This is the Kator Daily Podcast for Friday, August 3rd, 2018. I'm Caleb Brown.

This week the Boston Globe revealed that the TSA, the bane of the business traveler, has a secret surveillance

program aimed at U.S. citizens on a watch list of unknown origin.

Cato's Matthew Feeney discusses what we know and what we don't about the Quiet Skies program.

How was this TSA program revealed?

So this program was revealed by the Boston Globe thanks to interviews with federal air marshals and

documents obtained by the journalist working on the story.

All right, so what is TSA trying to find out about us?

So the story that the Boston Globe published has, I suppose, less to do with what the TSA is trying

to find out about us and more about the kind of people that can end up

under surveillance.

When many people think of the TSA, they might think that, well, they conduct screenings at check-in lines, but it turns out of course that they have

federal air marshals.

And I think many Americans would be forgiven for thinking that these air marshals tail terror suspects.

But under the so-called Quiet Skies program that Boston Globe revealed. In fact, thousands of of Americans

have been followed despite not being on a terror watch list or having any kind of suspicion

raised at all. All right so we understand that at least as far as courts are

concerned TSA operates more like meat inspectors than they do some

sort of investigative police force, but this seems to be more like investigating.

So it sounds like that, but I suppose if you actually look at the kind of behaviors that these

air marshals are tasked with keeping an eye on. It's rather interesting.

So TSA are asked to observe whether someone

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