No Fly List

The U.S. No Fly List is a secret federal roster used by the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Center, the TSA’s Secure Flight program, and airlines to prevent designated people from boarding commercial flights to, from, or within the United States. Created after the September 11 attacks alongside a separate list for passengers needing extra screening, it expanded from hundreds of names in 2001 to tens of thousands: reported figures include 21,000 in 2012, more than 47,000 in 2013, and 81,000 in 2016. It is distinct from the much larger Terrorist Watch List. The list’s stated purpose is aviation security, but its size and criteria have shifted with threat assessments, and related screening databases also inform systems used by Canada and Australia.

The central tension is security versus due process. People with names matching listed individuals have been wrongly delayed or prevented from traveling, while secrecy makes it difficult to learn why someone was listed or challenge the decision. Critics warn of privacy violations, discrimination, and inadequate remedies; the TSA established an identity-redress process to address mistaken matches. The list has also figured in debate over gun purchases: federal law does not automatically bar listed people from buying firearms, and government data cited in the account show watch-list individuals succeeded in more than 90 percent of reported purchase attempts from 2004 to 2010. Proposals to restrict such purchases failed amid disputes over effectiveness and constitutional protections. The screening system also relies on accurate ticket names and authentic boarding passes and identification.