This is my (probably) irrational fear when flying...

Can you imagine, after waiting two years from all of the Covid issues, finally getting to the airport and then having this happen? “This woman in front of me in the TSA line was happy & excited, and we talked briefly about Italy. She seemed so sane…..They tried to detain her, and she kept yelling crazy things about packing light, the best travel shoes, train reservations & apps and needing to write a trip report for her travel forum!” LOL!

I guess this is the benefit of being a Veteran - I know my prints are somewhere in the FBI's database, I'd be screaming up one side and down the other to get them to compare.

Years ago, post 9/11, every time I returned to the US, I would get extra scrutiny at passport control, but I was never detained or questioned - this would have been from about 2003 to 2010. Finally, on one such occasion in the last decade, the clerk asked me if I had ever lived in New York? I said I had not...after a lot of key strokes and about 2 minutes passing, he let me pass through without comment other than "welcome home".

Since that day, I was never again scrutinized at passport control, leaving me to assume that someone with my name was on a terror watch list, or something, and a note was finally posted in my file that I was not that guy. Or so I assume, and I am grateful for whatever happened to clear my name. Clearly that did happen because I got the global entry in 2016, no problem...

Once it has happened and you've been cleared, isn't that what the "redress number" (on airline booking sites) is for?

Jean, super funny!!

My stepdaughter got detained briefly during a connection in Germany, on our way back to the US. We were never told what the issue was but she had to go through some sort of process (don't recall the details) to "clear" her name. Gave us a bit of a concern! This was pre-911 and her first overseas trip since getting carted around Europe as an infant.

The first couple of times I used Global Entry, I got the big X over my picture and was sent to see one of the officers, who would ask me a couple of questions and let me through. Third time got the X again, but this time had my passport taken and was sent to a waiting area. The officer there looked over my information online and mumbled something about various computer programs not working well together. He did a few keystrokes, said I was good to go, and since then no more X's upon my return. No idea what was causing the problem, but thanks to that officer in SLC for taking care of it!

Years ago coming from London to Canada, I was pulled aside and told to go through the same exit that the airline staff were using.
Lots of smiles and thank you's in my direction, making me a bit confused.
It wasn't till after I was through that I realized I was wearing a very similar coat and scarf to the airline crew, and the official though I was with them!

Hahaha!!! Jean!!! BTW, I think I heard a bunch of "them" talking in a bakery recently....

while never mistaken for another and jailed (thankfully!), it is unsettling when one is selected for a pat down … not fun, awkward in fact. I’m hoping TSA PreCheck and Global Entry will eliminate that possibility in future 🤞

I once had a very common first, middle and last name. Got married and went to the DMV to get a new license with my new name. They said I had several outstanding tickets in a city I’d never been to and they wouldn’t give me a license. It was someone else with the same name and same date of birth. I don’t recall what I had to do to convince them it wasn’t me, but I was happy to have an unusual last name after that.