Read this fascinating article about a reporter who keeps trying to arouse the suspicions, and get arrested at airport security... and keeps failing.
As I stood in the bathroom, ripping up boarding passes, waiting for the social network of male bathroom users to report my suspicious behavior, I decided to make myself as nervous as possible. I would try to pass through security with no ID, a fake boarding pass, and an Osama bin Laden T-shirt under my coat. I splashed water on my face to mimic sweat, put on a coat (it was a summer day), hid my driver’s license, and approached security with a bogus boarding pass that Schneier had made for me. I told the document checker at security that I had lost my identification but was hoping I would still be able to make my flight. He said I’d have to speak to a supervisor. The supervisor arrived; he looked smart, unfortunately. I was starting to get genuinely nervous, which I hoped would generate incriminating micro-expressions. "I can’t find my driver’s license," I said. I showed him my fake boarding pass. "I need to get to Washington quickly," I added. He asked me if I had any other identification. I showed him a credit card with my name on it, a library card, and a health-insurance card. "Nothing else?" he asked.
"No," I said.
"You should really travel with a second picture ID, you know."
"Yes, sir," I said.
"All right, you can go," he said, pointing me to the X-ray line. "But let this be a lesson for you."
5 comments:
The article (which I read previously) is really funny and scary, TSA screeners are supposedly 'trained' and yet show repeatedly that they aren't. And just recently there was that TSA employee who was stealing stuff from bags and selling them on Ebay. You want a job done well, train them well, and pay them well... but make failures serious, they will then feel the need to actually do the job right. But of course when you are talking the sheer amoun of TSA employee's raising the budget like that for training and pay raises and even the most liberal spendthrift will balk. But then there is the argument to do away with the whole thing, and thats perhaps not a bad idea.
I'm inclined more to do away with the whole thing than increase it. Well, I would keep some level of airport security... perfunctorial yet detailed enough to scan for and find the average handgun or explosive, so that somebody at the level of "ex-airline employee with a grudge" can't make it onto a plane.
The conventional wisdom (C.W.) is that hijackers spend more time studying new ways to beat airport security than airport security does studying new ways to avoid being beaten by hijackers. C.W. also is (as stated in the article) that the best additions to airplane security have been the impenetrable cockpit door, and passengers' a posteriori knowledge that they have a personal stake in stopping hijackers.
Jil - didn't you go to shooters in Pattaya - I think they are tearing it down (the area it's in actually)
Ding: I'm checking on that. I certainly would hope not, but knowing Pattaya... anything is possible.
Ding: From my buddy Ray at Shooters:
"The bar has been sold and will be remodeled and renamed. I am not a part of the new venture. Manfred retains a minority stake. It is closed as of last night to do the reno."
So I'm not sure if there is going to be any "tearing down" done, but obviously some work is going on.
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