You can’t imagine how much I detest TSA. OK, maybe you can; I think my contempt is widely shared. It’s the arbitrary rules, the immediate awkward responses to last week’s threat, the implicit understanding that the overbearing security theater is going to continue forever without end, with ever-escalating nonsense, and the fact that you do not dare voice that outrage to the TSA, or they can and will make your travel unpleasant or even impossible. They are anti-free speech and anti-reason.
You know one little thing that just annoys the heck out of me? When I travel abroad, other countries don’t make me take my shoes off to go through security. Are they seriously at greater risk than we are? Or is this just random rules-tossing that we are obligated to suffer through?
One guy who has been fighting back is the security expert, Bruce Schneier. Right now, this week, he’s in a debate on The Economist with Kip Hawley, former head of the TSA, defending the claim that “changes to airport security since 9/11 have done more harm than good“. Schneier is cleaning Hawley’s clock. It’s one of the more entertaining and informative online debates that I’ve ever read.
Of course, it really helps that Hawley’s opening statement is this exercise in absurdity:
More than 6 billion consecutive safe arrivals of airline passengers since the 9/11 attacks mean that whatever the annoying and seemingly obtuse airport-security measures may have been, they have been ultimately successful.
You have got to be kidding me. Seriously? That’s your opening salvo? You know, I’ve got this lucky coin in my pocket that scares away tigers. Here’s the proof: I haven’t been eaten by tigers yet.
Schneier, on the other hand, punches hard. I like that in a guy.
Kip Hawley doesn’t argue with the specifics of my criticisms, but instead provides anecdotes and asks us to trust that airport security—and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) in particular—knows what it’s doing.
He wants us to trust that a 400-ml bottle of liquid is dangerous, but transferring it to four 100-ml bottles magically makes it safe. He wants us to trust that the butter knives given to first-class passengers are nevertheless too dangerous to be taken through a security checkpoint. He wants us to trust the no-fly list: 21,000 people so dangerous they’re not allowed to fly, yet so innocent they can’t be arrested. He wants us to trust that the deployment of expensive full-body scanners has nothing to do with the fact that the former secretary of homeland security, Michael Chertoff, lobbies for one of the companies that makes them. He wants us to trust that there’s a reason to confiscate a cupcake (Las Vegas), a 3-inch plastic toy gun (London Gatwick), a purse with an embroidered gun on it (Norfolk, VA), a T-shirt with a picture of a gun on it (London Heathrow) and a plastic lightsaber that’s really a flashlight with a long cone on top (Dallas/Fort Worth).
If you’d like to learn more about Schneier, here’s an entertaining account of how he taught a journalist to circumvent airport security. There’s one thing you need to know: TSA is a collection of ineffectual buffoons who are keeping themselves lucratively employed by inventing ever more elaborate, clownish schemes that don’t touch the real security issues.
Of course there’s plenty of truth here, and I get just as annoyed as everybody else. But I don’t really understand the objection to taking your shoes off. After all, a guy really did get on a plane with a bomb in his shoe. Maybe you have a better idea about how that could be prevented in the future?
In irony worthy of the finest security theater, Bruce Schneier, who has been the loudest at describing the TSA’s activities as security theater, was invited to testify this week before Congress on whether the TSA’s activities are security theater. However, because Schneier is suing the TSA, they requested that he be disinvited from testifying … and the Congressweenies complied.
The story was on Slashdot.org yesterday.
@Chas
Well for one it seems like an intuitive solution but really just becomes a Red Queen Race. Presumably once you start checking for shoes they’re not going to try that same trick twice…so checking for shoes becomes pointless…but if you don’t check for shoes they might try it again.
Someone from Israel who worked some security actually told me the best method is truly random screenings. You can always learn what the security measures are and what they profile for and make measures to beat that…but there is no actual defense against the random chance that you’ll be caught no matter what.
Guess who’s going on the blacklist?
On the upside are plans (as yet unimplemented) to integrate the full body scans with Facebook, which would let users know when their friends have made it through airport security and if they are smuggling weapons in their rectums in real time.
(And lest Poe’s Law make an appearance: yes, the article is a parody.)
OMG, were there MORE threats?!? I’m going to show up early and naked next time I fly.
“But I don’t really understand the objection to taking your shoes off”
Personally I don’t have an issue with taking my shoes off – but I sometimes I wonder if those around me do (mind me taking my shoes off). There have been times when I’m jumping on a flight after work (long day), and since I have a real bad case of Plantar Hyperhidrosis my feet can REALLY easily get stinky. I do all I can to not produce offensive odors, but sometimes there’s not a whole lot I can do (I’ll even change my socks prior to entering the terminal).
That said, I don’t think it’s really that effective. You do remember shoe-bomb-guy failed. But then again I’m one of those people who is willing to sacrifice the facade of security for the facade of freedom.
@Chas
It also seems to be a bit of my observation that “Anti-Theft devices in stores deter honest people from shop lifting”. Anyone paying attention to how the alarms work and how employees respond could see that they can be beaten with minimal effort…so serious shop lifters going into the store for the purpose of shoplifting aren’t deterred…but it does discourage casual impulse theft.
Maybe they should just have you check your shoes into carry on luggage and give everyone slippers or house shoes to wear on the plane? It’s actually be a benefit to fliers.
Warning: please wear socks.
@ChasCPeterson #1
The objection is that, had the shoe bomber taken his shoes off and run them through the x-ray machine, the scan would not have shown anything: the plastic explosives are transparent to x-rays and they would have looked just like everyone elses.
In theory, the idea is to scan for knives and other items that might be inside a shoe and snuck through in the two or three inches at the bottom where the metal detector functions poorly. But even there, glass knives are much sharper than metal and would not show up on either x-ray or metal detection.
The process is security theater, nothing more than “we will annoy people with little things so they will be deluded into thinking we are doing something effective.” In my more cynical moments, I suspect that the pointless removal of shoes will be eliminated as “a great relief to travellers” when something much more invasive and odious is put in place.
You know who else hates the Transporation Security Administration?
Hitler.
yeah, ok, some good points.
Ing@ 9
Hey!
I like that idea. Maybe everyone could be issued a nice bright orange jump suit too? And a scratchy blanket and wafer thin pillow, and a nice baloney sandwich on dry white bread and a paper cup of water for a snack…
Move along! Now serving inmates, er, ticket holders 1 through 21.
(end snark)
Ha-ha! Oh Chas, with silly comments like this, you really are Pharyngula’s foremost cut up!
I got upgraded last week on a flight out of Detroit (whee!) so I got to go through their ‘awesome people only’ line. No shoes off, no jacket off, no computer out of the bag, no full body scan – just put my cell in my bag and sauntered through. Thank goodness terrorists can’t afford first class tickets!
er, that’s “boarding” not “serving”
The whole goddamned Security Industrial Complex is worrisome. Not just because it is a bottomless, unnacountable, money pit but also because there is no communication or coordination of information.
And there’s that whole civil rights out the window thing.
When did Americans become so scared? Were they always this scared? Or is it the GOP, Limbaugh, Faux news axis of propaganda that has rendered them so fearful?
Meanwhile Obama is getting no credit for actually making Americans safer by reducing Nuclear warheads and repatriating nuclear material from around the globe.
I have a drive/fly point. Before that point I will drive, beyond that point I will fly. Since 9/11/1 that point has been getting farther and farther away. I live in SE Virginia, and when I went to Montreal in October 2010, I drove, in one long day, instead of flying. I didn’t want to deal with the security theater. I have given up some trips because it is too far to drive and I don’t want to fly. It is not any kind of fear of flying, I’ve been a private pilot since 1993. I know that my drive to Montreal was far more dangerous than a flight would have been. By the time I show up at the airport a couple of hours before the flight, take the flight, have at least one stop in another city (more time in that airport), then take the next flight, etc., then wait to get my luggage (if it makes it) and get a rental car, I can do a lot of driving. Maybe I should just buy my own airplane, then I can fly on MY schedule, and fly to an airport closer to my actual destination.
TSA = Tub Stacking Assholes. =)
I’ve got enough knowledge of airplanes to probably get on one naked, and still take it down if I really wanted to. And there are thousands of engineers in the US alone with more knowledge than me. You simply can’t make it 100% safe from human maliciousness.
And most of what TSA does wouldn’t even protect against most casual, moderately determined terrorists.
The vulnerability which allows 9/11 has been closed tight: Namely, it used to be that a hijacked plane was allowed to approach heavily populated areas. That is no longer the case. (In fact, I would argue that US planes are essentially un-hijackable at this point, both because of the reinforced cockpit doors, as well as the fact that, after 9/11, somebody trying to hijack a plane is going to get their ass kicked, I don’t care what kind of weaponry they have. You can blow up a plane, but you can’t hijack one, not after 9/11.)
Without the possibility of flying a plane into a building or a heavily populated area, it no longer becomes a particularly rich target. You can kill just as many people using other means, where there is far less security in your way.
add to the list my short list:
car anti-theft systems
computer CAPTCHAs
forced password changes even when its your data on your computer
lack of standardization of so so many things
lack of open architecture on so so many things
You know Schneier was previously couted to sit on government “security” (probably with the idiotic prefix “cyber” attached) panels. Then they seemed to back off.
Then the TSA just invited him to give testimony before Congress, then disinvited him in the same week.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120326/16160618252/tsa-freaks-out-gets-longtime-critic-bruce-schneier-kicked-off-oversight-hearing.shtml
It’s like they think he is another one of those “security experts” who is going to support more spying, more control over the internet, more guns/flags/ships. Then they remember that he is an actual security expert. Pssst, duuude! He’s that guy who said “security theater”. Get him off the list pronto.
I look forward to the pat downs when I fly.
Because other airports manage not to launch flying bombs without this measure. Some of these airports are in far, far more dangerous places in the world than the US.
Me personally?
Or do you mean the security systems in airports more likely to be targeted than those in the US?
Because those folks do have better ideas for security, and they implement them many times per day. But these ideas are, for the most part, subtle and/or invisible, (part of what makes them effective, of course), and don’t appeal to those that prefer activity to results.
The TSA is, of course, aware of these ideas, but they would involve a massive scaling back of their visible activity. Would you agree that the fact that they (apparently) find this objectionable in and of itself speaks of deep problems in the agency?
As jamessweet has pointed out, the possibility of actually highjacking a modern airliner is so low as to be considered nil. But if you want to blow up as many people as possible, how about that huge knot of humanity standing over there with their shoes off, waiting to get through security? And say, isn’t this a nice modern, expensive, busy airport terminal?
Bruce Schneier rocks: http://www.schneierfacts.com/ !
Chas:
Well, the so-called “shoe bomber” got the explosive on the plane, but didn’t actually blow anything up. I would think that the people who are trying to bring down planes might skip failed plans.
Also, the last time I flew, I wore flip-flops. Guess what I had to take off and set in the bin? You guessed it: my cheap, plastic, totally open flip-flops. What does that acheive other than pissing me off?
Oh you’ve hit one of my sincere dislikes of the modern world.
Since I got a job that requires a good deal of travel I get to see a lot of security theater and overly officious TSA agents. I don’t feel one bit safer knowing we’re all assumed to be guilty and required to submit to a search without any probable cause.
The whole-body scanners? From what I can glean in public records there is some concern about controls on radiation dosages, ability to record images especially since TSA said they can’t.
e.g. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/01/12/tsa_body_scanners/
Whenever I’m selected for the ‘random’ search I opt out. I don’t need any extra radiation, of some unknown amount, so since I want to keep my job and/or get home to my sweetie I submit to a public search. They only good part there is that some of the inspectors are embarrassed by it, of course the others are annoyed that I’m not queuing up to get scanned.
I quoted ‘random’ since I’ve been selected for a search in at least one direction in 9 out of the last 10 trips. My backpack is loaded with electronic gear and I think that I get a little extra attention, but that is just a guess. Other than that, I look even more innocuous than PZ, my beard’s all white!
The smaller airports are usually more pleasant, maybe less stress on the employees?
Last Question: Will the airport security level ever drop?
It’s the sheer inconsistency of the draconian policies that really get to me. I’ve had toothpaste confiscated before and I lost a very nice pocket knife which I had forgotten to move to my luggage. What really got to me was that at the same time they completely ignored the pocket full of very sharp pencils I had on me (and I know where the jugular is.) Fortunately I managed to keep my temper enough to keep that little fact to myself.
TSA once confisgated my magazines. My MAGAZNINES. Perhaps they were worried that I’d threaten national security by trying some weird sex tip from Cosmo on the pilot?
The only way these things make flying safer is by deterring people from flying thus reducing the demand for flights, thus reducing the number of flights.
Meanwhile, I can get on my packed commuter train every morning carrying whatever the hell I want, including a live chicken.
A guy really did get on a plane with a bomb in his underwear. Remove all underarments and put them in the tray, please. Your cooperation is appreciated.
*undergarments
I’m reminded of the NYPD’s botched Muslim Spying operation. They were caught in NJ because, and I laughed when I read this in the paper, the landlord of the place they were using as HQ for their spying saw all the equipment and their suspicious actions and reported them as possible terrorists.
To be fair they did make me disarm my chicken before letting me on last week
Ing #8
Because your comparison is so clear, I find it useful to re-write a portion of your final sentence thus:
THe idea of impulse terrorism make me LOL. Makes me just imagine someone reading a magazine and just deciding to burn the airport down.
Hee hee! “Casual terrorism”!
Ing,
To be fair, airports themselves might lead to impulse terrorism. I mean, have you been to the Detroit airport? That place sucks ass.
For me it was the sign “Luggage is designed to protect it’s contents: Airport is not liable for any damaged goods”
I have to pay for them to mishandle my luggage to the point that it breaks shit inside…inside a device they pointed out is designed to protect it’s contents…and they have the nerve to pull that shit!?
I have utter loathing for the TSA. They are a waste of money and a violation of constitutional liberties.
The 9/11 hijacking was a nifty tactic. But like the trojan horse, it can only be used once; in the very unlikely event that someone tries to hijack a plane again, the passengers will capture if not kill him. (see shoe bomber).
See, prior to 9/11, if you got hijacked, you might fly somewhere new, spend a few days somewhere, have a good story to tell. Now, if you get hijacked, you are going to die. Which means that 300 passengers suddenly have a very intense desire to stop the hijacking.
A successful hijacking cannot occur under these conditions. To reinforce the “you will all die” idea, f16s will shoot the plane out of the sky before they let it fly off course. That means the 300 passengers have a very strong incentive to fight, whatever the costs or odds, because the other option is to die.
With this in mind, the TSA is not needed, and even their proposed purpose, they do badly. Taking lighters and nail clippers from Marines, but not their rifles and bayonets? The TSA must all have been ASVAB failures.
http://terminallance.com/2010/12/17/terminal-lance-89-tsa-keeping-america-safe/
Anecdote from last week: flying out of Portland Wednesday morning, the security line extended over two-thirds of the terminal, longest I’d ever seen. After standing at the back for about two minutes, a uniformed guy asked my dad if he had been born before 1937. Since he had, we were walked up to the short line. Apparently a new program allows old people to skip shoe/coat removal.
I still had to do the full routine. The scanning device marked some dangerous pills I had in my pocket (the only danger being to my lower intestine if they’d been taken from me).
Flying back in four hours, can’t wait to see what’s been added for today.
Because I’m a total looser reminded of ME2 where there’s a funny bit of dialogue mocking the TSA if you bring both Thane and Garrus to the Citadel. One being an assassin the other a cop will talk about how ineffective the security measures actually are.
Anybody remember the Glasgow Airport attack? Fat lot of good airport screening did there.
Much as I like reading articles on the vulnerabilities of security screening, I do worry that someone will read one, take advantage of the vulnerability, and actually blow something up, etc. I also saw a tv program recently that pointed out that all photocopiers have a hard drive in them that records everything scanned by the photocopier. The point was that this hard drive is rarely, if ever, wiped. So if you buy a used photocopier from the right supplier, you can access the hard drive and recover (as they did in the program) things like patient records from hospitals, files from police stations, ID that employees have photocopied, etc. Much as I liked knowing about the risk, I also worried that they had potentially just explained to criminals how to do it.
Long before 911, I realized that I could get a small weapon (knife/gun) onto a plane by hiding it in the steel-toed boots I was wearing(the boots would set off the metal detector, but at the time they would not have you take off your boots and inspect them). It shouldn’t work now, but I did think of contacting the TSA to point out the problem.
On a lighter note, one of my friends was going through security and was taken aside for secondary screening. With the security officer kneeling in front of him, he was asked to remove his belt. He replied, “Do I have to pay extra for this?”.
I’ve mentioned this before, but don’t remember if on Pharyngula…
My wife can always get on a plane with her knitting needles. Not only are they potentially a stabbing weapon, but she uses the circular kind, so they would make a dandy garrote.
Now she’s 5’2″ and barely weighs a buck-ten, but I’m a big guy, and if we had something nefarious in mind, she could just hand them off to me (I’m not trained in any kind of weaponry, but they don’t know that).
On one occasion they asked her to knit a few stitches, just to make sure she was a legit knitter, and I rather imagine that if I showed up with knitting needles, they might want a bit of explanation. But still, I will never understand the notion that toothpaste is more dangerous than a potential strangling device with sharp points on either end.
Oh, yes, and @ montanto (#29): I also frequently have a bunch of sharp pencils in my carry-on. Never once have they been questioned, or even looked at funny.
We just flew back from the UK, and we instinctively started to take off our shoes, the security guy said, “Americans, are we?”
You read neither the article or the comments did you?
Yes it was far better to let an obvious gap remain to be discovered later.
Oh dog – I can’t even share my TSA hate experiences without starting to sputter and getting incoherent in my rage.
I think the one that I hate the most is when we flew from one airport out to LAX for a transfer to our final destination. At LAX we got off the plane, got sent along a corridor and directly INTO A SECURITY LINE from the plane we just got off of (and I mean directly – there were not even any bathrooms accessible because of airport construction)
– we had to throw out any liquids we had, because they clearly had become dangerous somewhere between the runway and the terminal, and go through the whole bleeping ritual (shoes off, blah blah …) and then THEY FRISKED MY BABY – the #*@$ bleeping morons wouldn’t let me carry him through the stupid detectors, no he had to walk (he was just barely walking – he is big for his age and is now often mistaken for a child a good two or three years older than he is) and these loud, angry looking people who made me set him down made his cry, and this was obviously really suspicious so then had to check out his diaper. #$)*%&#)$*&%
and since I got upset, they had to check me out too, since only terrorist mothers would get upset about all of this.
I would love to get to the point where I can take my children through airport security without one of them ending up scared and in tears.
And can someone explain to me why they sell drinks and duty free stuff on the plane so that you have to jam it into your suitcase once you get off the plane before you are allowed on the next plane ??? At what point did my orange juice become explosive ???
See – what did I say – incoherent! Gotta stop now.
Oh, almost forgot: we flew back from London two days after the underwear bomber incident. You can’t imagine what a Dantean nightmare Heathrow was, complete with zombie security demons who had been on duty for 48 hours or more. Very much a case of closing the barn door after the horse got out…
In my (Canadian) experience, the most hassle comes from small-town airports. Last time I visited Fredericton from Toronto, the folks at Pearson Airport didn’t ask for more than my shoes off. And I had a random hand scan. The shoe thing is pointless. The Fredericton airport on the way back, though, damn. I ended up going through my makeup case (I was there for Halloween, so we’re talking a damn lot of makeup) with a very power-trip-y screener, explaining what each thing was if it wasn’t apparent enough for them to put in the plastic bag or not. Did you know a coloured lip balm is a gel, but a lipstick is not? Even if they’re both in stick form? I felt so secure afterwards.
The list is not quite that big, and many of those on it have been arrested, and many of those who have not are wanted. The idea that the no-fly list is some random assortment of innocent Cat Stevens-types who simply made a donation to the wrong charity or worship the wrong god is kind of a load of bullshit. However, the rest of what Mr. Schneier had to say seems pretty spot on.
Something else P Zed should appreciate about Schneier: A regular feature of his blog “Schneier on Security” is “Friday Squid Blogging” in which a squid factoid is presented along with an invitation to discuss any security issues not otherwise discussed that week.
@Chasm: I just don’t get why are we supposed to be frightened of shoe explosives. Considering that the guy who tried it was not successful in the first place.
All of the security measures are really anti-tiger talismans in reality. The terrorists will always try the one method that TSA are not checking for. And as such it is always better to have better security inside the planes so that terrorists can’t get away with their surprise attacks (and this has proven to work multiple times when TSA didn’t, including the shoe bomber). And also, of course, intelligence work.
* If they get arrested, there is no need for the no-fly list.
* If they are “unwanted”, then they won’t be able to fly because US wouldn’t give them visa any way. Their only way in would be through a fake passport (and as such a no-fly list is useless) or crossing the frontier by land.
* If there was just one single innocent person that got banned of flying because of a lastname, then it sucks. And there were many such cases over the years.
I know — a couple of years ago, Bruce and I were both guests at an sf con, and we had a joint afternoon squid session. Calamari was served, we chatted about our favorite cephalopods, it was quite fun.
I think the sweet spot is generally small-to-medium-sized cities. The smaller towns (Columbia, MO*) don’t have enough money/facilities to go all-out, the big cities are too busy, but in between, you have my hometown of Boise which has an enormous short-man complex and the security theater to go with it. It was the first place I had to put my hands behind my head (holding up a cough drop that I had forgotten to stash away in my bag).
* Columbia only has two gates and flies to only one other city. So it doesn’t have the full-body scanners or anything like that, but once past security, you do have to wait in what is essentially a shed attached to the main building.
I had to take my belt off on a Copenhagen to Stockholm flight last year.
But not my shoes.
I find that this is a good aid to remember what continent one is currently on.
yeah, this now oft-repeated argument is not one of the good points I referred to earlier. The guy succeeded in getting the bomb onto the plane. That plan worked. The fact that he couldn’t get the fuse lit in that specific case is obviously irrelevant to the TSA’s job of keeping the explosives off the plane. You think they should have waited until it ‘worked’ to react?
It achieves not having to give special treatment to some people over others. You really don’t get this? Slipping a pir of sandals off and on is not something I count as a major inconvenience–not like a pair of Docs or something–but it still pissed you off.
I guess you’re extra special.
Yeah, Europe, you take off your belt but not your shoes; US, shoes but not belt. Unless they want to scan you, in which case you take of both.
Schneier attacks Hawley for having used anecdotes. Then Schneier proceeds to use anecdotes for his own case. Funny.
@ j.p.hollembaek #42
The thought has crossed my mind that the most effective improvement to airline security might be to mount an 18 inch hard rubber truncheon on the back of each row of seats, and have the flight attendants explain why they are there along with pointing out where the exits are.
If you go through the full body scanners, they do ask you to take off your belt (as well as your shoes).
And of course it’s worth remembering that the 9/11 hijackers didn’t smuggle their weapons through passenger security, they had people working in the airport put them on the planes ahead of time.
I just have to rebut a few points here. In no particular order:
To rebut Bruce “Security Theater” Schneier (Though as an aside to snipe at a guy for arguing with anecdotes then argue predominately with anecdotes is a little absurd. As is tagging the TSA with something done in London):
It doesn’t make it magically safe, it does however make it more difficult to bring an explosive liquid on and assemble it. And that is the point. Nothing is perfectly safe, but the TSA has to balance the threat with the obtrusion of the search/rule. The ‘safe’ thing to do in this particular instance is to ban them entirely as the agency did in response to threat information in 2006, but on the other hand TSA loosened the restriction in response to the complaints of passengers, attempting to do so in a way that still mitigated the threat.
Butter knives are not a prohibited item. They do not have a blade, and are allowed through the checkpoint. Quoting from the prohibited item list on TSA’s website (link at bottom): “Knives – except for plastic or round bladed butter knives” are listed as prohibited.
First off, no body likes Skeletor.. Ehem, Micheal Chertoff. But Secondly the “Full Body” scanners were deployed to counter a known threat, that is that the walk through metal detectors detected only metal, and nothing else. That threat was exemplified by the underwear bomber, hence the rapid deployment.
In order: A mistake, as acknowledged by the agency. Not TSA. An anecdote from a pilot with no verification. Not embroidered, what appears to be a metal gun shaped raised design that is prohibited under a restriction on realistic replicas (The reasons for that are listed in the article he linked.) Not TSA. and finally an anecdote from a pilot with no verification. This is his big list of failures or excesses?
Also Schneier is a clown. A man who cackles about sneaking penknives, ‘jihad’ books, and Islamic Jihad flags through security. (Hint, only one of these is prohibited.) It is easy to snipe from the sidelines at TSA. With 50000ish employees there are certainly going to be some that are bad at their jobs, and do things like take away cupcakes. But that does not mean the agency is simply Security Theater, or that TSA is worthless.
In response to Gregory in Seattle #10:
My favorite part of discussions about the TSA is the people who ‘know’ what an x-ray machine shows and does not. I can tell you that you are flatly, patently wrong. C4, explosives in shoes, and glass knives all show up on the x-ray machines used by the TSA. Not only that but they are fairly obvious, and easy to distinguish from surrounding material. But nice try.
In response to Anri (#24):
TSA does implement a number of subtle/invisible security measures. TSA as an agency is dedicated to protecting the flying public, regardless of what you may think. They are constantly reevaluating and changing policy in response to passenger complaints and new threat information. The best example is TSA’s risk based security initiative where they are attempting to limit security on low risk passengers (Kids under 12, Flight Crew, pre-checked frequent fliers, ect.) in order to focus on more high risk and unknown passengers. (Second link at bottom to TSA’s description of Risk Based Security)
In response to Dr. Audley Z. Darkheart, purveyor of candy and lies #27:
(And to all those who mentioned that Richard Reed, the shoe-bomber, failed.) Richard Reed failed not because shoe bombs cannot work, but because of sweat. He had been questioned by French Security Screeners and had missed his flight. He was so nervous, he slept in his shoes and the combination of sweat and rain water caused the fuse to fail. To quote the wikipedea article on him: “The explosive apparently did not detonate due to the one-day delay in the take-off of Reid’s flight. He had worn his shoes for more than one day, and the rainy weather, perhaps along with Reid’s accumulated foot perspiration, caused the fuse to be too damp to ignite.” The point of failure in this case is easily fixed, making it a still viable threat.
In response to j.p.hollembaek #42 and more broadly in response to those complaining about constructional violations:
The TSA search is a regulatory search. It falls under the US regulatory code and does not require a warrant. It does need to be limited to the regulation’s area, in this case transportation, and the search must be only for violations of regulations, and not criminal in purpose. e.g. for prohibited items and not drugs. (Though if illegal material or evidence of illegality is found in the course of a search TSA must report it to Law Enforcement.)
Congress has regulated air travel to mandate that certain items may not be taken on to airplanes, and established the TSA to do regulatory searches in order to prevent prohibited items from reaching the airplane, mostly in accessible luggage. Moreover, you, in buying a ticket, and then in showing up at the checkpoint are giving implied consent to be searched. As far as the law is concerned, if you do not wish to be searched, don’t buy an airplane ticket.
No one likes TSA screening. And TSA screening is certainly not 100% effective. But to demonize them without a proper understanding of what they do is wrong.
(And to those who say TSA doesn’t find anything. Last week TSA found 29 guns in passenger luggage: 21 of them loaded (3rd link). For the greatest hits of what TSO’s have found this week, though with a bit to many puns for my taste, check out the TSA blog blog.tsa.gov )
http://www.tsa.gov/travelers/airtravel/prohibited/permitted-prohibited-items.shtm
http://www.tsa.gov/what_we_do/rbs.shtm
http://blog.tsa.gov/2012/03/tsa-week-in-review-debrainer-discovered.html
Also truthspeaker (#64): No that is completely wrong. The ‘weapons’ used in the attacks, mainly box cutters and the like were not prohibited in accessible luggage on aircraft at the time, and were not detected by the private screeners prior to the hijackers boarding the aircraft.
I see the TSA has deployed one of its paid commenters.
Oh, lookie, spambot with some factoids. Now, do those factoids mean we were really safer in the skies, or that overzealous ill-trained folks must show something to bosses to keep their paychecks coming? I vote for the latter.
This is an excellent point. I’ve been thinking about getting a new wallet, but then again, I haven’t been attacked by sharks for as long as I’ve owned this one. I’d better keep it.
Woo! Ad hominem attacks! You sure showed me!
Paid commentators? Clearly they would get a lot out of their money by having one guy commenting on a primarily atheist blog. I certainly can’t be commenting because I like this blog, but was unhappy with what I saw as false and misleading information being posted on it.
I just reread the 9/11 commission’s report, and you’re half right – there’s no clear picture of what weapons, if any, the 9/11 hijackers used.
Another fuckwitted idjit who doesn’t know and understand what ad hominen really means. It doesn’t mean just being insulted, as you seem to believe. That is a mistake on your part.
Peez,
“It’s the arbitrary rules, the immediate awkward responses to last week’s threat, the implicit understanding that the overbearing security theater is going to continue forever without end, with ever-escalating nonsense, and the fact that you do not dare voice that outrage to the TSA, or they can and will make your travel unpleasant or even impossible.”
You left out the part where none of it makes us any safer, and possibly makes us less safe.
How about those people, like Schneier, who demonize them with a proper understanding of what they do?
Why did the TSA lie about the capability of full-body scanners to store and send images?
Why haven’t the full-body scanners been tested for safety?
Why did the TSA urge news outlets not to report on the story about the kid who videoed himself allegedly sneaking weapons on board?
It does mean that people insulted me, with out addressing my arguments. From the wikipedia article:
They attacked me for being a ‘spambot’ or ‘paid commentator’ without addressing the points I put forward. That is an ad hominem attack.
Why do TSA employees wear badges, even though they are not law enforcement officers?
” Six billion safe passenger arrivals” is TSA’s euphemism for passengers having spent enough time standing in line since 9-11 for 8,871 of them to die of old age.
If TSA had never existed, and terrorists inflicted 9-11’s casualty total every decade, Americans would still be 5,000 lifetimes ahead, and taxpayers some fifty billion dollars richer.
There’s a post up on the TSA blog right now where the guy actually brags about catching a flier with Ecstasy pills in his crotch. Mission creep has started already.
I’ll adress these one at a time.
I would challenge that Schneier does have a proper understanding of what we do, for if he does, he certainly hasn’t demonstrated it.
I am unaware of them lying about that. Link?
They have been, by the manufactures and TSA.
I can’t speak for the agency and if it is the video I am thinking of, that ‘kid’ had little to no idea what he was talking about and they could have done that out of a desire to avoid a sensational and fact free attack on the agency.
They are federal officers. Law enforcement are not the only ones with badges.
What they are braging about is finding something that was intended to be hidden. TSA is not looking for Ecstacy or any drugs for that matter.
I suggest you read his book or some of the many articles he has written on the issue.
First of all, holy shit. You claim to be informed on these matters, but you’re unaware of this?
Here’s a link to the original denial: http://blog.tsa.gov/2010/11/tsa-has-not-will-not-and-our-advanced.html
And here’s the admission that they “misspoke”: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505145_162-33544598/tsa-admits-body-scanners-store-and-transmit-body-images/
So, not by an impartial third-party then. That means they haven’t been tested.
http://www.examiner.com/homeland-security-in-chicago/new-report-on-tsa-scanner-safety-uses-old-data-new-report-on-tsa-scanner-safety
http://www.npr.org/assets/news/2010/05/17/concern.pdf
Avoiding criticism is not a valid reason for a government agency to pressure news organizations not to report a story. That’s what you expect in a dictatorship. In a free society, a government agency is welcome to present its own version of the facts, but not to suppress criticism.
They’re supposed to be. I’m not aware of any other federal agency, other than law enforcement, where the employees wear badges.
If they found something hidden that wasn’t a threat to airline security, then they shouldn’t be mentioning it on their blog.
@Searchbot:
Guess what. None of those were found a) in shoes or b) through the body scanner. In fact, NONE of the items they found to be prohibited were in shoes or on the person. They were all in checked and carry-on luggage.
The removal of shoes and the radiation poisoning are useless security theatre. Drop your bags on the conveyor belt and if you’ve got bad stuff, we’ll find it. The only things I’ve ever seen found in the body scanner were excuses to feel up pretty girls.
The only airport where I’ve been required to take my shoes off was the one serving St Petersburg (Russia, not Florida). They explained over the tannoy that it was a new requirement of British Airways. A week earlier British Airways had not required me to take my shoes off at Heathrow when I left for Moscow. The next time I flew with British Airways (out of the UK) this was once again not a problem.
Security theatre, indeed.
And yes, I realize hating on the TSA is a ploy of the Right Wing Anti-Union forces, but they’re not making it easy to NOT hate them.
Do either of you have a substantive answer to Searchbot’s points?
It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good. If the TSA and its counterparts elsewhere are discouraging people from flying, that’s got to be good for the climate.
Hey, I’ve cut myself on magazines. It hurt, eventually.
Luggage-bomb attempts? Check all the luggage.
Suicide hijackings by carry-on sharp objects? Check all the carry-on for sharp objects.
Shoe-bomb atempt? Check all the shoes.
Underwear-bomb attempt? Full-bod scanners.
I don’t know what anybody expects. If for some weird reason you were in charge, you wouldn’t have made those same decisions?
Seems to me the huge pain in the ass can be blamed on those people who try to blow up planes.
I have little doubt that the actual people of the TSA include plenty of the usual assholes, fuckups, dumbasses, and bullies. At all levels. So anecdotes abound.
But the security measures themselves? I don’t know what anybody expects.
If there are airports elsewhere that don;t make you take off your shoes and don;t otherwise check people’s shoes, then all of the other passengers that depart from that airport are vulnerable to a hypothetical shoe bomber. People in charge in the USA have decided that’s an avoidable risk worth avoiding. I don’t think they’re wrong.
To be fair, the only time I’ve felt even half-way intimidated at an airport was in Dubai. I was only changing flights rather than visiting, but the soldier at Immigration asked me “Any guns?” as I put my backpack onto the conveyor belt. For a fraction of a second I formulated the snappy reply “Only the one folding-stock AK-47 with half a dozen banana clips”, but the fact that he was carrying an AK-47 and had long since perfected his thousand-yard stare encouraged me to just say “No, sir”.
Well, Chas, one thing I would do as an elected official is consult actual security experts, from my country and others, instead of lobbyists who work for the people who make the scanners.
I would also keep the pre-9/11 passenger screening that worked, not break systems that were already working.
In reply to truthspeeker #82/#83:
I have, and still challenge it. He is to airport security what ID proponents are to biology.
First off, I have some significant knowledge of airport security. I do not know everything, as I freely admired. As for them lying, it was a misstatement. The agency is not infallible, and its press and public relations people more so. Though the idea that because the machines can store images in a mode that is not accessible to airport personnel isn’t exactly a huge deal. The majority of the machines in airports are not x-ray backscatter machines but rather the millimeter wave machines, and have an automatic targeting program that causes the images to never be seen by anyone.
There is a difference between untested and not tested by someone you trust. To say that they are untested is false.
I have no idea why they would ask the agencies to do that, but it is telling that the news agencies didn’t in large part publish reports. That they didn’t says that the concerns raised by the TSA or the factual problems with the story made them unwilling to publish. TSA can’t order them not to publish stories, and not publishing sensationalist or dubious reports is the mark of a strong press, not dictatorship.
In reply to Katherine Lorraine, Chaton de la Mort #84:
Yet, items have been found in shoes, even posted to the blog. Moreover if your body is not screened, you could bring anything through simply by putting in your pockets. Or in your underwear as Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab did.
I think Searchbot needs to prove its factoids are meaningful by showing context with proper controls. You know, those things that scientists and Mythbusters use. Including the context that many of those items were in the luggage for years without problems, and all of a sudden became problems after 9/11, much to the inconvenience, but not necessarily the safety, of the traveling public. The ball is in his court to show that we are really safer, not just illusionally safer. And illusion is what we have at the moment. A magic show with smoke and mirrors.
Pre-9/11 Screening did not work. Evaluations by FAA ‘Red Teams’ found that the private screeners were unable to detect even the most obvious of threats, never mind that most checked luggage was not screened.
Because you work for the TSA?
This was a widely reported story.
Making the same statement repeatedly, without checking its accuracy, is lying.
Only if you actually believe that the mode is not accessible to airport personnel.
If something is only tested by people who have a vested interest in the outcome of the test, you can consider it untested. Would you trust Monsanto’s tests about the safety of their products? Would you trust tobacco companies about the safety of theirs?
Not legally, no. But asking or urging them not to publish a story sounds like a threat when it comes from the government, and has no place in a free society.
So much like the TSA then.
The one part of pre-9/11 screening that did work was the metal detectors and baggage x-rays. Why supplement something that does work with something expensive and intrusive?
No need to reply searchbot, you have been killfiled, along with the other obnoxious and vocal true believers.
Many people have no choice but to fly. If your family lives in Nebraska and you go to college in Florida, let’s say, how the hell are you supposed to get to see your family without flying? Or if you’re studying abroad? Or if you have close family members in another country? Or if your work involves travel? You can answer that it would be better if the US had better transport options, including effective, affordable and high-speed intercity rail, so that fewer people had to fly. But it doesn’t. And even if it did, it wouldn’t help people who live an ocean apart from their families. Just trying to deter people from flying is not reasonable, unless you also provide practical alternatives to flying.
(It’s just as bad as the “Let’s make fuel really expensive so that people are deterred from driving! That will be great for the environment!!” line of reasoning. Sounds great, unless you’re a poor person who lives in a city with no public transportation and who needs to drive in order to work, apply for jobs, or go grocery shopping.)
And people who have to fly should not be subjected to intrusive, humiliating and pointless security theatre in order to do so. I find it risible that some people actually think that, say, regulating the size of passengers’ toothpaste tubes is actually going to prevent a single terrorist attack. It’s farcical. And even if it did, it’s an enormous overreaction to a statistically-small threat. The average person is far, far, far more likely to die in a car accident, say, than to be the victim of a terrorist attack on a plane. Let’s stop panicking about something which is a very minor threat.
In responce to Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls #93:
Firstly lets point out a few things. Do I agree with every prohibited item? No. Do I think that penknives are a serious threat to airplane safety? No. What I will say is after 9/11 airplanes became a more visible target. The goal was no longer to hijack one, but to destroy them and the people on board. There have been several attacks on aviation infrastructure since 9/11 and TSA has done its level best to prevent them.
The problem with trying to argue that TSA has made us safer is that the evidence is in that there hasn’t been a successful attack on aviation since 9/11. But, as has been pointed out here, that is not a compelling argument. I no of no way to scientifically demonstrate that TSA is preventing airplanes from blowing up, and the only quantitative evidence I have is the items that are found. Is the traveling public more safe because TSA prevented 29 guns from going on planes last week. I believe we can say yes.
Insulting you without addressing your arguments is just insulting you. They must further intimate that your argument is wrong because of the insult.
“You’re an idiot” is an insult.
“You’re an idiot, and therefore wrong” is an ad hominem fallacy.
Yes.
But how many guns did pre-TSA screeners prevent from going on planes in a comparable time period? That’s the relevant question.
Nobody disagrees that the job TSA is allegedly supposed to do is important. It’s the implementation, the cost, and the corruption that’s the problem.
truthspeaker, thanks for the scanner link, it was way better than mine.
I’ll just leave this here:
Wired: $56 Billion Later, TSA Worthless
@Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls
#93
A lot of safety regulation came about after catastrophes (or a series of bad accidents) happened. Seat-belts requirements, air-bags, no infant in front-seat due to air-bag, shatter-proof windshield, etc.
We don’t have anymore air-plane hijacking?
The better question to ask, as Pteryxx said in 102, is whether the benefit TSA provided is worth the cost.
#103
Oops, it should be truthspeaker #101 regarding the cost-benefit thing.
I’m guessing you’re not old enough to remember the 1970’s.
The whole idea that the small threat of airline terrorism is worth this massive degradation of privacy and billions of wasted dollars is the problem. Those of you who are defending the TSA are coming from a mindset that finds this a reasonable, normal reaction. It’s not. It’s really not. It’s just that we’re used to seeing it as normal now. It’s actually insanely paranoid.
Guess what? We can’t stop every act of terrorism. Ever. Ever. Ever. Launching the TSA on the speculative hope that their bullshit security theater is going to decrease the chances of an already highly unlikely event by a little bit is madness.
We ought to remember we’re great big grown-up people and we don’t have to live in fear. For God’s sake there are people in far more dangerous countries than ours that listen to bombs going off in cafes every week and they still somehow manage to get themselves to work, feed their kids and have a life.
No, we don’t want to leave big obvious holes in security. But we need to abandon the notion that we can control everything (we can’t) and that a speculative gain in security is, by default, always worth the costs. No. No. No.
I’m willing to take my chances on a plane without everyone having to dump their Coca Cola out. Why aren’t the rest of you?
Searchbot:
Come clean – who’s paying you to have this opinion? Don’t even try to say you don’t make your livelihood in some way that’s connected to this because it’s crystal clear that you’re going to defend the basic goodness of security theater no matter what.
Ah, Bruce Schneier. The Chuck Norris of security.
Did I do that link wrong? Here it is http://www.schneierfacts.com/
I’ll also observe (I know, I know, anecdote) that the people who trust and defend the TSA the loudest often turn out to be people who rarely fly. They have no direct experience of airline travel as an everyday thing, so the remote possibility of OMG TURRISTS taking over a plane looms bigger in their imagination than it should.
I fly at least a dozen times a year and have for a decade. Perhaps it’s just me, but seasoned frequent fliers have a far better appreciation of reality on this topic.
Chas,
So you’re saying that the extra step of removing my flip-flops, even though my feet were visible was necessary? For what? I’m not asking for special treatment, you insufferable ass, I want the screeners to be able to think for themselves. You’re not going to stop any “bad guys” if you can’t do that.
Okay, yeah the shoe bomber got his dud on the plane. When that failed, we had the (failed) underwear bomber. This shit just keeps escalating and TSA’s rules aren’t helping. In fact, they’re probably causing the escalation.
Why don’t we all have to take off our undies? Why don’t we all have to be stripped/cavity searched?
Or, hey, maybe we should see what other countries do for security, instead? I’d bet good money that Israel has pretty tight airport security. I’d also bet that it’s intelligence based and passengers don’t have to take their shoes off.
@Josh
#106
There’s much truth in this.
And beefed up cockpit doors could have done the job for a fraction of the cost of the screening program.
No, it’s not worth the cost. Scale the cost back a hundred fold, taking away all the illusions of safety, getting to the real safety, and it might be. Safety tends to be 20-80. Twenty percent of the cost gets you eighty percent of your safety. Making something close to absolutely safe costs a fortune and is inconvenient to use, as the TSA screening proves.
We don’t know the real costs, as some of the costs are black-boxed in the budget.
Yeah, it wasn’t actually me who spelled it out, but that *was* the point I intended to emphasize with my quote. Not only is the TSA rotten and most of its procedures useless if not outright harmful to passengers, it’s wasted effort because there are much more dangerous security holes going unaddressed.
@Audley
#111
Israeli Airport Security
A few keys.
“2 percent and 5 percent of travelers get singled out for additional screening.” (I’m guessing the article meant 2 percent to 5 percent)
“The exact selection criteria aren’t publicly available, but ethnicity is probably a consideration.”
Very likely the selection process is racially biased.
“Secondary screening can involve hours of questioning. Agents have been known to click through all of a traveler’s digital photographs. Body searches are common, and agents usually take luggage apart one item at a time. Israeli agents confiscated all the luggage of Indiana University professor Heather Bradshaw and kept it for three days.”
If you ARE selected… oh boy.
Pro: They’re very effective (as far as I know), and for a vast majority of people, very little hassle.
Con: If you’re in that minority that got screened… well, you’re not making your flight by the looks of things.
Plus, you need intelligent people.
@Nerd
#113
I think that measure was taken already.
To be fair, they did implement that after 9/11.
To be even more fair, Bill Clinton had proposed it in the 1990s, because unlike GW Bush he heeded the warnings about al Qaeda*. But the Republican Congress wouldn’t require the airlines to take on the expense of reinforcing cockpit doors, nor would they provide federal funds to pay for it.
*Lest we forget, the first time al Qaeda tried to blow up the World Trade Center was in 1993. And the federal government caught the planner without torturing anyone or using secret prisons, tried him in a federal court without it turning into a circus or joke, and he is currently serving a life sentence in a federal prison.
Despite Searchbot not knowing what an ad hominem is, (s)he still reads a lot more like someone who knows what they’re talking about w.r.t. flight security than those (s)he’s arguing with.
Walton,
If you really have to fly for the reasons you list, the TSA won’t stop you, will it? Most flying is “discretionary” as the economists say.
Anyone going to claim I’m a paid shill of the TSA or security companies, finally breaking cover after being a “sleeper” here for several years?
You’re missing my point completely. No, of course it won’t – and that’s the problem. People who have to fly – for instance, for work purposes or to visit family – are forced to undergo intrusive, humiliating, and completely unnecessary treatment at the hands of the TSA. This is not something that anyone should have to endure, especially given that (a) it serves no real security purpose and (b) even if it did, it’s a huge over-reaction to a statistically minor threat.
Of course you’re not. However, I think you’re missing the point on several levels. I think this partly comes from your being British: in the United States, a country with vast distances and appallingly bad land transportation infrastructure, and in which many people live, work and study far away from their families, flying is absolutely indispensable for a great many people. Yes, that should be fixed – but it should be fixed by providing workable and affordable land transport alternatives, not by trying to deter people from flying.
Can’t blame them.
I don’t much like tourists, myself.
Okay, maybe Israel wasn’t the best example. Racial profiling, eeeeewww!
Even so, this whole discussion just shows that TSA can only react and can’t act proactively.
KG:
Just out of curiosity, how much time do you spend in the U.S., flying from state to state?
I can’t stand the silly circus airport security has turned into, however, it’s often the only travel choice there is, given time constraints and travel distance. The U.S. is hardly known for great travel alternatives.
Well, they do have fewer enemies, mostly.
He did get the Nobel Peace Prize.
The plane hijacking to end all plane hijackings! See comment 42.
It can’t. Not unless everyone suddenly stops being afraid.
Pure crystallized stupidity. Sue their asses, and then sue the rest of them. </money-independent fantasy>
They accused you of being a spambot or paid commenter because of the points you put forward.
They did not say the points you put forward must be wrong because you allegedly are a spambot or paid commenter. That would be an ad-hominem argument.
Why am I not surprised.
Oh, so some of them are X-ray machines after all?
T rays are “harmless waves bouncing off your body”. But X rays are ionizing radiation. I hope they’re being phased out. The cosmic radiation you get on a flight is already bad enough!
Dude, you have fallen among the scientists. When something has only been tested by people with a conflict of interest, it has not been tested.
Or bullshitting, which is arguably worse.
WTF? Those were, as you yourself said, in luggage – the stuff that was already controlled before 9/11.
On the bright side, if Searchbot’s attitude catches on, I’ll never have to worry about drug tests again.
Potential Employer: We need you to take a drug test.
Me: I did one myself. I’m clean.
Potential Employer: OK, then! You’re hired.
So what will be the logical escalation of security measures when somebody with surgically implanted explosives gets on board a plane?
Strip searches looking for suspicious surgery scars, followed by a deep tissue x-ray scan?
I’m of the opinion the next major airline terrorist incident won’t even take place on a plane. Why go to all that trouble to conceal a tiny bomb when you could just pack a trolley bag full of explosives and shrapnel, wait until you’re in the middle of a massive check-in queue, and set off your bomb before you have gone through security?
…
I guess I won’t be flying to the US any time soon.
I don’t think I’ve flogged this video here before, so: I Love the TSA (Hint: it’s sarcastic.)
Searchbot … I would be inclined to give you the benefit of the doubt about being a shill for the TSA but for your comment at #79
I would challenge that Schneier does have a proper understanding of what we do, for if he does, he certainly hasn’t demonstrated it.
Schneier clearly understands exactly what the TSA does: maintains the twin fictions that there is an overwhelming terrorist threat and that they are doing something to prevent it.
Remember: Fear Is Safety!
Who else hates them? Yours truly.
Travelling from NYC to Charleston SC two years ago, the lock on my checked suitcase had been broken and the contents searched and replaced any old way. On top, there was a note from the TSA, advising me of the search. Not even an apology for wrinkling all my clothes and covering them with their germs.
I tried to claim some money for replacing my lock and for laundry charges, but was told that you’re not allowed to lock your bags and if I wanted to re-wash my clothes, that was my problem.
This is exactly what I meant about context and controls. The presented data needed some context to become meaningful. In this case, why is it safer to have no handguns in luggage where people don’t have access to it, compared to just leaving it there in the luggage. Makes no difference in the long run, increases inconvenience to the passengers, and is just a cosmetic increase in real safety, not a real increase in safety.
I’m with Searchbot on this. I do not care for much of the administration, and application, behind the TSA, but I do feel that they’re the popular “boogeyman” for sheeple to pick on currently. It’s almost as if people get so comfortable with all the rights they have all the livelong day, they start to desperately seek out where rights are being trampled on and wail about it. I’ll wail right along with you, but being a true skeptic, I look at both sides with care and patience.
Plus, PZ, what exactly are the “real security issues”? There’s no sarcasm in that question; let’s talk about what’s principally at stake with mass air travel. Where’s the dialogue for what should be happening rather than what is happening, and where’s the dialogue about whether we can ever effectively provide transportation security without some sort of sacrifice of public convenience or autonomy? To paraphrase Louis CK… Why should we expect it to be perfect? “It sucks!” Well, make your own security, then. How hard could it be?
Talk about violation of civil rights… when a plane crashes and people are deprived of their very life, that’s a serious violation of civil rights. But we don’t see a vicious, bullying call for the dismantling of all air-travel as we know it.
Let’s look at another example. Take a simple nitrate test. They swab your bag, at a few dollars per swab (this happened last time I flew). They are looking for explosives, like TNG, TNT, or C4. But, they also pick up fertilizer nitrates, and medicinal nitroglycerin patches, and even just getting wet in a thunderstorm. Or have false positives without nitrates being present.
Lets see the real statistics on how many real examples of explosives in people’s luggage are picked up, how many false/fertilizer positives are seen, and how many man-hours of passenger time is wasted on full manual inspection of the luggage due to false positives. If they have 100 or 1,000 false positives per explosive actually detected, it is cost effective to continue the swabbing. If it is over 10,000 false positives per explosive found, the test should be tossed. It is a feel good measure, not an effective measure.
It… really wouldn’t be. I could crib from less intrusive countries’ notes.
Uh, lolwuuuut? You have demonstrated no such thing. This isn’t skepticism, it’s reflexive status quo defense. Your post is contentless.
Choosing to take a mode of transit that has a non-zero risk of catastrophic failure is not a violation of civil rights, jackass.
Unironic use of this phrase is getting to be a surefire mark of a lackwit.
Happiestsadist, #51
I wish I caught your comment earlier and not after 80 more comments had been made. My experience in Canada has been similar, that small town airports are worse. I know the Fredericton airport well as I am from there and travel back periodically. I have always had a harder time going through security at that airport than when I traveled through Pearson, Trudeau or Vancouver. Though to be honest it has never been much of an ordeal, but my shoes and belt rarely come off in larger centers but I often remove them at the Fredericton airport. I think they might be foot fetishists, however I think they need some lessons emphasizing the need for it to be safe, sane and consensual.
Are we really having an argument over whether or not the TSA is composed of angry, evil, power-hungry little people?
@ Audley #111 & FilthyHuman #115
I lived and worked in Israel for a number of years and have plenty of experience flying in and out of the country (I still do once a year to see the wife’s family).
The security at their airport is incredible and multi-layered, and that’s just the layers that I’ve been able to see. I’ve never felt safer to fly than on any flight in or out of the country. In order to enter Ben Gurion airport, you pass through a security gate similar to entering a military installation in the US. I’ve been approached while unloading my bags in the parking garage by people offering to sell my trinkets or long distance calling cards, only to see the same people enter through security keyed doors inside the airport.
They have people in plain clothes standing on the sidewalks outside the terminals observing everyone coming and going. They’re easy to spot if you just look out for people with something bulging out from under their jacket as they randomly speak to nobody nearby. And there’s plenty more of them inside, too.
The airline personnel at the counters are trained to observe as well. In one instance, my wife (an Israeli) was asked questions while we were checking our bags, and then asked again by security while our bags were being screened. When the answers didn’t match well enough, we were taken aside and questioned about the difference. Similarly, my wife and I are often separated and asked identical questions to see how our answers match.
Security is a big deal there, obviously.
As for random screening selection, I was once singled out. Keep in mind that I’m as Scandinavian in appearance as one can get, so it wasn’t a matter of “looking Arabic”. I was living/working in Israel when my father passed away in the US. I booked a flight home with my wife for the funeral, but she returned to Israel a couple weeks before me. My return trip took me through Frankfurt, Germany, and the flight sucked. I was coming down with a flu, I hand’t had anything to eat, and obviously couldn’t smoke, there was incredible turbulence, it was a long flight, the flight was late, etc.
So I arrived in Germany, hauled ass to my next gate, only to realize I was about to enter a secured area with no food, smoking etc (all flights to Israel go through additional, Israel-specific security). Wanting desperately to eat and smoke, I turned around to head back out, but was cut off by two bald, bad ass-looking gentlemen in suits, who insisted I follow them.
I immediately knew what was up and was fully cooperative, and even acknowledged to them that I understood what was going on and would be no trouble to them. Well, due to the intensity of the situation, hunger, and nicotine craving, my hands were shaking. I didn’t speak enough Hebrew to converse with them, but enough that I followed along. I knew immediately that it wasn’t going to be a fun experience. As soon as I made a comment in Hebrew, they both snapped their heads to me, confirmed I spoke a little Hebrew, and immediately radioed that I spoke Hebrew and for everyone (whoever “everyone” was) to switch to speaking German around me.
Bla bla bla. In the end, I was taken aside, stripped to my underwear, and searched up to (but not including) bending over and coughing. I had to demonstrate that all of my electronic devices worked. They looked through each picture on my camera. My electric toothbrush was snapped in half. The linings of my suitcases were cut open. Every article of clothing unfolded, all other items opened and inspected (including the unmentionables that my wife and I picked up at an adult store in the US..that were inspected by two women…was somewhat embarrassing). I bought a ton of candy for my nieces and nephews while in the US…every single piece was inspected.
*Nothing* in my bags or on my person was inspected by less than two people. My portable CD player was dismantled (irreparably). I was questioned for about three to four hours in total but in iterations by different people, everything cross-checked with the previous inquisitor, etc.
It was rather confusing and disorienting. People coming out of nowhere to ask a question and then vanishing. Someone popping in to make me explain an item I was carrying. Another person coming in to ask random things, like details about my family, my job, people I knew, naming Israeli politicians, etc. My wife (and everyone I had ever known in my life) was fully unaware and would be until my flight arrived without me. Me wondering if I was living one of those stories where some guy is in the wrong place at the wrong time and simply vanishes.
One highlight was being asked to name an Israeli athlete and the only one I could name was my wife’s uncle, who was the first Israeli to play in the English Premier League. Perplexed at how I knew his name, they questioned how I knew the name, and when I explained that he was my wife’s (then-fiance’s) uncle, I was suddenly something of a celebrity…for all of three seconds.
In the end, everything was returned to me in a giant pile and I was told I had 10 minutes to repack it. I managed on adrenaline alone LOL. Finally, I was brought a sandwich and Coca Cola (the olive branch of soft drinks), taken to an empty gate so that I could smoke, offered an apology for the inconvenience, and given contact details and a letter to present on my arrival to Israel for full replacement of all damaged items.
For what it was worth, I thanked them for doing their job so well.
I was then escorted outside by one of the suited gentlemen to a plane waiting on the flight line, taken aboard, and seated in the last row of the plane, empty with the exception of a man reading a magazine in the opposite window seat. While adjusting my seat belt, I noticed he, too, had a lump in his jacket under his arm.
I had to pee badly, but didn’t dare give anyone a reason to be alarmed. So I did my best to sleep out the 3 or 4 hour flight to Israel while my side was splitting.
Upon arrival, I called my wife’s best friend, who “works in security” in Israel, and she did some looking into it.
It turns out I was flagged when I boarded my flight in the US, which explained how the two guys in suits appeared out of nowhere in Germany to single me out. Despite my Scandinavian appearance, on paper I was a single, male, 20-something, non-Israeli flying one-way (in their estimation) to Israel.
It turns out that I matched the profile of some asshole who tried blowing up his shoe a couple weeks earlier, and evidently he had at some point taken flights to/from Israel to “scout opportunities” in Israel. And yes, the man in the opposite window seat was there specifically to watch me. Oh and my bags still flew on a separate flight after all that scrutiny.
There are a million other details to the story, but this is too long already. Bla bla bla.
Truthspeaker at #125, please report to baggage claim to receive your Internet.
Safety rules can actually cause problems. I worked for Conglomerate Chemical for year, and the PPE (personal protective equipment) for loading a commodity chemical into rail cars was full acid suit with respirator. This is fine until the weather gets to hot (>80F), then the question becomes, which is better, to have a heat stroke in the acid suit which lacks air conditioning and doesn’t breathe, and possibly pass out and be exposed, or to just use the respirator and allow the body to sweat and cool. Then you could at least run from the chemical if it got loose. Not surprisingly the chemical operators tended to choose the cooler option as the safest thing to do.
The TSA screening is like a full acid suit in 100F weather. Overkill for the situation in full context.
The way to check unobtrusively for explosives is to have a bomb sniffer sampling the air from over the heads of travellers. If it gets a hit, the travellers can be inspected more closely.
James Sweet #20 got it right:
And hijacking that plane would be a lot more difficult if passengers had things like my 1 1/2″ Swiss Army knife to help defend the plane with, instead of confiscating it.
BTW, it’s not publicized at all, but in addition to the “Airport Lost and Found,” there is now a “Security Lost and Found” where on the return trip you can look for your confiscated items. Some airports very nicely offer padded envelopes next to the security lineup where you can mail things home to yourself.
Montanto, always a good idea not to tell them little things like that. I have several times clamped my teeth on the word, “Why are you worried about that? I can kill someone with a rolled-up magazine.” And that’s why it’s security theatre–they know it and we know it.
Travis @ #135: I’m from there too. *squints* And from your blog, it sounds as if we’re roughly the same age. Hmm.
A friend of mine works security at Fredericton Airport, but the rest of the folks there… yeah. Not all that pleasant, mostly.
Best line I’ve seen all day. Other than the question a student in the lab I sub-TA’ed asked me. (“How is the TATA box related to the cleavage site”)
Here’s my objection to removing my shoes: It’s too damn hard to bend over to take them off and put them back on! (Which is why I ended up just going barefoot last time I flew.)
TSA security measures may work, but most of the evidence to date is that it works like a man swatting flies with a sledgehammer, or curing your headache with a guillotine. I think I’ve said this before, but has anyone even considered the possibility that the so-called shoe bomber or underwear bomber may have been doing what they did exactly in hopes that our security response would be what it was ? That we would overreact and so cause more annoyance and discomfort to ourselves than a single explosion on a single aircraft would do ? It’s all speculation, of course, but I think it’s some interesting speculation. We need some congressional oversight on this. In a closely related matter, we seriously need to undo/go back all on the USA-PATRIOT act. (yes, it actually is an acronym, in almost a perfect example of political doublespeak )
I suspect TSA is not there to make you feel safe, they are there to keep you scared.
The TSA has never stopped a single terrorist attack. Period.
How do I know this? It’s quite simple: If they had foiled a terrorist plot, they’d be the first to sing it to the mountaintops. It would, in their eyes, justify their existence. We’ve heard no such announcement, so they haven’t stopped an attack yet.
Well, what if their “security” measures have simply dissuaded any potential terrorists.
What terrorist, after deciding that airplanes are simply too well-protected would give up? None of them. They would pick another target (e.g. the crowded lines before the security screenings, a mall, etc.). Since there haven’t been any such attacks, we know that no terrorists were foiled by the TSA, and forced to pick another target.
It’s not that they’ve done “more harm than good”, it’s that they’ve done zero good.
And why is security so important on the aeroplane but almost non-existent on the train, at least in my country? You board the train, no one looks into your bags or make you take off your shoes. I can even bring my own food, including liquids(!) with me.
Aaaand the award for most assinine comment of the thread goes to peterzachos @ 132:
Yep, if I didn’t have all these pesky rights, I’d never even notice when they were stripped away.
I’ve flown twice since 9/11; once in 2007, once in 2010. Both times I carried a 2 inch Swiss army folding knife on the plane. Right there in my purse (to be fair, I forgot I had it both times)–no questions, wasn’t caught. TSA doesn’t make us safer; it only maintains the APPEARANCE of safety.
Coming late to the discussion. Also : I have never flown to US, so no first-hand experience here.
As far as I understand, this whole security has nothing with protecting passengers themselves. Fuck the passengers, they are just a necessary inconvenience. Planes are secured more than other methods of transport because they can be flown into buildings. That’s it.
Well, tell me about it !
The term was actually coined by none other than Bruce Schneier himself, who’s still kicking TSA ass in the OP to this day.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_theater
This is quite the interesting thread. Thanks Pteryxx for the link @ 154.
@Travis: so true about Fredericton. Last summer I flew to Montreal from Fredericton, where they squeezed my valuable watercolour tubes (an absolute no-no) and declared them to be liquids, then made me choose between them and my toiletries. This was after the first officer had already examined and approved my bag.
When I complained that the rules were not even hinted at on the Air Canada site, I was told, rudely, that they don’t work for Air Canada and don’t have any obligation to publicize their rules.
Later, in the waiting room, one of the stewards (or whatever they’re called these days) came over and told me he had witnessed the rude treatment, that they had no right to treat a senior that way, and asked me for permission to file a complaint on my behalf.
But that’s precisely what’s in question: whether the treatment does serve real security purposes, and whether it’s a huge over-reaction – and so far, I’m not in the least convinced of the contrary arguments.
You’re plain wrong. I am not missing the point. I have to do a fair bit of longish-distance travel for my job, and wherever possible (roughly, when the 1-way journey takes no more than 2 days and a night, and I can avoid costs my employer or funder would consider excessive), I go by surface transport. But beyond that, all long-distance travel is energy-hungry, and at present that means greenhouse gas spewing. Both jobs and lives need to be arranged so that much less of it happens, and anything that pushes people in that direction is good in that respect, whatever its other drawbacks. The sort of climate change you can expect in your lifetime without drastic reductions in such emissions will be a good deal more than “intrusive and humiliating”.
you won’t do shit about AGW by making flying a miserable and abusive experience. because people won’t stop flying when they need to, and otherwise they’ll just start driving, individually, all across this country, in their SUV’s and minivans. Because those are really the only two options, seeing as the train service in the US looks like this; the most direct route across the US takes 4 days (Seattle to NYC), and most parts of the US aren’t reachable by train at all. Hell, there are entire states not reachable by rail.
And they aren’t going to simply stop traveling either; especially not with the ever-greater distances one needs to move to find a job and/or a cheep, decent education, resulting in extended and even nuclear families being sprinkled about multiple states.
Odd. The last 3 times I’ve flown from the UK, I’ve been asked to take my shoes off.
The last time I flew (to Spain), I had 75ml of prescribed skin cream in a transparent 125ml container. I was refused entry, so had to rush downstairs and buy an empty (opaque) 100ml container. Rushed upstairs again, and in front of the security people, transferred contents from the larger container to the smaller. “Ok sir, no problem now, it’s the container that’s the problem, not the amount of liquid in it”. Idiocy.
In the UK, belts have to be taken off because they have metal buckles, which register in the metal detectors.
But then there’s the largish piece of metal in my leg – been there 15 years, never detected at an airport. I sometimes point it out to them after they’ve harassed me. They then scan my leg, and still can’t detect it. So, make your gun from titanium and plastic, and it won’t get spotted…
and i should add: a lot of the smaller airports aren’t even affected by any of this. Minot airport, you can show up 15 minutes before the boarding. So, the flights from one middle-of-nowhere town to another middle-of-nowhere town won’t be deterred by harassing people at international airports.
well, they might chose to fly out of canada or mexico; or, going in the other direction, they might chose to vacation/do business trips somewhere that isn’t the US. and displacement isn’t deterrent.
This is ass-backward from the scientific process. You are presuming that the measures work. The scientific process requires that the TSA demonstrate with solid and conclusive data that their draconian measures actually work. And that data is lacking. Like I asked about the nitrate swabs, what is the rate of finding real explosives, not fertilizer residue, in the luggage? We don’t know. But my hunch is that they never find enough explosives to knock a hole in a plane. Ergo, it is all for show, at much inconvenience to the passengers, and much money in the pockets of the security companies.
There is absolutely no reason why making travelling a less pleasant experience would not lead to less travelling than would otherwise occur. As I said, much travel is “discretionary”. Or are you claiming decisions about travel are somehow exempt from the normal process of weighing up pros and cons?
The role of TSA in maintaining national security is much like the role of a pastie in preventing nudity. Even if air transportation were made completely safe, what about everything else?
I mean, if I were a terrorist, I wouldn’t even be thinking about blowing up or hijacking a plane. There are thousands of unguarded soft-targets. It isn’t that hard to kill a lot of people in a really terrifying way.
Utter bilge. In cases of uncertainty, the rational approach is to take precautions that have a good prospect of working, even without evidence that they do – although of course they can and should be revised if there is evidence that they don’t. All I’ve seen here is a lot of whining and worthless anecdotage.
Yours is utter bilge. Look at the hijacking rate prior to 9/11. Essentially nil for years. That is what I mean about controls, and with controls and context in place. there is nothing but security theater, which matches the prior rate. Look at your emotional, not logical, response. It makes you feel safer, gives you the warm fuzzies, and makes you think you don’t have to worry. But you still do.
To take the specific case of shoes, we know that explosives can be smuggled in shoes, and that one attempt to do so failed because the fuse was damp, not through any more fundamental flaw in the plan. We know that the scanners used are not good at detecting things in shoes that are being worn. It is therefore a rational precaution to make passengers take their shoes off, even if, as a matter of fact, this never prevents a single terrorist atrocity.
people already hate traveling; hating it some more won’t change the needs to congregate for christmas, thanksgiving, 4th of July, etc.
i see you don’t actually care that I just answered this in my previous posts
@Jadehawk:
Not to mention people who have to fly out TODAY for a trip to Albany TODAY for a meeting TODAY! WHY ARE YOU NOT ON A PLANE YET?! Go go go go! (Happened to me, but it was tomorrow rather than today.)
Not really – we appear to be having an argument over whether or not they are efficient angry, evil, power-hungry little people.
I have head more than one analysis of the situation suggest that in empowering the TSA to bully us, we are acting on a sort of latent desire to address tragedy with hardship, even if the two are unrelated in effect. something bad happened, and we’re too happy and comfortable, and that makes us feel guilty, so we invent a way to be less happy and comfortable because that makes us feel better about the bad thing. Doing penance, in effect. Or something.
…the thought has suddenly occurred that it might be possible to look at the acceptance of conservative-style deprivation-based economic policy in this light. Hmmm…
KG,
As I pointed out earlier, any of us is far, far, far, far more likely to die in a car accident, say, than to be a victim of an airline terrorist attack. (Flying is actually the safest form of transportation, statistically, and this was the case long before the current ramped-up security theatre was introduced.) And if a terrorist wanted to set off a bomb, they wouldn’t have to get on a plane to do so. Yet, because of 9/11, the possibility of airline terrorism, specifically, despite its extreme rarity, attracts ridiculous paranoia far beyond the statistical level of risk. That is why it’s a huge over-reaction.
…Which is possible because you happen to be in Europe. It isn’t possible everywhere. It should be, but the US’ long-distance surface transport network is really crappy. If you really want to address AGW, provide effective and affordable alternatives to flying. Making life miserable for people who fly is not a reasonable way of changing things. Please look at what Jadehawk said:
And, again, I’ll point out that your argument about the TSA deterring flying this is a lot like the argument “We have to make fuel much more expensive so that people drive less!” It sounds great, unless you’re in a place with no usable public transport, and need a car to get to work. The way to change people’s behaviour is not to punish them for doing things they need to do; it’s to provide them with alternatives.
That would be relevant, if we had solid evidence not only that the TSA was deterring significant numbers of people from flying, but that this was having a significant effect on worldwide greenhouse emissions and actually affecting the rate of AGW. As it is, you haven’t shown any evidence at all that this is the case; it’s pure speculation. Absent such evidence, it seems to me that the real harm to human beings’ lives caused by these “security measures” enormously outweighs the speculative gain.
And we know that letting people drive cars leads to road accidents (and unlike shoe bombings, such accidents are a very frequent occurrence). Making it illegal to drive would, undoubtedly, lead to fewer people dying in road accidents. Would that make it a “rational precaution” to ban cars? There is such a thing as an over-reaction to a threat.
In any case, as Antiochus points out, there are many much easier targets than airlines for a would-be terrorist. It would be enormously easier for a terrorist to bomb a bus, a train, a public square, or anywhere else where there happens to be a large number of people gathered and where no one is paying attention to hir activities. And there’s nothing we can do to prevent it. In reality, just by being alive and going out in public, we run the risk that we might fall prey to a terrorist attack. But it’s such a rare occurrence, in comparison to other causes of death, that it really is not worth worrying about; it certainly isn’t worth making our lives stressful and miserable in order to guard against a miniscule risk of something bad happening.
It is therefore a rational precaution to make passengers take their shoes off, even if, as a matter of fact, this never prevents a single terrorist atrocity.Given the massive inconvenience and delay to the traveling public, there is no excuse to require people to take off their shoes unless you can show with actual data you are finding explosives/weapons in said shoes. That has been my point all along. Separate the warm fuzzies of thinking you are safer with “show” from reality. You have fallen for the show. I haven’t.
so I actually went and checked, and I was right. Drop in air travel since 9/11 has been relatively small (and apparently mostly caused by baggage checks, not personal security), and have not resulted in fewer people traveling, but in more people driving. Resulting, incidentally, in the equivalent of 4 airplane-crashes worth of new car accidents (520 people/year).
I guess killing Americans is a way to reduce AGW, sooo… I guess I concede the point…?
Dang, blockquote failure #171. The first sentence is KG. The rest is my response.
deadly car accidents, that is.
@DLC 146
I pretty agree with your thinking. If you want headlines, an attack is necessary. Not successful, although that would be a bonus, just very visible.
If you want to make people’s lives hell the appearance of danger is just as good as the real danger itself, and is significantly lower effort to maintain. Add this to a lot of vested interests and here we are.
The worst part of security theatre is that they pack all these people into a line to get through security theatre, a ton of squishy targets – rather than letting them go through and get to the more safe interior of the airport.
Nerd,
All I see in you here is someone desperate to justify their dislike of being inconvenienced, and willing to abandon all rationality to do so. Your #165 is not even coherent at a surface level.
The security precautions do not make me feel safer: when I do fly, I never give a thought to the possibility of a hijack or explosion.
*facecouch*
Overblown airport security kills people.
I know, and it’s been a load of crap all along, since we know it is possible to smuggle explosives onto a plane in your shoes. It is obvious that increasing the chance of detecting such explosives if present – and neither you nor anyone else has given any gorunds to doubt that making people take their shoes off does this – is likely to deter attempts to use this method.
Do you have evidence for any of the premises you relied upon to draw this conclusion?
Obviously you do. Otherwise, the security theater would be an unnecessary evil impeding your freedom movement, without making it actually safer to travel in a cost-effective manner.
Ben Franklin got it right:
ruteekatreya,
1) We know explosives can be smuggled onto planes hidden in shoes because it has been done.
2) Those responsible for the scanners used say they can’t readily detect anything hidden in shoes while they are worn, but can when they are not. I don’t know they aren’t lying, but even if you assume they are generally mendacious, why exactly would they lie about this specific fact? What would they gain by it?
3) If a potential terrorist knows that a specific smuggling method is unlikely to succeed, then assuming minimal instrumental rationality on the terrorist’s part, they will not try this method. If they know it is likely to succeed, they will be likely to use it.
Which of these claims do you dispute, and on what grounds?
I asked you for evidence of any of your premises, not a repetition of the premises.
My issue with having to take shoes off it that it delays everything a lot. On occasion the only reason I haven’t missed connecting flights due to security theater is the fact that those flights were late.
When you arrive in the US, all your luggage is unloaded, you have to reclaim it, check it in again and go through the whole fun & games again before you can go to your connecting flight. Hello? Wasn’t I screened before I boarded the transatlantic flight? Why am I not simply sent through a corridor that goes directly to the terminal for my connecting flight and lies entirely behind the controls? Because that’s how it works at several airports in Europe. Oh, you mean that would require modifying the ancient building of the airport? I wonder if all the other security circus doesn’t cost more within a year or two.
*catatonic shock*
Yeah, well, neither do I, but that may be because I’m on the autism spectrum and don’t take meatspace seriously enough.
On the whole subject of security it gets even better outside the USA.
One million British travellers planning to fly to Canada, the Caribbean and Mexico this year face the risk of being turned away at the airport – at the insistence of the US Department of Homeland Security.
KG, Searchbot et al are obviously Al Qaeda operatives :P They know that it is all security theatre and that it won’t stop any terrorist attacks, that is why they are defending the TSA so vigourously!
/snark
But what if we’d put scanners…
Hey, I think we may be on to a quick fix for the unemployment rate!
Actually if I were a terrorist I would be researching heavily populated areas in the midwest. Big enough to make a splash bur rural and distant enough from major metropolitan areas to send the message. None of you are safe. The City isn’t safe, the Country isn’t safe, The air isn’t safe, the trains aren’t safe, the road’s aren’t safe. The strike will come and it could hit any one of you and there’s nothing you can do about it, but do please try.
People forget the goal of terrorism isn’t the actual attack, it’s the aftermath.
On one hand I’m semi-sympathetic to the TSA and that (in theory) because I believe most security is theater i.e. deterrence. My issue is that I don’t believe terrorism is an occurrence like shoplifting or car theft that can be deterred.
[meta]
Maybe it’s not just an autism thing. I often find myself emotionally unafraid of things that I rationally know ought to make me afraid. And vice-versa. My risk management skills are largely for shit.
[/meta]
For example, this should frighten me ;)
[I’ve had the same thought, Ing…I’m surprised that the terrorists aren’t doing a better job.]
OMG Rick Santorum was right, teh terrorists are going to blow up North Dakota’s 40th most populous city!
@Ing
#188
Maybe because, if pushed hard enough, their opponent might decide to dispense with the whole “Geneva convention” thing and level the terrorists’ host country in retaliation.
#193, oops, not Ing.
@Antiochus Epiphanes
#191
Ha. If that were the goal, there’d be TSA agents at every lane in the baggage control instead of just 2 out of 10, and you’d get through five times faster.
Little-known fact: terrorists are complete morons.
Take your average apologist from the Internet. Now imagine someone 10 times as zealous (if you can, LOL). How much intelligence do you think can possibly be left?
LOL. That has already pretty much happened; it’s the reason for terrorism from such places. Remember, you’re talking about people who actually want everyone around them to die as martyrs.
Unless of course you’re suddenly talking about the much more common homegrown terrorists.
@David
#196
I wonder if they would like another Genghis Khan style sacking?
Found a somewhat relevant Wiki page.
The bomber will always get through
In short, good offense always beats good defense.
Also I’m more concerned about the bigger security risk behind the scenes. Imo the biggest security weak spot is the disgruntled or desperate employee…from the stories I’ve heard of how airline personal are treated that troubles me
You’re just being silly. The evidence for (1) is the news stories about the shoe bomber, and for (2), the statements of the TSA that scanners cannot readily detect things in shoes that are being worn. (3) simply relies on the general truth that people usually select means of achieving their ends that they believe have a good chance of accomplishing those ends.
Now, maybe you’d like to answer my question: which of my (1)-(3) do you dispute, and on what grounds?
What’s the difference between then and now? Horses instead of stealth bombers?
So you’re insisting that the thing that is deterring a failed bombing attempt is the security, not the fact that the bombing itself failed even when undetected, then? I guess the TSA is more a lucky scanner than a lucky wallet, huh?
No, I’m not “insisting” on that. I don’t even know there is currently anyone trying to find a way to smuggle explosives onto a plane at all. I’m saying it is a rational precaution to make people remove their shoes, as it is likely both to deter potential shoe-bombers, and to catch them if they do make the attempt. We know, and potential terrorists know, that the plan was in fact viable and failed because the fuse got damp, as already pointed out.
Now, how about answering my question, hmm?
@ruteekatreya
#201
Then: Deliberate destruction of infrastructure, extermination of population and erasure of culture (basically, anything you can think of conceivably that the Mongols can destroy, they did).
Now: Well, at least we’re not trying to exterminate the population and utterly fuck them up.
We’ve got the first and the last covered, and the mongols didn’t always practice the middle (Or any of them, really)
Not /entirely/, perhaps.
Do you not understand how the italicized part makes it absurd to make the bolded statement?
Don’t. Be. So. Silly. Of course it doesn’t. It is highly likely that there are people trying to find ways to smuggle explosives onto planes, and therefore there are highly likely to be people who can be deterred by security precautions. I just don’t know that there are.
Now, how about answering my question, hmm? I think it’s reasonable to conclude that you don’t have an answer if you again fail to give one.
@ruteekatreya
#204
True, but against the Khwarazmian dynasty, they certainly did all three.
I don’t understand.
There is nothing absurd at all about the bolded statement.
It’s called risk management.
I too have no idea whether anybody is plotting to smuggle a bomb onto a plane right now or recently.
I do know that hiding a bomb in your shoe has already been proven to be an effective plan if nobody’s checking shoes.
I would prefer that people responsible for air-travel security do something to deter the proven effective method. That would seem to entail checking shoes.
Wow, there’s a lot of shitty thinking on this thread. The usual suspects. I’m only picking on rutee as the most recent.
oh, and one note to the internet logicians: comment #67 is, in fact an actual example of a real live argumentum ad hominem. It really is.
Likely based on fucking what? I can talk all I want about how, for instance, prison might serve as a deterrant to criminals, and it makes intuitive sense, but the evidence suggests that the threat of prison doesn’t deter criminals in any practical sense. Why should I assume that security measures are actually deterring would be terrerists? You say it’s likely; what do you base this off of?
Are you incapable of inference? I’m asking you to substantiate your claim of deterrence, which most closely correlates to 3, and it is on the grounds that you are only supplying me with ‘common sense’, as it stands; That’s not a good basis to make actual decisions with.
It’s a contradiction; how do you make statements on what’s likely if you don’t even know how common the event you’re discussing is to start with?
That implies quantified risks. Show your damn work, if you’re going to claim this.
It is a very strange effective plan that ends in your operative in custody and an unexploded plane.
God damn, how about I throw you idiots a gimme? Rather than arguing that checking shoes is effective, why aren’t you morons trying to argue that the current security measures are forcing them to try difficult-to-impossible plans to begin with (Underwear, shoes)? It still wouldn’t establish that security in airports to this degree is really enhancing safety, but at least it won’t be as patently absurd as “These plans fail, and therefore we must do the most intrusive things possible to prevent future occurrences of them”
I mean, seriously, you don’t know the occurence of these actions, and you’re talking about what’s ‘likely’ about them. That’s like if I asked you “What are the odds that an evenly weighted die will come up as 1 if I cast it?” The intuitive answer is 1/6; you know the likelihood based on what you think you know. But it could be 1/4 (Because it’s actually a d4) or 1/100 (Because I have a novelty d/100). As it stands, you’re telling me you know the likelihood of a die face coming up, and you haven’t even established you know what kind of die it is.
blockquote>Plus, PZ, what exactly are the “real security issues”?
Well, what about mechanical inspection and quality control of the procedures involved in flying airplanes ?
Keep in mind that the vast majority of airplane crashes are not due to terrorist attacks but to mechanical failures and human error.
When you think about this and see that Air Canada, for instance, intends to contract out mechanical inspection of its airplanes to questionable companies in Salavador that employ low-wage workers to save a few bucks, while millions of dollars are invested in pissing off passengers in search of an elusive bomb, it is, to say the least, a bit puzzling.
[absurd idea]
Why not profile shoes? Shoes are a piss-poor explosive device, with a very thin explosive area that must flex, and unless you get a clump of HE together, it’s not likely to much damage other than the foot of the terrorist. Profile shoes that actually has such a storage space. Say women’s shoes with high and blocky heels, orthopedic shoes, lifts, or hiking/combat boots. Leave the rest of us alone. Same results as now I bet.
[/absurd idea]
@rutee
#208
And to quantify risk, we’re going to need to agree on how much you value the life of 1 human (or groups of humans).
Hm… thought exercise.
So, for example, if I value 1 human life at $1 billion dollars. This gives the value about $0.40 per human second.
Let’s say all the security measures add/waste, on average, 20 minutes of your life, which is a little under $500 per traveler per air-travel.
Given FAA statistics, there are 737.4 million passenger traveling per year.
So, just going by the annual time-cost to travelers, we’re already paying around 368 billion dollars a year (so about 368 lives a year), disregarding the money paid in tax/airline ticket to pay for the security.
So, going back to $1 billion a life, the annual cost is equivalent to 368 lives lost per year (in short, TSA need to “save” at least that many a year to even have a chance to be considered effective).
On 9/11, 3000 people died. So, unless TSA expect a 9/11 style attack once every 9 years. There’s simply no way for current system to be cost-effective given the time wasted.
Cost-benefit analyses cited on Schneier’s blog: (emphasis mine)
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2011/04/counterterroris.html
See also: http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2011/01/cost-benefit_an.html
We know explosives can be done by surgical embedding. Why don’t you support a full surgical examination of everyone?
Things the TSA does:
– Make people waste time and annoy them through all sorts of tests.
Things the TSA did not do:
– Prevent 9/11
– Save the world from the shoe bomber.
– Create a no fly list with tons of false positives.
Sorry, accidentally put “Create a no fly list…” in the “did not do” part instead of the “does” part. I fail.
In the worst case, how much explosive can you smuggle in a shoe, anyway? Is it actually enough to down a plane?
Isn’t there the problem that we run into Lisa Simpson’s Tiger Stone situation? “There have been no explosions or attempts at smuggling explosives therefore the security systems are working” with that justification the screenings can be kept in place forever.
On the same subject, but in a slightly different direction, when was the last time you were screened when getting on a train; crossing a bridge; or driving through a tunnel?