of foreign nationals on US turf. Most of what’s in the flyer is either TSA regulations or fairly core constitutional rights, so I expect it to hold for anyone.

2. I don’t advise showing the sheet to TSA agents; quite justifiably they have no reason to believe it. That’s why there are URLs in the margin that cite official sources. Print those out and you’ll have a better shot.

If you get resistance to complying with their own policies, you should immediately escalate to a higher level TSA agent. The Transportation Security Manager (TSM) is the highest for any given checkpoint. Above them is the Federal Security Director, but really you’re better off calling the TSA Ombudsman’s office.

There are direct contact numbers to call for official word that photo/video recording is perfectly legal; if you’re in a non-listed airport, again, call the Ombudsman’s office. Many cops and TSOs simply are completely mistaken about policy.

(Hardly a surprise, given that it’s considered “sensitive security information” and kept secretâ€¦)

3. TTBOMK you cannot request opposite gender screening. Rules explicitly say you’re supposed to get same gender as what you present. You could of course always claim to be trans, but good luck pulling that off if you aren’t actually, given how hard it is even for real transfolk to have their gender identity respected.

4. The flyer’s intended for the traveler, not for showing TSA. I call the body scanner machines electronic strip searches, because that’s what they are, and I feel that they should require the same standard of evidence as any other strip search. The ACLU agrees with me on that one.

5. The “except if there’s a law against it” means TSA does not (though, again, many agents think they do). For all the airports listed on the back, I have personally called the individuals listed and they have confirmed that neither local TSA, airport, or local laws prohibit photography/videography. I haven’t checked airports not listed, so I can’t tell you if those have laws against it. If you want to do the research, please feel free to email me the results and I’ll update the sheet.

6. Please don’t point to the sheet as justification for disobeying something; I am not responsible for whatever stupid shit you might do. Point instead to what the sheet points to – it gives *official* cites for everything. I’m just providing it in a conveniently information-rich format.

If you are in the right, you should be able to point to something official to back you up.
Sai

Anon#26: Politeness and firmness are not mutually exclusive. I advise people to be absolutely polite – but not to back down on asserting their rights.

If government official violates them, that just gives you grounds to sue ‘em for it later. But it’s an incredibly bad idea to escalate a situation through attitude.

This is especially necessary, unfortunately, due to the TSA’s complete failure at communicating the better parts of their policies (e.g. right to opt out, right to take photos, right to take medical liquids, etc) to their own employees, let alone to other airport staff, local police, etc.
Anonymous

I just got back from a trip where (due to some flight delays) I went through “enhanced” security twice, once in San Diego and once in Los Angeles.

Both times, I opted for the pat down. Both times, the TSA workers were polite and professional — certainly not what I expected after following a lot of the previous BB articles I’ve read. Things have apparently improved.

There was about a 4-5 minute delay for me to receive the pat down instead of the scanner. This was important to me, because I arrived at LAX an hour late but still breezed through security and got to my plane before the final boarding call.

I guess my message is this: by choosing to fly, you accept a non-zero chance that you will be scanned or patted down. It is not fair to the TSA workers for you to decide — AFTER you are in the security line — that you have a problem with this concept. Stay calm, stay polite, or stay home.
tylerkaraszewski

Cory, curious — have you been flying lately? How have your opt outs and protests gone? Or like the rest of us, are you protesting only in spirit, and when actually in the airport just doing whatever they want to avoid making a scene or missing our flights?

I freely admit to being the second group that. The one that would like to protest, but not enough to embarrass my wife who would have to stand by and watch the whole thing.
- Cory Doctorow
  
  I just hip surgery in January and haven’t done any flying since.
  - JustOk
    
    what, so you’ve been walking everywhere?
  - tylerkaraszewski
    
    I hope you heal up quickly.
Anonymous

Do these rights apply to any traveler, or only to citizens of the USA?
jonw

This is very good.

I am a pretty regular inter-island Hawaii flier, but the interisland terminal has been sealed off from the main terminal and still does not use scanners. I have not had the scanning/groping choice offered to me yet.
- Ryanwoofs
  
  Similarly, I fly around Alaska on one of our local airlines that has separate terminals outside the security zones. It’s quite stunning how stress-free flying can be when you’re not treated like a dangerous, and yet idiotic, juvenile delinquent.
Anonymous

I’ve been flying quite a bit lately, as always, and have continued opting out. The searches have become noticeably less intrusive. They have, however, really started trying to convince people of the virtues of the backscatter machine. There’s a lot more front-end discussion and a lot less assault on the other side. (I fought very hard to not make any puns there.)
Anonymous

First: I have heard that some scientists thing the radiation dosage is possibly up to 20X what was first estimated and poses skin cancer risks, risks for those previously treated with radiation for cancer, and risks for children.

Second: I have heard that Senators Bob Bennett (R-UT) and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) introduced a bill to require all commercial airports to have and use MANDATORY body scanners by 2013. The bill is called the Securing Aircraft From Explosives Responsibly: Advanced Imaging Recognition Act. the so-called S.A.F.E.R. A.I.R. Act.

What is happening with that?
nox

Protesting doesn’t have to create an unpleasant scene. I’m a Canadian and I first opted-out of the backscatter in Honolulu.

It was the second day of what would eventually become a five day nightmare of United trying to get me to my attempt to elope. I had expected that the United agents in HNL would be nicer and more hospitable than those in SFO. I was wrong. It’s difficult to find unhappy, broken people in HI, but somehow United had found (or created) them all.

It was during one of several half-mile treks from the gate to the ticket booth that I was directed to the backscatter. It took a couples times of politely telling them I’d like the alternative search before they focused on me and asked, “Are you declining this search?” With all the horror stories floating around in my head, I hoped that the Hawaiian TSA agents would be better than United agents and said, “Yes please.” The agent grabbed his radio and called out, “We have an opt out!”

When the screener came to get me, his colleagues asked him if he was OK. With clear resignation and reluctance, he said yes and led me to the screening area. He professionally explained what he was going to do and that I could opt for a private screening at any point. I explained my decision, and quipped that in spite of the new ‘enhanced pat-down’ I was hoping to avoid my first sexual experience with another man. He nervously agreed.

He was extremely professional, confirming consent every time he touched me. We discussed how neither of us wanted to be in that situation. He didn’t find anything, so I was cleared to continue my half-mile trek.

I have the feeling that the vast majority of TSA screeners are normal people working an unpleasant job – particularly when they’re forced to pat you down. Unfortunately it only takes one scumbag to ruin your day. YMMV, but I’ve been lucky so far in both SFO and HNO.
Anonymous

I traveled from Philadelphia to Columbus, and both times I requested to opt out of the full-body scanner. Both times, I was told the machine was off (once for rebooting between shifts and then because it was later in the evening), and I was processed through the simple metal detector with no pat-down. If these machines are so vital for securing our safety and American freedom, then how is it acceptable that certain airports still let us through security when the machines are rebooting or shut down?
Anonymous

opting out of the electro-magnetic and/or nuclear (x-ray) exposure has been something i do 30 times or more a year. I want to live past 70 and if i did the calculations correctly from the latest L3 Comm data I will be over exposed (thus dead) by the time I am 66 years old. I always make them do the pat down!! There have been a few times where they lost track and i got through without the pat down that I asked for. This is especially true at the very busy airport in the country. Make then earn their paycheck. Opt out of being over exposed!!
dilinger

I flew tonight, and my partner and I both opted out. The pat down was fine (knowing what to expect), and the TSA was pretty professional.

What bothered me was a comment made by another TSA person when we first opted out; something along the lines of, “next year, you won’t have the choice to opt-out.” I didn’t ask for an explanation, but if that’s true I’ll probably just stop flying.