Originally Posted by
jkhuggins
The chief problem, as Schneier points out, is that many people confuse "suspicious" with "unusual". "Unusual" is an easier word to define: anything that doesn't normally happen within the scope of the life experience of the observer.
Usually, things that are "suspicious" are "unusual". However, things that are unusual aren't inherently suspicious. Being "suspicious" requires the ability to assess risk and threat: a property which people are notoriously bad at, unless specifically trained. And most of us (myself included) aren't trained in that regard.
Valid points and to add something, what I think is suspicious, you think is suspicious, and someone else thinks is suspicious can all be very different. That doesn't help things. For example, people taking pictures at an airport is neither suspicious or unusual in general. Now people taking pictures of say, x-ray screens, or LEO locations, or things like that, to me anyway, would be suspicious. But others might disagree.