TSA Fails Most Tests
 

http://abcnews.go.com/US/tsa-fails-t...ry?id=51022188

Maybe they should start paying more attention to their xray and NoS screens and less attention to their cellphones and people's genitals.

Pissy doesn't deserve a bonus for this lackluster performance, but he'll probably get one because catching 20% of contraband is so much better than catching 5%.

Perhaps if TSA fully staffed more lanes, they wouldn't have such horrendous long lines and the resulting chaos. They might find it easier to concentrate on the task at hand without all the self-generated pressure and distractions.

I'm sure the last test failures were followed up with a list of recommendations for TSA. I wonder if they bothered to follow those recommendations (because I seriously doubt they were responsible for the increased focus on genitals and breast milk).

It's interesting to see TSA faulted for not following procedure. Someone should have reminded the testers that screeners have the final say on what actual procedures are at the checkpoint and in baggage search.

Well, we can't blame the former TSA Administrator for this years round of tests and have yet had a naming contest for Pekoske.

Seems TSA is doing somewhat better than the 95% failure rate of the last testing that made it to the pubic but how hard is it to improve on a 95% failure rate?

I think this passage from the link in OP's post is interesting:

Wasn't expanding the use of pooches suppose to be how to speed up TSA checkpoints?

2001 to 2017 and it seems that TSA is still flailing away at doing things that minimum pay contractors were doing adequately and for way less than $8,000,000,000.00 taxpayer dollars each year.

"The TSA is taking these findings very seriously" -- TSA Spokesman

"Give us more money for better screener machines and we will be able to see items in carryon luggage." -- TSA Chief in testimony to the US Congress

This is at least the second budget year that I can recall in which TSA has intentionally slowed lines and implemented more odious screening methodology in a blatant and transparent attempt to extort more budget from Congress with outright lies that buying new machines or hiring more people will keep the Bad Guys at bay, reduce the three-hour waits, and eliminate the 95% failure to detect Bad Things.

And let's not forget extorting the general public - "if you had PreCheck, you'd already be home!"

It certainly slows it down at MSP.

A few weeks ago, I was at work at DIA. I went out of security to visit an office in the main terminal and went back to the A Concourse security point. TSA had closed off all but 1 access point and the screening line was long and growing. They even funneled employees and TSA Pre Check into the same long line. It turns out they brought out the explosive detection dog out and was walking up and down the line.

In order to professionalize, you need to Federalize :-(

Yes, it seems the dogs are slowing the lines down. If Pres are supposedly trusted travelers, why are they being sent past the dog? Also, from what I can deduce, the dogs are NOT being walked past passengers but passengers are being forced to divert so that they walk past the dog.

I use to know a guy that was a canine handler. As I remember canines have a very short attention span which limits their work day to pretty short periods. I just don't see how TSA using canines is a long term solution to anything that TSA does.

The real question is why can't TSA train its employees to actually screen for threat items? Is it because these people are looking for things that just don't matter, playing mind games, and fondling genitals?

If TSA is missing somewhere around 80% of threat items then it is clear we are not getting the TSA that our $8,000,000,000.00 annual tax dollars worth.

Fro the ABC link:

A sentiment that has been repeatedly stated for years by many posters on FT.

I wonder what the TSA's failure rate was before the current scope 'n grope regime went into place? We didn't hear much about it back in those days.

Their attempts at increasing security produce the opposite effect.

Two years ago 95%.

I'm more curious about pre-scope (2008?), when TSA transitioned from annoyance to atrocity. TSA was reasonably good at staying out of the headlines until they started scope n' grope.

Yes, one of the ways. The number of ED dogs dedicated to aviation is constantly expanding. The Viper teams are not dedicated to aviation but work any of the modes that TSA has responsibility to "secure." I believe some of the K9s used by Viper teams are being redirected to being dedicated to aviation.


And that is one of the most important points - all of this could be done for WAY less. But TSA is not simply about transportation - it is a highly important aspect of domestic security objectives that could not be achieved without an entity such as TSA providing "cover."

Will we learn next about bear's toilet habits or the religion of the Pope?

The VIPR teams are the clerks who harass us at Metro, AMTARK, light rail and bus terminals. They should be cut from 31 to ZERO.

As noted following previous reports, We, the People, will pay dearly for this.

Congress' Answer -- Throw More Money at the TSA
 

Well, I guess the latest inspection worked like a charm:

At MSP, they even funnel CLEAR past the dog.

Fortunately, they have a dog at only one end. (I won't say which end of the dog they are, everybody already knows that.)

They just stop all passengers from moving for a few minutes while they reboot the dog.

Right! TSA is taking their own responsibility to screening all carryon bags and passengers, as well. You cannot afford to lose their jobs. That's big problems!

This is very bad! They failed to screening the passengers' carryon bag. They should have to be screened all carryon bags. They could slip a gun, knives, boxcutters and a few other items, as well. TSA is not doing good jobs. They have to be improvement. They cannot be afford to lose their jobs. They have to do retraining in the classroom for 40 hours. You are taking own responsibilities to work for TSA. They should listen to manager, supervisor and a few other, as well.

Now, now: some of them were/are actual sworn police officers. They're fun to annoy because you can do the "Are you detaining me" and probably cause game and it's even more effective and legally clear cut than it is when messing with the TSA airport rent-a-goon.

Rep. Rogers' statement makes an assumption that the TSA was working correctly at one point, and now is broken. In my opinion, it's never worked correctly, but it really went downhill after October 2010 when the scanners were introduced. It's just become more broken.

The desired outcome has been achieved. There have been no further terrowist attack on planes in the US and planes aren't falling out of the sky every day. Why should additional funding be required, right?

... as they earn overtime pay at our expense... :(

TSA Office of Inspection Criminal Investigators are now probably trying to find this "unnamed source":

Quote:

---

When ABC News asked the source if the failure rate was 80 percent, the response was, "You are in the ballpark."

---

http://abcnews.go.com/US/tsa-fails-t...ry?id=51022188

Why? The hearings were public not private. I'd read that the committee felt the results should be made public because they were so bad that the public deserved to know.

I think the point is that TSA could (and would) go after someone for 'leaking' the public hearings. All TSA has to do is retroactively reclassify the information revealed at the hearings as SSI or whatever.

I thought it was most interesting that they found 'vulnerabilities' associated with screener performance, equipment and procedures. That doesn't sound like they are doing a whole lot right, even after everyone enjoyed a two-week vacay at the ''academy".

If they aren't using or maintaining the equipment properly, why should the taxpayers fork out $$$ for expensive new unproven 3D technology? Are we going to send everyone back to the 'academy' for another two-week vacay to train them on the new machines when they've failed to master the current equipment?

How can something that is public be leaked?

I doubt that TSA has sent all screeners through the academy. Even considering overly large class sizes of 100 people and starting a new class every week of the year only around 5,200 screeners could be scheduled each year. TSA has somewhere around 40,000 screeners so it will take some time to cycle all current screeners through this training.

Precisely! They have to do retraining again. They have to be improvement. If they passed the security tests. They will let go to work at airports. They are required to do training for approximately 40 hours in the classroom. Every time they have to get better security training. If they don't, they will lose their jobs.

http://theweek.com/articles/736329/tsa-pathetic-failure

The TSA is a pathetic failure

Matthew Walther

​​​​​​​Have a feeling that this author isn't fond if TSA.

I once had them pilot a new technique at LAS - they had the security line stretched out single file so they could walk dogs up and down it it, and then they were letting everyone through the precheck - they just had all the lanes open and people would randomly be sent through every 1/5th or whatever how many scanners there were.

It freaked people out because the line stretched way longer than normal because of the switchbacks but I got through in about 30 mins.

That's the way it should be done, not by making passengers walk by the dog two times.

30 minutes is too long, dogs or not.

The TSA way of screening is inefficient and clearly not effective. I think the whole concept of how TSA screens needs to be tossed on the garbage pile and start from fresh. The simple fact of the matter is that 99.999% of travelers present zero threat. TSA screens like 100% of passengers are a threat.

I was dropping my minor daughter off for a flight she was taking yesterday, and had a pass to take her to the gate. At the xray machine I realize I have my swiss army knife in my pocket still. I tell the TSA agent at Midway that I forgot I had my pocket knife with me, I try to hand it to him to throw it away, and he tells me to put it in a bin and run it through the X-ray.

My knife comes through to the other end just fine, and my daughter gets flagged for extra screening of her backpack because she had an unopened water in it.

An article from Newsweek calling for the privatization of TSA. I think it has merit.

http://www.newsweek.com/tsa-disastro...vatized-718370

THE TSA IS A DISASTROUS FAILURE AND SHOULD BE PRIVATIZED


edit to add:

sorry about the large text size above but I don't see anyway for users to manage font pitch.

But the optics on the 6:00 news are great. It sends the perception that government is protecting us. (From what? is an entirely different question!)

Who protects us from the TSA?