DHS IG censures TSA on "SSI"

Old Jan 5, 2017, 8:17 am
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DHS IG censures TSA on "SSI"

“I can only conclude that TSA is abusing its stewardship of the SSI program,” Roth said in the report. “None of these redactions will make us safer and simply highlight the inconsistent and arbitrary nature of decisions that TSA makes regarding SSI information. This episode is more evidence that TSA cannot be trusted to administer the program in a reasonable manner.”
https://www.meritalk.com/articles/dh...ion-decisions/
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Old Jan 5, 2017, 9:12 am
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I think this paragraph from the same link better colors the professionalism of TSA leadership in general.

Roth’s complaint is preceded by a House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform bipartisan report issued in 2014. According to Roth, this report stated that TSA “had engaged in a pattern of improperly designating certain information as SSI in order to avoid its public release because of agency embarrassment and hostility to congressional oversight.”
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Old Jan 5, 2017, 4:31 pm
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Those of us who post regularly in this forum have long recognized that TSA sprays its SSI designation around on its records and documents like a drunken dog marking territory. The very fact that the entire SOP manual is SSI, while none of the contents that travelers need to know are duplicated elsewhere in non-SSI publications, shows the depth of the paranoia and stupidity in which the agency has wallowed almost from the day of its creation.
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Old Jan 6, 2017, 10:15 am
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Originally Posted by WillCAD
Those of us who post regularly in this forum have long recognized that TSA sprays its SSI designation around on its records and documents like a drunken dog marking territory. The very fact that the entire SOP manual is SSI, while none of the contents that travelers need to know are duplicated elsewhere in non-SSI publications, shows the depth of the paranoia and stupidity in which the agency has wallowed almost from the day of its creation.
I've got to believe that, in addition to using SSI to hide information from the public (and Congress) that SSI is also used as a clerkforce motivational tool. You create SSI, tell the clerks that this information is essential to national security and can't be disclosed, and they respond by feeling important. SSI and cop-like uniforms are two key ingredients in the TSA's social engineering approach.
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Old Jan 6, 2017, 10:41 am
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Originally Posted by FliesWay2Much
I've got to believe that, in addition to using SSI to hide information from the public (and Congress) that SSI is also used as a clerkforce motivational tool. You create SSI, tell the clerks that this information is essential to national security and can't be disclosed, and they respond by feeling important. SSI and cop-like uniforms are two key ingredients in the TSA's social engineering approach.
I think it is just little minded people who think they can wield power over others by keeping essential information needed to transit TSA screening secret.

SSI classifications should be terminated forcing TSA into using the national security classification system.
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Old Jan 6, 2017, 10:44 am
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Originally Posted by FliesWay2Much
I've got to believe that, in addition to using SSI to hide information from the public (and Congress) that SSI is also used as a clerkforce motivational tool. You create SSI, tell the clerks that this information is essential to national security and can't be disclosed, and they respond by feeling important. SSI and cop-like uniforms are two key ingredients in the TSA's social engineering approach.
It also provides a sort of 'cover' for the unchecked exercise of 'screener discretion'. Screeners can claim that there are SSI rules for confiscating medical nitro pills, for example, and there is absolutely nothing a pax can do to challenge the confiscation.
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Old Jan 7, 2017, 2:50 pm
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So, does this "censure" have any practical effect? Or does TSA simply go on with business as usual?

If this censure has no effect, then we can just put this next to all the wonderful congressional hearings about TSA that make for great theater and result in nothing.
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Old Jan 8, 2017, 7:03 pm
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Originally Posted by jkhuggins
So, does this "censure" have any practical effect? Or does TSA simply go on with business as usual?

If this censure has no effect, then we can just put this next to all the wonderful congressional hearings about TSA that make for great theater and result in nothing.

Excellent question. I always believed that complying with OIG findings was compulsory. If not then why conduct the review at all?
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