Theres a good article about it here
http://dissidentvoice.org/2009/08/%E2%80%9Cyour-name-is-common%E2%80%9D-racial-profiling-in-the-us/
Its pretty amusing/ridiculous that they stopped the ex president of India was a victim of this stupid technique.
The silly thing is, is that I'm British, my parents are British and my name is Mathew Smith. I am however mixed race which could be misconstrued (by an idiot) as middle eastern.