Passenger screening system

• US 9,723,010 B2
• Filed: 04/09/2008
• Issued: 08/01/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 04/09/2008
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Kyndryl Incorporated
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Kerr, Glenn M.
• Primary Examiner(s): Flynn, Kevin
• Assistant Examiner(s): NELSON, FREDA ANN
• Application Number:
  US12/099,863
• Publication Number:
  US 20090256675A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,401 Days
• Field of Search: 705 11, 705 5, 705 6, 340 58, 235382, 726 19
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/33 using certificates
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/02 Reservations, e.g. for tickets, services or events
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/102 Entity profiles

Abstract

A system, method and program product for providing passenger screening. A method is disclosed that includes: providing a third party service to collect profile information from a user and provide the user with a unique ID; submitting the unique ID from the user to a reservation system when the user books a reservation; passing the unique ID from the reservation system to a government agency; submitting the unique ID from the government agency to the third party service and returning associated profile information to the government agency; checking the associated profile information against a watch list within the government agency and generating a screening level for the user; and communicating the screening level to a screening agent.

Claims

1. A method for screening passengers, comprising:

providing a third party service to collect profile information from a user and provide the user with a unique ID;

submitting the unique ID from the user to a reservation system when the user books a reservation, wherein the reservation system collects only the unique ID for identification;

passing the unique ID from the reservation system to an agency in response to booking a reservation;

submitting the unique ID from the agency to the third party service and returning associated profile information to the agency;

checking, in response to the submitting, the associated profile information against a watch list within the agency and generating a screening level for the user based on the associated profile information and the watch list; and

communicating the screening level to a screening agent, wherein the screening level indicates a level of screening to be performed on the user.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the reservation system includes an airline reservation system.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the profile information includes a name and a date of birth.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the profile information includes biometric data.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the screening level is printed on a boarding pass.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the agency is a government agency.

7. A non-transitory computer readable medium having a program product for screening airline passengers, comprising:

program code for collecting profile information from a user and for providing the user with a unique ID, wherein the unique ID can be presented to an airline reservation system when the user books a reservation; and

program code that provides profile information to a government controlled watch list system in response to an inputted unique ID obtained from the airline reservation system in response to the user booking the reservation, wherein the airline reservation system collects only the unique ID for identification, and wherein a screening level for the user is generated based on the profile information and the government controlled watch list, and wherein the screening level is communicated to a screening agent, wherein the screening level indicates a level of screening to be performed on the user.

8. The computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein the profile information includes a name and a date of birth.

9. The computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein the profile information includes biometric information.

10. The computer readable medium of claim 7, further comprising program code that provides profile information to the airline reservation system in response to an inputted unique ID.

11. A system for screening passengers, comprising:

a traveler profile system having a registration system for collecting profile information from a user and providing the user with a unique ID; and

a reservation system for creating travel reservations, wherein the reservation system includes;

an input for receiving the unique ID during the creation of the travel reservations, wherein the reservation system collects only the unique ID for identification;

and a communication service for passing the unique ID to a watch list service, in response to the receiving the unique ID, and receiving a screening level for the user based on the unique ID and the watch list and communicating the screening level to a screening agent, wherein the screening level indicates a level of screening to be performed on the user;

wherein the traveler profile system further includes a data retrieval system for providing profile information for the user to the watch list service in response to obtaining the unique ID from the watch list service in response to creating the travel reservations.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the traveler profile system further includes a profile management system for allowing the user to manage profile information.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein the reservation system includes an airline reservation system.

14. The system of claim 11, wherein the reservation system further includes an identity confirmation system that can submit the unique ID to the traveler profile system and obtain profile information of the user.

15. The system of claim 11, wherein the reservation system further includes a boarding pass generation system that can print the screening level on a boarding pass.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the screening level is encoded.

17. The system of claim 11, wherein the profile information includes a name and a date of birth.

18. The system of claim 11, wherein the profile information includes biometric information.

19. The system of claim 11, wherein the profile information includes an address and names of family members.

20. The system of claim 11, wherein the watch list service includes a government watch list service.

21. A method for screening passengers, comprising:

collecting, by a computer infrastructure comprising at least a memory and a processor, profile information from a user and providing the user with a unique ID, wherein the unique ID can be presented to an airline reservation system when the user books a reservation; and

providing, by the computer infrastructure, profile information to a government controlled watch list system in response to an inputted unique ID obtained from the airline reservation system while the user books the reservation, wherein the airline reservation system collects only the unique ID for identification, and wherein a screening level for the user is generated based on the profile information and the government controlled watch list, and wherein the screening level is communicated to a screening agent, wherein the screening level indicates a level of screening to be performed on the user.