WATCHLIST

Watching the Watchlist: Building an Effective Terrorist Screening System

The U.S. government maintains several lists of individuals for national security, law enforcement, and regulatory purposes. The primary consolidated list related to terrorism is the Terrorist Screening Dataset (TSDS). Reports also discuss the existence of a "kill list," which is a colloquial term for an internal government process involving targeted lethal force against specific high-value terrorist targets.

Watch Lists

Various U.S. agencies use "watch lists" to screen individuals for potential threats or compliance issues. These lists are consolidated into a master dataset, the TSDS (previously known as the Terrorist Screening Database, or TSDB), which is managed by the FBI's Terrorist Screening Center (TSC).

Key examples of these lists include:

Terrorist Screening Dataset (TSDS): The primary, consolidated list of known or suspected terrorists (KSTs) used by multiple federal agencies for screening purposes.
No-Fly List and Selectee List: Subsets of the TSDS maintained by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) that identify individuals who are prohibited from boarding commercial aircraft or who require enhanced screening.
Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) List: Maintained by the Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), this list includes individuals and companies subject to economic sanctions, and U.S. persons are generally prohibited from dealing with them.
Denied Persons List and Entity List: Maintained by the Department of Commerce's Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), these lists restrict certain individuals and entities from participating in the export of specific U.S. products and technology.
FBI Most Wanted and Fugitive Lists: Public lists of individuals wanted for serious crimes or who have fled from justice.

"Kill Lists" and the Disposition Matrix

The term "kill list" is a colloquial name for a confidential internal government process developed during the Obama administration, sometimes referred to as the Disposition Matrix.

This process involves an interagency review to identify, track, and, in some cases, target individuals deemed to pose an "imminent threat of violent attack" against the United States, primarily in overseas conflict zones.
The authority for targeted lethal action falls under the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) passed after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
The program has faced significant legal scrutiny and civil liberties challenges regarding due process, particularly when it concerns U.S. citizens who were targeted without formal charges or judicial process.

The terrorist watchlist was created in response to the attacks on September 11, 2001; it is the U.S. government’s primary effort to consolidate and share information about individuals who may pose terrorist threats to the United States. It is an unclassified but sensitive dataset containing biographic (e.g., name, date of birth) and biometric (e.g., fingerprints, photographs) identifying information about individuals with a nexus to terrorism. The terrorist watchlist and its subsets, such as the No Fly List, are used by federal agencies to inform their screening and vetting decisions for various services or benefits, such as issuing a U.S. passport.

Individuals, including U.S. persons (i.e., U.S. citizens, nationals, or lawful permanent residents), may be nominated for inclusion in the terrorist watchlist if they are known or reasonably suspected to be engaged in terrorism or terrorist activities, or are associated with known or suspected terrorists, among other criteria. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), generally, the U.S. government’s policy is to neither confirm nor deny whether a person is on the terrorist watchlist due to security concerns. Therefore, U.S. persons are typically unaware of their status on the watchlist.