> The main reason for the TSA to outsource the questioning of travelers and scoring of answers is to evade the rules applicable to collection and use of personal data by Federal agencies. … The nominal “fly/no-fly” decision will still be made by the TSA, not the contractor. But that “decision” will be a rubber-stamp approval or disapproval based solely on whether the app shows a “pass” or “fail” score, or whether the would-be traveler doesn’t have a suitable smartphone or is otherwise unable or unwilling to complete the app-based process.

You hear the drug trade is really lucrative but you're not allowed to sell drugs, so you send your money to a contractor that sells drugs, they give you more money back, and you technically haven't "sold drugs."

Somehow, thinking breaks down at the boundary between systems, because inexplicably the constraints or guarantees of the consuming system do not propagate to the providing system.

TSA could and should be (made) identity-agnostic, with its mandate to protect vehicles and occupants. Immigration is what should care about the individual that's being allowed into the country.