Entries Tagged "TSA"

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Five-Year-Old Boy Detained by the TSA

His name is similar to someone on the “no fly” list:

A five-year-old boy was taken into custody and thoroughly searched at Sea-Tac because his name is similar to a possible terrorist alias. As the Consumerist reports, “When his mother went to pick him up and hug him and comfort him during the proceedings, she was told not to touch him because he was a national security risk. They also had to frisk her again to make sure the little Dillinger hadn’t passed anything dangerous weapons or materials to his mother when she hugged him.”

The explanation is simple: to the TSA, following procedure is more important than common sense. But unfortunately, catching the next terrorist will require more common sense than it will following proper procedure.

If I ever get to interview Kip Hawley again, I’ll ask him about this.

EDITED TO ADD (1/12): Another kid on the no-fly list.

Posted on January 10, 2008 at 10:53 AM • View Comments

Airport Behavioral Profiling Leads to an Arrest

I’m generally a fan of behavioral profiling. While it sounds weird and creepy and has been likened to Orwell’s “facecrime”, there’s no doubt that—when done properly—it works at catching common criminals:

On Dec. 4, Juan Carlos Berriel-Castillo, 22, and Bernardo Carmona-Olivares, 20, were planning to fly to Maui but were instead arrested on suspicion of forgery.

They tried to pass through a Terminal 4 security checkpoint with suspicious documents, Phoenix police spokeswoman Stacie Derge said.

The pair had false permanent-resident identification, and authorities also found false Social Security cards, officials say.

While the pair were questioned about the papers, a TSA official who had received behavior-recognition training observed a third man in the area who appeared to be connected to Berriel-Castillo and Carmona-Olivares, Melendez said.

As a result, police later arrested Samuel Gonzalez, 32. A background check revealed that Gonzalez was wanted on two misdemeanor warrants.

TSA press release here.

Security is a trade-off. The question is whether the expense of the Screening Passengers by Observation Techniques (SPOT) program, given the minor criminals it catches, is worth it. (Remember, it’s supposed to catch terrorists, not people with outstanding misdemeanor warrants.) Especially with the 99% false alarm rate:

Since January 2006, behavior-detection officers have referred about 70,000 people for secondary screening, Maccario said. Of those, about 600 to 700 were arrested on a variety of charges, including possession of drugs, weapons violations and outstanding warrants.

And the other social costs, including loss of liberty, restriction of fundamental freedoms, and the creation of a thoughtcrime. Is this the sort of power we want to give a police force in a constitutional democracy, or does it feel more like a police-state sort of thing?

This “Bizarro” cartoon sums it up nicely.

Posted on January 3, 2008 at 12:49 PM • View Comments

New Lithium Battery Rules for U.S. Airplanes

Starting in 2008, there are new rules for bringing lithium batteries on airplanes:

The following quantity limits apply to both your spare and installed batteries. The limits are expressed in grams of “equivalent lithium content.” 8 grams of equivalent lithium content is approximately 100 watt-hours. 25 grams is approximately 300 watt-hours:

  • Under the new rules, you can bring batteries with up to 8-gram equivalent lithium content. All lithium ion batteries in cell phones are below 8 gram equivalent lithium content. Nearly all laptop computers also are below this quantity threshold.
  • You can also bring up to two spare batteries with an aggregate equivalent lithium content of up to 25 grams, in addition to any batteries that fall below the 8-gram threshold. Examples of two types of lithium ion batteries with equivalent lithium content over 8 grams but below 25 are shown below.
  • For a lithium metal battery, whether installed in a device or carried as a spare, the limit on lithium content is 2 grams of lithium metal per battery.
  • Almost all consumer-type lithium metal batteries are below 2 grams of lithium metal. But if you are unsure, contact the manufacturer!

Near as I can tell, this affects pretty much no one except audio/visual professionals. And the TSA isn’t saying whether this is a safety issue or a security issue. They aren’t giving any reason. But those of you who paid close attention to the Second Movie-Plot Threat Contest know of the dangers:

Terrorists camouflages bombs as college textbooks, with detonators hidden in the lithium-ion batteries of various electronics. The terrorist nonchalantly wanders up by the cockpit with his armed textbook and detonates it right after the seat belt sign goes off, but while the plane is still over an inhabited area. Thousands die, with most of the casualties on the ground.

Chat about the ban on FlyerTalk. Does any other country have any similar restrictions?

EDITED TO ADD (12/28): It’s not a TSA rule; it’s an FAA rule.

The FAA has found that current systems for putting out aircraft cargo fires could not suppress a fire if a shipment of non-rechargeable batteries ignited during flight, the release said.

Here’s the actual rule; it’s the DOT that published it. Lithium batteries have been banned as cargo for a long time now. This is the DC-8 fire that led to the ban.

Posted on December 28, 2007 at 3:05 PM • View Comments

Airport Security Study

Surprising nobody, a new study concludes that airport security isn’t helping:

A team at the Harvard School of Public Health could not find any studies showing whether the time-consuming process of X-raying carry-on luggage prevents hijackings or attacks.

They also found no evidence to suggest that making passengers take off their shoes and confiscating small items prevented any incidents.

[…]

The researchers said it would be interesting to apply medical standards to airport security. Screening programs for illnesses like cancer are usually not broadly instituted unless they have been shown to work.

Note the defense by the TSA:

“Even without clear evidence of the accuracy of testing, the Transportation Security Administration defended its measures by reporting that more than 13 million prohibited items were intercepted in one year,” the researchers added. “Most of these illegal items were lighters.”

This is where the TSA has it completely backwards. The goal isn’t to confiscate prohibited items. The goal is to prevent terrorism on airplanes. When the TSA confiscates millions of lighters from innocent people, that’s a security failure. The TSA is reacting to non-threats. The TSA is reacting to false alarms. Now you can argue that this level of failures is necessary to make people safer, but it’s certainly not evidence that people are safer.

For example, does anyone think that the TSA’s vigilance regarding pies is anything other than a joke?

Here’s the actual paper from the British Medical Journal:

Of course, we are not proposing that money spent on unconfirmed but politically comforting efforts to identify and seize water bottles and skin moisturisers should be diverted to research on cancer or malaria vaccines. But what would the National Screening Committee recommend on airport screening? Like mammography in the 1980s, or prostate specific antigen testing and computer tomography for detecting lung cancer more recently, we would like to open airport security screening to public and academic debate. Rigorously evaluating the current system is just the first step to building a future airport security programme that is more user friendly and cost effective, and that ultimately protects passengers from realistic threats.

I talked about airport security at length with Kip Hawley, the head of the TSA, here.

Posted on December 27, 2007 at 6:28 AM • View Comments

"Where Should Airport Security Begin?"

In this essay, Clark Ervin argues that airport security should begin at the front door to the airport:

Like many people, I spend a lot of time in airport terminals, and I often think that they must be an awfully appealing target to terrorists. The largest airports have huge terminals teeming with thousands of passengers on any given day. They serve as conspicuous symbols of American consumerism, with McDonald’s restaurants, Starbucks coffee shops and Disney toy stores. While airport screeners do only a so-so job of checking for guns, knives and bombs at checkpoints, there’s no checking for weapons before checkpoints. So if the intention isn’t to carry out an attack once on board a plane, but instead to carry out an attack on the airport itself by killing people inside it, there’s nothing to stop a terrorist from doing so.

[…]

To prevent smaller attacks—and larger ones that could be catastrophic—what if we moved the screening checkpoints from the interior of airports to the entrance? The sooner we screen passengers’ and visitors’ persons and baggage (both checked and carry-on) for guns, knives and explosives, the sooner we can detect those weapons and prevent them from being used to sow destruction.

This is a silly argument, one that any regular reader of this blog should be able to counter. If you’re worried about explosions on the ground, any place you put security checkpoints is arbitrary. The point of airport security is to prevent terrorism on the airplanes, because airplane terrorism is a more serious problem than conventional bombs blowing up in crowded buildings. (Four reasons. First, airlines are often national symbols. Second, airplanes often fly to dangerous countries. Third, for whatever reason, airplanes are a preferred terrorist target. And fourth, the particular failure mode of airplanes means that even a small bomb can kill everyone on board. That same bomb in an airport means that a few people die and many more get injured.) And most airport security measures aren’t effective.

His bias betrays itself primary through this quote:

Like many people, I spend a lot of time in airport terminals, and I often think that they must be an awfully appealing target to terrorists.

If he spent a lot of time in shopping malls, he would probably think they must be awfully appealing targets as well. They also “serve as conspicuous symbols of American consumerism, with McDonald’s restaurants, Starbucks coffee shops and Disney toy stores.” He sounds like he’s just scared.

Face it, there are far too many targets. Stop trying to defend against the tactic, and instead try to defend against terrorism. Airport security is the last line of defense, and not a very good one at that. Real security happens long before anyone gets to an airport, a shopping mall, or wherever.

Posted on December 20, 2007 at 12:28 PM • View Comments

New TSA Report

A classified 2006 TSA report on airport security has been leaked to USA Today. (Other papers are covering the story, but their articles seem to be all derived from the original USA Today article.)

There’s good news:

This year, the TSA for the first time began running covert tests every day at every checkpoint at every airport. That began partly in response to the classified TSA report showing that screeners at San Francisco International Airport were tested several times a day and found about 80% of the fake bombs.

Constant testing makes screeners “more suspicious as well as more capable of recognizing (bomb) components,” the report said. The report does not explain the high failure rates but said O’Hare’s checkpoints were too congested and too wide for supervisors to monitor screeners.

At San Francisco, “everybody realizes they are under scrutiny, being watched and tested constantly,” said Gerald Berry, president of Covenant Aviation Security, which hires and manages the San Francisco screeners. San Francisco is one of eight airports, most of them small, where screeners work for a private company instead of the TSA. The idea for constant testing came from Ed Gomez, TSA security director at San Francisco, Berry said. The tests often involve an undercover person putting a bag with a fake bomb on an X-ray machine belt, he said.

Repeated testing is good, for a whole bunch of reasons.

There’s bad news:

Howe said the increased difficulty explains why screeners at Los Angeles and Chicago O’Hare airports failed to find more than 60% of fake explosives that TSA agents tried to get through checkpoints last year.

The failure rates—about 75% at Los Angeles and 60% at O’Hare—are higher than some tests of screeners a few years ago and equivalent to other previous tests.

Sure, the tests are harder. But those are miserable numbers.

And there’s unexplainable news:

At San Diego International Airport, tests are run by passengers whom local TSA managers ask to carry a fake bomb, said screener Cris Soulia, an official in a screeners union.

Someone please tell me this doesn’t actually happen. “Hi Mr. Passenger. I’m a TSA manager. You know I’m not lying to you because of this official-looking laminated badge I have. We need you to help us test airport security. Here’s a ‘fake’ bomb that we’d like you to carry through security in your luggage. Another TSA manager will, um, meet you at your destination. Give the fake bomb to him when you land. And, by the way, what’s your mother’s maiden name?”

How in the world is this a good idea? And how hard is it to dress real TSA managers up like vacationers?

EDITED TO ADD (10/24): Here’s a story of someone being asked to carry an item through airport security at Dulles Airport.

EDITED TO ADD (10/26): TSA claims that this doesn’t happen:

TSA officials do not ask random passengers to carry fake bombs through checkpoints for testing at San Diego International Airport, or any other airport.

[…]

TSA Traveler Alert: If approached by anyone claiming to be a TSA employee asking you to take something through the checkpoint, please contact a uniformed TSA employee at the checkpoint or a law enforcement officer immediately.

Is there anyone else who has had this happen to them?

Posted on October 19, 2007 at 2:37 PM • View Comments

Shoe Scanners at the Orlando Airport

I flew through Orlando today, and saw an automatic shoe-scanner in the lane for Clear passengers.

Poking around on the TSA website, I found this undated page. It seems they didn’t pass the TSA tests, and will be discontinued:

The shoe scanning feature on the machine presented for testing on August 20 does not meet minimum detection standards. While significant improvements were made, (in fact a new machine was submitted) the shoe scanner still does not meet standards to ensure detection of explosives.

GE’s been apprised of these results and TSA and GE have agreed to continue working together. TSA and its partners at the laboratory stand ready to further test the GE shoe scanner feature upon completion of additional detection capability enhancements to meet the agreed upon security requirements.

The machine currently in use in Orlando does not meet minimum detection standards and several additional security measures are required by TSA to mitigate the shortfalls of the shoe scanner feature. Accordingly, the prototype shoe scanner used in Orlando will be discontinued, effective October 10. It had been hoped that an acceptable scanner would be available, but given that the lab prototype does not meet all standards, TSA will not authorize the shoe scanner feature for security purposes in any of the airports where it is currently deployed and awaiting use. The GE Kiosks may be used to read biometric cards associated with the Registered Traveler program but will not provide a security benefit.

Posted on October 10, 2007 at 4:02 PM • View Comments

Weird Terrorist Threat Story from the Raleigh Airport

This is all strange:

In a telephone interview, Fischvogt also told me, “we received word from the pilot about the suspicious activity before the flight landed.” Fischvogt explained that when Flight 518 landed, it sat on the tarmac for 45 minutes before FBI “took jurisdiction,” boarded the plane and arrested two people. DHS and local law enforcement were also present on the tarmac but “FBI took over the sight and the situation,” Fischvogt said.

“Wait a minute,” I asked, “The passengers were stuck inside the plane with two bad guys for 45 minutes before law enforcement boarded the aircraft?” I wanted to make sure I heard Fischvogt correctly.

“Yes,” Fischvogt confirmed.

Consider the agencies present 24/7 at the federalized Raleigh-Durham International Airport: FBI, DHS, (TSA & Federal Air Marshal Service), Joint Terrorism Task Force, ICE (Immigrations and Customs Enforcement) and airport police. And yet it took seven law enforcement agencies some forty-five minutes to put a single officer on the plane to counter the threat and secure the aircraft?

My analysis is that the delay was caused by FBI and DHS fighting over who had jurisdiction; protocol over ‘acts of air piracy’ are a constant source of bickering between the two agencies and have been the subject of at least one DHS Inspector General’s Report.

Of course the threat was a false alarm, but still….

EDITED TO ADD (10/9): Read the comments. The author of this blog seems to be a fear-mongering nutcase. (I should have read more about the source before posting this.)

Posted on October 8, 2007 at 1:56 PM • View Comments

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Sidebar photo of Bruce Schneier by Joe MacInnis.