Schneier on Security

The SMH article with a bit of detail about the fallout of the prank is here:

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/al-kyder-virgin-on-the-ridiculous/2006/08/18/1155407997552.html

It's funny that the media & airline take on the prank is "childish". I think it's a great example of how easy it is to socially engineer an airport. If you can pull a prank like that, a real terrorist will likely have no trouble pulling off a somewhat more dire "prank".

If you're not checking baggage, and you're using the Virgin Blue kiosks, then at no point do they ask you for ID.

I'd consider that scary, but it's all security theatre anyway.

The response is so incredibly clueless. They said "well, it's not like "Terry Wrist" is on a watch list, so of course he wasn't stopped." The real point is, anybody can claim to be anyone and get right on a plane. You're counting on a terrorist to use his real name (or a consistent alias).

As has been said, it's all theater anyway, little of it does any good except to make it look like something is being done.

I think that parody like this is priceless to the future of our society.

It makes the masses realise the security theater that is going on, and we all know that education is usually a good first step to actually driving change.

BTW, Happy new year.

The police was pretty angry at them for a rather more outrageous antic, apparently:
"The convoy of three black cars, decked out to resemble an official Canadian motorcade, came within metres of the hotel where US President George W Bush was staying."
"Among those arrested was The Chaser's Chas Licciardello, who sat in one of the cars dressed as Osama bin Laden."

But after some consideration they're talking about dropping charges for.

See here: http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,22873870-5006301,00.html

Re: the fun at APEC, they're also selling T-shirts reading "Free the Chaser 11". Part proceeds go to Amnesty International, which explains why the slogan isn't "Lock up the Chaser 11".

How is this scary? A couple of people put in funny names on their tickets. Big deal. Is this really any more dangerous than when we all used the names "Ben Dover" and "Ivanna tinkle" in elementary school? At no time did they try to get anything past security, or even board the plane. There is plenty about airline security to worry about, this isn't.

I love these guys! They show you all the insecurity's in the world! Remember that people are your biggest security holes!

I love the Chaser.

I love the comments on youtube mentioning what would happen if you tried this in the US. This only cements my view that security in the US is crazy.

Mind you, security isn't great in Australia (see the Chaser's stuff re: APEC 2007). But no one here takes it very seriously. You wouldn't have to worry about the cops shooting you or anything like that (the cops very rarely use guns in Australia).

I think a lot of people commenting here forget that they check your ID with your boarding pass as you pass through security. You can easily get your boarding pass in the ticketing area of the airport after security, but it would be hard (hard meaning requiring good fake ID) to actually USE that boarding pass.

""The Chaser guys could do well with using spell check. Using names that could be genuine such as Al Kyder and Terry Wrist is hardly going to spark a global security alert, especially considering everyone goes through the same stringent security procedures," the airline's spokeswoman, Amanda Bolger, said."

The airline does not seem to understant that is the point of humor. A practical joke should have enough clues to tell the victim that it's a joke, otherwise it's just a simple lie.

And yes, the DNF list does apparently have homonyms and variants that have netted many innocent travellers.

Gotta love this one too, about profiling:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=McB9tsabPn0

Regards
Fake

The Chaser Boys show how empty and ineffective all the security theatrics launched upon the public by politicians and police are. This is why the so-called authorities hate them so much.