JetBlue says names of cargo shippers not given to Torch
JetBlue Airways, a provider of air passenger service, told Shippers’ News Wire the names of shippers who booked cargo on JetBlue’s passenger jets had not been given to Torch Concepts, a provider of terrorist risk assessments, along with passenger records.
“We only have account numbers in our files after shipments of cargo, and those numbers never left our files,” said a spokesman for the airline.
On Sept. 19, JetBlue publicly acknowledged it had provided Torch, a Pentagon contractor based in Huntsville, Ala., with data on more than one million passengers.
The company had done so after “an exceptional request by the Department of Defense,” said David Neeleman, JetBlue’s founder and chief executive officer. “This was a mistake on our part and I know many of our customers feel betrayed by it.”
On Sept. 22, the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Trade Commission said they have opened investigations into JetBlue’s conduct. For its part, JetBlue said it has hired the accounting firm of Deloitte & Touche to review its privacy policies.
Lawyers for Torch Concepts, JetBlue said in a statement, had confirmed that “no identifiable customer data was released to any third party, including the Department of Defense or the Transportation Security Administration, and that all the data has been destroyed.”