Entries Tagged "air travel"

Page 11 of 46

British Tourists Arrested in the U.S. for Tweeting

Does this story make sense to anyone?

The Department of Homeland Security flagged him as a potential threat when he posted an excited tweet to his pals about his forthcoming trip to Hollywood which read: ‘Free this week, for quick gossip/prep before I go and destroy America’.

After making their way through passport control at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) last Monday afternoon the pair were detained by armed guards.

Despite telling officials the term ‘destroy’ was British slang for ‘party’, they were held on suspicion of planning to ‘commit crimes’ and had their passports confiscated.

There just as to be more than this story. The DHS isn’t monitoring the Tweets of random British tourists—they just can’t be.

EDITED TO ADD (1/30): According to DHS documents received by EPIC, the DHS monitors the Internet, including social media.

In February 2011, the Department of Homeland Security announced that the agency planned to implement a program that would monitor media content, including social media data. The proposed initiatives would gather information from “online forums, blogs, public websites, and messages boards” and disseminate information to “federal, state, local, and foreign government and private sector partners.” The program would be executed, in part, by individuals who established fictitious usernames and passwords to create covert social media profiles to spy on other users. The agency stated it would store personal information for up to five years.

[…]

The records reveal that the DHS is paying General Dynamics to monitor the news. The agency instructed the company to monitor for “[media] reports that reflect adversely on the U.S. Government, DHS, or prevent, protect, respond government activities.”

[…]

The DHS instructed the company to “Monitor public social communications on the Internet.” The records list the websites that will be monitored, including the comments sections of [The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, the Huffington Post, the Drudge Report, Wired, and ABC News.]”

Still, I have trouble believing that this is what happened. For this to work General Dynamics would have had to monitor Twitter for key words. (“Destroy America” is certainly a good key word to search for.) Then, they would have to find out the real name associated with the Twitter account—unlike Facebook or Google+, Twitter doesn’t have real name information—so the TSA could cross-index that name with the airline’s passenger manifests. Then the TSA has to get all this information into the INS computers, so that the border control agent knows to detain him. Sure, it sounds straightforward, but getting all those computers to talk to each other that fast isn’t easy. There has to be more going on here.

EDITED TO ADD (1/30): One reader points out that this story is from the Daily Mail, and that it’s prudent to wait for some more reputable news source to report the story.

EDITED TO ADD (1/30): There’s another story from The Register, but they’re just using the Daily Mail.

EDITED TO ADD (1/30): The FBI is looking for someone to build them a system that can monitor social networks.

The information comes from a document released on 19 January looking for companies who might want to build a monitoring system for the FBI. It spells out what the bureau wants from such a system and invites potential contractors to reply by 10 February.

The bureau’s wish list calls for the system to be able to automatically search “publicly available” material from Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites for keywords relating to terrorism, surveillance operations, online crime and other FBI missions. Agents would be alerted if the searches produce evidence of “breaking events, incidents, and emerging threats.”

Agents will have the option of displaying the tweets and other material captured by the system on a map, to which they can add layers of other data, including the locations of US embassies and military installations, details of previous terrorist attacks and the output from local traffic cameras.

EDITED TO ADD (1/30): New reports are saying that customs was tipped off about the two people, and their detention was not a result of data mining:

“Based on information provided by the LAX Port Authority Infoline—a suspicious activity tipline—CBP conducted a secondary interview of two subjects presenting for entry into the United States,” says the spokesperson, who notes that the CBP “denies entry to thousands of individuals” each year. “Information gathered during this interview revealed that both individuals were inadmissible to the United States and were returned to their country of residence.”

This makes a lot more sense to me.

Posted on January 30, 2012 at 10:52 AM • View Comments

The TSA Proves its Own Irrelevance

Have you wondered what $1.2 billion in airport security gets you? The TSA has compiled its own “Top 10 Good Catches of 2011“:

10) Snakes, turtles, and birds were found at Miami (MIA) and Los Angeles (LAX). I’m just happy there weren’t any lions, tigers, and bears…

[…]

3) Over 1,200 firearms were discovered at TSA checkpoints across the nation in 2011. Many guns are found loaded with rounds in the chamber. Most passengers simply state they forgot they had a gun in their bag.

2) A loaded .380 pistol was found strapped to passenger’s ankle with the body scanner at Detroit (DTW). You guessed it, he forgot it was there…

1) Small chunks of C4 explosives were found in passenger’s checked luggage in Yuma (YUM). Believe it or not, he was brining it home to show his family.

That’s right; not a single terrorist on the list. Mostly forgetful, and entirely innocent, people. Note that they fail to point out that the firearms and knives would have been just as easily caught by pre-9/11 screening procedures. And that the C4—their #1 “good catch”—was on the return flight; they missed it the first time. So only 1 for 2 on that one.

And the TSA decided not to mention its stupidest confiscations:

TSA confiscates a butter knife from an airline pilot. TSA confiscates a teenage girl’s purse with an embroidered handgun design. TSA confiscates a 4-inch plastic rifle from a GI Joe action doll on the grounds that it’s a “replica weapon.” TSA confiscates a liquid-filled baby rattle from airline pilot’s infant daughter. TSA confiscates a plastic “Star Wars” lightsaber from a toddler.

In related news, here’s a rebuttal of the the Vanity Fair article about the TSA and airline security that featured me. I agree with the two points at the end of the post; I just don’t think it changes any of my analysis.

Posted on January 9, 2012 at 6:00 AM • View Comments

Studying Airport Security

Alan A. Kirschenbaum, Michele Mariani, Coen Van Gulijk, Sharon Lubasz, Carmit Rapaport, and Hinke Andriessen, “Airport Security: An Ethnographic Study,” Journal of Air Transport Management, 18 (January 2012): 68-73 (full article is behind a paywall).

Abstract: This paper employs a behavioral science perspective of airport security to, examine security related decision behaviors using exploratory ethnographic observations. Sampling employees from a broad spectrum of departments and occupations in several major airports across Europe, over 700 descriptive items are transcribed into story scripts that are analyzed. The results demonstrate that both formal and informal behavioral factors are present when security decisions are made. The repetitive patterns of behavior allowed us to develop a generic model applicable to a wide range of security related situations. What the descriptions suggest is that even within the formal regulatory administrative framework of airports, actual real-time security behaviors may deviate from rules and regulations to adapt to local situations.

Posted on December 30, 2011 at 6:11 AM • View Comments

Merry Christmas from the TSA

Cupcakes deemed security threat:

Rebecca Hains says she was going through security at the airport in Las Vegas when a TSA agent pulled her aside and said the cupcake frosting was “gel-like” enough to constitute a security risk.

The TSA has officially jumped the shark.

EDITED TO ADD (1/12): The TSA claims that the cupcake they confiscated was in a jar. So this is a less obviously stupid story than I previously thought.

EDITED TO ADD (1/13): The cupcake lady says that the TSA is lying.

Posted on December 25, 2011 at 10:28 AM • View Comments

Assessing Terrorist Threats to Commercial Aviation

This article on airplane security says many of the same things I’ve been saying for years:

Given the breadth and complexity of threats to commercial aviation, those who criticize the TSA and other aviation security regulatory agencies for reactive policies and overly narrow focus appear to have substantial grounding. Three particularly serious charges can be levied against the TSA: it overemphasizes defending against specific attack vectors (such as hijackings or passenger-borne IEDs) at the expense of others (such as insider threats or attacks on airports); it overemphasizes securing U.S. airports while failing to acknowledge the significantly greater threat posed to flights arriving or departing from foreign airports; and it has failed to be transparent with the American people that certain threats are either extremely difficult or beyond the TSA’s ability to control. Furthermore, the adoption of cumbersome aviation security measures in the wake of failed attacks entails a financial burden on both governments and the airline industry, which has not gone unnoticed by jihadist propagandists and strategists. While the U.S. government has spent some $56 billion on aviation security measures since 9/11, AQAP prominently noted that its 2010 cargo plot cost a total of $4,900.

The author is a former Delta advisor. Wired talked to him:

Brandt says aviation security needs a fundamental overhaul. Not only is the aviation industry failing to keep up with the new terrorist tactics, TSA’s regimen of scanning and groping is causing a public backlash. “From the public’s perspective, this kind of refocusing would reduce the amount of screening they have to put up with in the United States,” Brandt tells Danger Room, “and refocus it where it’s needed.”

[…]

None of this is going to be easy, or cheap. Brandt proposes that the government subsidize airlines for better employee background checks or explosives detection tech. But that’s could strike taxpayers as a bailout.

On the other hand, he and Pistole actually share the same headspace, so it’s possible that TSA will buy his overall critique. “The best defense is still developing solid intelligence on terrorist groups interested in targeting aviation,” Brandt says. Beats treating us all like terrorists.

Or, as I say: investigation, intelligence, and emergency response.

Posted on December 13, 2011 at 12:46 PM • View Comments

EU Bans X-Ray Body Scanners

The European Union has banned X-ray full body scanners at airports. Millimeter wave scanners are allowed as long as they conform to privacy guidelines.

Under the new EU legislation the use of security scanners is only allowed in accordance with minimum conditions such as for example that: security scanners shall not store, retain, copy, print or retrieve images; any unauthorised access and use of the image is prohibited and shall be prevented; the human reviewer analysing the image shall be in a separate location and the image shall not be linked to the screened person and others. Passengers must be informed about conditions under which the security scanner control takes place. In addition, passengers are given the right to opt out from a control with scanners and be subject to an alternative method of screening.

Article.

Posted on November 17, 2011 at 1:13 PM • View Comments

TSA Administrator John Pistole on the Future of Airport Security

There’s a lot here that’s worth watching. He talks about expanding behavioral detection. He talks about less screening for “trusted travelers.”

So, what do the next 10 years hold for transportation security? I believe it begins with TSA’s continued movement toward developing and implementing a more risk-based security system, a phrase you may have heard the last few months. When I talk about risk-based, intelligence-driven security it’s important to note that this is not about a specific program per se, or a limited initiative being evaluated at a handful of airports.

On the contrary, risk-based security is much more comprehensive. It means moving further away from what may have seemed like a one-size-fits-all approach to security. It means focusing our agency’s resources on those we know the least about, and using intelligence in better ways to inform the screening process.

[…]

Another aspect of our risk-based, intelligence-driven security system is the trusted traveler proof-of-concept that will begin this fall. As part of this proof-of-concept, we are looking at how to expedite the screening process for travelers we know and trust the most, and travelers who are willing to voluntarily share more information with us before they travel. Doing so will then allow our officers to more effectively prioritize screening and focus our resources on those passengers we know the least about and those of course on watch lists.

[…]

We’re also working with airlines already testing a known-crewmember concept, and we are evaluating changes to the security screening process for children 12-and-under. Both of these concepts reflect the principles of risk-based security, considering that airline pilots are among our country’s most trusted travelers and the preponderance of intelligence indicates that children 12-and-under pose little risk to aviation security.

Finally, we are also evaluating the value of expanding TSA’s behavior detection program, to help our officers identify people exhibiting signs that may indicate a potential threat. This reflects an expansion of the agency’s existing SPOT program, which was developed by adapting global best practices. This effort also includes additional, specialized training for our organization’s Behavior Detection Officers and is currently being tested at Boston’s Logan International airport, where the SPOT program was first introduced.

Posted on September 14, 2011 at 6:55 AM • View Comments

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Sidebar photo of Bruce Schneier by Joe MacInnis.