Just How Safe Is TSA Security?
 

TSA gropes the genitals of men, women, and children looking for WEI which includes knives yet airport workers have free access, almost no chance of screening, and can carry in almost any kind of weapon they wish.

Why is it that TSA claims to protect air travelers when the reality is that TSA doesn't even come close to meeting its mandated obligations to the public?

Man knifed on tarmac at Philadelphia airport.

Box cutter!! The exact same weapon that was used on 9/11 to take over the aircraft that day and here 17 years later the exact same weapon is in the secure area of this airport.

Exactly what does the public get from the $8,000,000,000.00 taxpayer dollars that TSA gets each year?

TSA's answer to date when asked about screening airport workers: "It's too hard."

Don't those workers actually need to use box cutters to do their job?

Serious question? Aircraft cleaners would need box cutters to do exactly what? Stash one under a seat cushion for later recovery during a flight by a bad guy? The issue in my mind is the feces that TSA puts passengers through while airport workers go about their business without notice by TSA.

If I have a house with two doors but only lock one is the house secure? Is an airport secure if a subset of all people entering are not searched?

TSA constantly tells us how "the terrorist" are constantly probing for security weaknesses. It would be a pretty dumb person who can't see through the hole in TSA's security plan.

… to cut boxes? Open bags? Cleaning supplies? Replacement barf bags etc?

I agree with this in the abstract.

However, I don't believe that box cutters pose any threat to aviation whatsoever, given the presence of secured cockpit doors, FAMs, and the willingness of passengers to rush & subdue any attacker.

For the same reason, I don't believe that airport workers having utility knives — which are tools with tons of perfectly legitimate uses — poses any threat to aviation.

Yes, it can pose an interpersonal threat (as in the case you linked), but that is not within TSA's legitimate purposes. People can get beat up, tased, stabbed with a pencil, etc. in an airport or airplane, just like they can anywhere else. So what? That's simply not relevant unless it can take down or hijack a plane, cause mass casualties, or the like.

(Note that this is different from e.g. the security needs of a courthouse, where interpersonal violence is the main thing they need to prevent.)

So in short: yes, criticize the hypocrisy. But don't accept the implicit premise that this is necessary for security.

I wonder just exactly real time security TSA provides to the air side. Sure they more or less....mostly less....screen employees entering concourses but what about other areas? For example, several times while waiting for my wife in baggage claim I’ve watched baggage handlers move between the air side and the baggage claim area with no more security than using their access cards or punching in a security code to a door lock. I’ve seen no indication of any other security like TSA or airport security personnel at those doors.

Taped boxes can be opened with a car key or even an allowed 4" blade or less sharp pointed scissor. In a former life I was involved in aircraft maintenance and don't recall any need for knives to repair or service airplanes. Does a box cutter pose a threat to the ability of an airplane fly? Not to any great extent unless a person gained access to certain areas of the airplane. They do pose a threat to passenger safety and some pilots might capitulate if passengers were threatened which could pose a direct threat.

At my local airport an employee entrance is located just a few feet away from a TSA screening checkpoint. Employees scan their card open the door and walk in, passengers on the other hand get the TSA treatment. I have observed the employees from both sides of the entrance and never saw a security check of any kind. I did see employees entering with a roll-aboard, bags full of 2 liter bottles of beverages and other assorted large unscreened items.

I don't begrudge an employee of having plenty of beverage to drink on a hot Texas day but I do object that they can have those items unscreened while I'm not allowed over 100ml even with screening.

TSA simple does not provide effective security if they lock the front door while leaving the back door standing wide open with a lighted "Welcome, Come In" sign shinning brightly.

Bingo! You and I can't bring liquids but airport employees can...

After all an airport employee is not going to do anything wrong... Oh wait, one of the original "liquid" bomb plotters worked for the airport.

Hmm.. Well I am sure the rest of the airline and airport employees in the world are all safe.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-a6909891.html

Homeland Security arrests airline employee at JFK for allegedly smuggling cocaine

https://www.wcnc.com/article/news/cr.../275-490990880

Maui Now : Firearm Theft Investigation: 3 Hawaiian Airlines Employees Arrested

Thousands Standing Around wasting our tax $$$.

Those are two totally different things, though.

The first is unfairness from unequal treatment. The second is a question of what's actually a security concern.

Let's be honest, the extreme supermajority (like 99.9999%) of things pose no security risk whatsoever. In fact I would bet that more people will be killed by bathtubs per year, no matter how lax or nonexistent the airport screening is, no matter if it's waived for employees or passengers or both.

So your second part is just not true. There is no "more than bathtub level" security-to-aviation threat from allowing employees to come and go without getting groped, even if they're taking their liters of drink or boxcutters or whatever.

There also isn't any from passengers. And that's unfair and wasteful. So don't be pissed at the part where they're not doing the stupid thing, be pissed at the part where they are.

If we take TSA's claims that terrorist organizations are testing and probing airport security daily as true then my position is valid. Any group of people who wish to cause harm or interruption to commercial aviation would not overlook all means to achieve that goal. I do believe that some degree of passenger screening is needed and I also believe that airport workers should be screened to the same standards. If a 150 ml bottle of x is potentially harmful it doesn't matter who has it. If an item is prohibited beyond a checkpoint then it should be prohibited for everyone entering that boundary. I realize exceptions have to be made for tools, fuels, oils, gases, and other materials to conduct aircraft operations but controls need to be in place for those exceptions. Prisons have controls for knives and such in food prep kitchens, tools, and for most other potentially harmful items. While extreme, similar steps can be used at airports to control hazardous materials.

I think a careful review of TSA screening requirements when applied to the operational side of airports would drastically change what TSA suddenly finds allowable. The end result would be of benefit to passengers where only WEI should be interdicted, not breast milk, soda pop, water, pudding, hand lotion, cupcakes in jars, purses with leather embossed images of pistols, body jewelry and so on.

The other possibility is that TSA intentionally exaggerates the threat posed to commercial aviation. Got to keep that funding coming in along with growing the agency each and every year. If TSA is exaggerating the threat then again there is a need to validate the current screening requirements and having those standards applied to airport workers would help on that front.

The U.S. “doesn't have a system to provide air security. It has a system to bother people.”

https://tinyurl.com/yc3ux74b

~~

“The illusion of security doesn’t actually make anyone safer, and it’s more aptly called a false sense of security.” https://tinyurl.com/ydegeq22

~~

“There are two fundamental flaws in our approach (to screening):

The first is a strategy that looks upon every single person who flies — old and young, fit and infirm, domestic and foreign, pilot and passenger — as a potential terrorist.” tinyurl.com/p6w3r8h

Here's an interesting document for you from Jonathan Corbett's litigation. TSA screwed up and posted Corbett's sealed, unredacted brief publicly. InfoWars (of all people) got a copy before they took it down, and reposted it. I've reposted the copy from them.

I've highlighted the parts that TSA redacted. (Except p. 43/36 fn. 15, which is an image already highlighted in gray.)

Notice a trend in what they wanted to hide?

Now compare to, say, 49 USC 114(r)(4)(B)…

Do they in fact make such claims? Under oath? Please show me where. I'd love to impeach them. See Corbett brief above.

What I've seen is mere hypotheticals. There's not even a claim to take at face value, let alone any value to that face.

Yes. IF.

This would also be the result of my litigation. Although it'll take years, my bet is that I'm the more likely and faster means of achieving that objective.

:eek::rolleyes:

The TSA Administrator just in the last couple of months gave a talk at a university and recognized a few TSA screeners. His remarks included the claim of the constant probing and testing. It may have been George Washington. There was FT thread about it.

Edit to add:

Not sworn.....

Pekoske's remarks

I have often read of the claim that terrorists are testing and probing security on a daily basis, but IIRC, that claim has always come from individuals who claim to be screeners and it makes me wonder if they are fed such propaganda during training or at their daily briefings. It doesn't seem quite believable that after a decade of daily testing and probing there hasn't been a successful attack, especially in light of TSA's failure rate.

As for exaggerating the threat, it's not only TSA that does so but also the security-industrial complex. Security has become a cash cow for so many (think Chertoff) that they are not going to give it up willingly.

I couldn't open Sai's link above, highlighted the parts that TSA redacted. I think this is what that link contains:

Saying that terrorist are always testing and probing is TSA's mantra from the front office down to the newest employee. If TSA's screening failure rates are somewhere between 60 to 90% then terrorist success rates would be very high if an operation was attempted.

Regardless, TSA does claim that commercial aviation is under constant watch and testing by terrorists. Shouldn't TSA screening policies reflect those concerns? By not applying all policies equally to passengers and workers TSA is either lying about the threat or placing the public at risk.

That says "looking" and "waiting". Not actually "testing" or "probing" in any active way whatsoever.

Haven't done an exact check but that looks correct to me.

TSA also says they have to get it right every time and we know how well they've done with that. :D

The link had his video/audio comments. Skip around the first 14 minutes.

TSA continues proving TSA Style Security is just an expensive show for travelers.

one of the suspects said he could transport guns via commercial airlines

Fed's at DFW arrest 10 airport workers who schemed with undercover agents to transport meth across the country. where it really gets concerning is plans to ship guns and explosives.

I have to wonder, TSA started the SHOE CARNIVAL after one failed attempt, small electronics have to be removed for no reason, and LGA's over 100 ml are prohibited over a rumor of a plan. All senseless demands on travelers that offer little to no security benefit. Yet there have been many cases of airport workers violating security requirements, smuggling guns, and other contraband inside the secure area yet TSA has failed to require screening of airport workers.

What will it take, a gunfight on board a plane, an explosion in flight, or some other horrible event?

TSA, we're not safer with them.

Given TSA's previous record, I would guess that a gunfight inside the sterile area or aboard an aircraft would result in more draconian measures on pax rather than on TSA or airport workers. Ditto ad infinitem for an explosion on an aircraft - TSA would simply double-down on passenger abuse, increase the lines, and use the entire incident as an excuse to demand a massive budget increase.

[emp added]

For the sake of accuracy, the electronics one stems from the ink jet cartridges incident out of.... Egypt/Sudan(?). It' still pointless, but it does have a "cause".

Weren't those items being shipped as cargo. And I think it was laser toner cartridges.

Yup. Commercial cargo that went as cargo on scheduled pax service. Not sure about the form (laser vs ink jet), but the event was the trigger used to justify the change to electronics screening. Of note, as usual, is that the change actually implemented had little/nothing to do with the actual event.

The event you mentioned happened years ago, didn't it? The intense interest in "small electronics" began a year ago with basically a rumor that terrorists were capable of packing explosives into laptop computers. The fact that it took TSA a year to implement new screening practices for electronics (and granola bars/gummie bears/Jordan almonds) says to me that it's not a huge concern.

If you have a water leak in a basement do you hang curtains on the third floor? TSA addresses a below the wings threat by jerking travelers through hoops.

Sure, but the whole "bomb in a laptop" carp has been around for years. We've been reading tales for years of people being forced to turn on electronics to prove that they're real. This latest round of abuse is just a swing of the pendulum.

Correction: every ordinary laptop is a bomb.

Obligatory: https://xkcd.com/651/
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...44a194625c.png

Thanks, Sai. I have two laptops and a number of other LIon batteries in my home. I don't think I'll ever sleep soundly again...

I am happy to serve the public interest in practical education. :)

isnt that for the other forum? :)