Originally Posted by
celle
Most countries will page you to open your bag is they want to look inside - this even happened to me in China.
Alternatively, many people recommend using cable ties to secure their bags.
Whatever you use, you are only protecting your possessions against an opportunistic thief. A really determined thief can open your bags, regardless of how you secure them.
Part of the idea is to collect evidence for the purpose of filing reports and claims. Some TSA locks indicate whether they have been opened and searched. If a thief must damage the luggage to enter it, that's ideal because it creates evidence. But if security needs to cause damage to do their job, that's a problem.
I've been through a lot of airports and never heard someone getting paged to unlock their baggage. Sometimes people get paged for no given reason.. perhaps that's what's going on. But certainly there are numerous cases of peoples locks being cut, so I don't get the impression everyone is given the chance.