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The
review will look at air carriers' policies and procedures to
determine if they are properly safeguarding personal
information, unfairly or deceptively monetizing that data, or
sharing it with third parties, USDOT said Thursday.
USDOT’s Office of Aviation Consumer Protection will conduct
privacy reviews of Allegiant, Alaska , American, Delta,
Frontier, Hawaiian, JetBlue, Southwest, Spirit, and United.
USDOT sent letters to the carriers asking about policies on
passenger personal information, details of complaints alleging
airline employees mishandled personal information, and required
employee privacy training.
"Airline passengers should have confidence that their personal
information is not being shared improperly with third parties or
mishandled by employees," Transportation Secretary Pete
Buttigieg said.
USDOT said if it finds evidence of problematic privacy practices
the department could open formal investigations, take
enforcement actions, issue industry guidance or adopt new rules.
Airlines for America, an industry group, said air carriers "take
customers’ personal information security very seriously, which
is why they have robust policies, programs and cybersecurity
infrastructure to protect consumers’ privacy."
Major U.S. airlines have spent $36.6 billion on IT systems since
2018, including $7.4 billion in 2023, the airline group said.
Buttigieg said the department is working on the review with
Senator Ron Wyden, who has long advocated for consumer privacy.
"Because consumers will often never know that their personal
data was misused or sold to shady data brokers, effective
privacy regulation cannot depend on consumer complaints to
identify corporate abuses," Wyden said in a statement.
Mishandling consumers’ private information may be considered an
unfair or deceptive practice by airlines and can result in civil
penalties, USDOT said.
USDOT said in December it was scrutinizing the frequent flyer
programs of major U.S. airlines for potential deceptive or
unfair practices, the agency said as regulators step up
oversight of the airline industry.
(Reporting by David Shepardson)
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