Given bare or stockinged feet, the lack of floor mats is also a chronic problem, Mr. Weinstein said. Matt Blaze, an associate professor of computer science at the University of Pennsylvania and an expert in security cryptology, agreed.

“Somehow we ended up with this cobbled-together mess,” he said. “At the very point in the process at which you have to take your shoes off, that’s where the carpeting ends.”

From a customer service standpoint, it’s “infuriating,” he said. But disorder also raises genuine security concerns.

“There’s no better place to get away with something than a chaotic environment,” he said.