What is your ATS score?

If you think that the "big three" credit bureaus, Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax, know far more about you than you care for, and you worry about your personal privacy, well, hold on to your hat? What is your ATS score?

In case you didn't know (as this writer did not until recently), ATS stands for Automated Targeting System, and it is yet another post-9/11 vehicle for government snooping brought to you by our Homeland Security Department. Your ATS score might be termed your "terrorism rating."

As for who, exactly, is targeted by ATS, the answer is virtually everyone who enters or leaves the United States, whether by plane, ship, car, train, motorcycle, etc. (We presume, however, that illegal aliens sneaking across our borders are an exception.) Upon entering or departing our country, Homeland Security assigns you a score based on an assortment of arbitrary factors: where you are from, how you paid for your tickets, your motor vehicle records, whether you have taken any one-way trips in the past, your seating preference, and even what kind of meal you order?

Homeland Security describes the ATS program as "one of the most advanced targeting systems in the world," steadfastly defends it, and claims that its ability to identify terrorists and drug smugglers "would be critically impaired without access to this data."

In case you are wondering if your ATS score identifies you as a potential Mohammad Atta, keep on wondering, because travelers are not allowed to see or directly challenge their ATS ratings, which the government will keep on file for 40 years. You cannot see your rating, but Homeland Security explained in the Federal Register in November that some or all of the ATS data compiled about an individual may be shared with state, local, and foreign governments for use in hiring decisions and in granting licenses, security clearances, contracts, or other benefits. In some cases, the data may be shared with courts, Congress, and even private contractors.

"Everybody else can see it, but you can't," complained Stephen Yale-Loehr, an immigration lawyer who teaches at Cornell Law School, in an AP interview.

The Homeland Security's Privacy Office has issued a privacy impact statement attempting to explain away this invasion of our citizens' privacy. Among the things included in that statement: "An individual might not be aware of the reason additional scrutiny is taking place, nor should he or she" because, supposedly, that might compromise the program's methodology.

Incidences of government surveillance are becoming more and more unnerving. I recently received a notice in the mail--forwarded to me from a rental car company--that included a photo of the rear license plate of a car I had inadvertently driven through a toll-tag-only lane on New Jersey's Garden State Parkway. The photo had been taken as the car passed under a sensor at approximately 60 miles per hour. With such technology widely available, government surveillance of all motor vehicles, at all times, is now practical. The technology has reached a level of sophistication that would have astounded even George Orwell.

As bad as motor vehicle surveillance may be, at least the telephoto cameras only photograph your car's backside, not yours. Air travelers who are searched by backscatter X-ray machines (soon to be used at Sky Harbor Airport in Phoenix) will enjoy no such sense of privacy. In fact, the news photo we saw of Susan Hallowell, the director of the Transportation Security Administration's security laboratory, demonstrating this equipment being used, reminded us all too much of the naughty "X-ray specs" advertised in comic books during our youth. But at least the "X-ray specs" relied on an optical illusion, whereas the backscatter X-ray machines can produce a realistic enough image to embarrass anyone with a sense of modesty.

While a December 1 wire-service story from AP stated: "The Transportation Security Administration said it has found a way to refine the machine's images so that the normally graphic pictures can be blurred in certain areas while still being effective in detecting bombs and other threats," such statements are hardly reassuring.

If a government agency's collection of naked-as-a-jaybird composite images of its citizens--for whatever ostensible purpose--is not a violation of our right to privacy, then the word has no meaning.