Security is About to Crack Down on Electronics
 

FAA Issues New Search Guidelines

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The government has provided new guidance for the nation's airlines regarding the searches of all electronic devices, according to Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) spokesman Paul Turk.

Turk said the FAA issued additional guidance to airlines in the past week regarding searches of all electronic devices. He said that -- among other devices -- pagers, cell phones, computers, even electric toothbrushes would be subject to possible examination before boarding flights.

Besides basic x-raying scrutiny, a source said some devices would also be subjected to explosive trace detector testing, or ETD, in which a screening agent wipes a swab on the device and places it in an analysis machine. The machine tests the swab for explosives and produces a printout that can identify the traces of explosives found, if any.

Some passengers at Atlanta's Hartsfield International Airport said the inspection of the devices caused long delays Saturday morning.

http://www.cnn.com/2002/TRAVEL/NEWS/...nce/index.html

As of 10 minutes ago, security was still the same at Narita, despite all my electronics. Same at BKK this morning. Hopefully this 'guidance' won't make it too far outside the US.

Oh no! Oh no! Oh no!

Does this mean we have been flying with the potential for bombs in these devices all these years? 60 million people flying a month, and any one of them could have hidden a bomb in these devices! Oh no! How have we managed to survive this long?

Absurdity without end...

Is this Mineta's way of getting even for all that time he was imprisoned as a child in the Japanese internment camp during WWII?

'Cause if it had been me, who knows what kind of rules I might eventually inflict on my fellow Americans if given the opportunity? Especially when my rules aren't published as lawful regulations but instead are deemed to be security secrets. Not too many people have such vast power to control the minutae of daily life.

Directing our focus toward objects instead of bad people makes us no safer and would not prevent a repeat.

[This message has been edited by FWAAA (edited 02-03-2002).]

You should apologize for that crudity, or better yet, remove it.

No, but perhaps it shows all of us here what you think about people of Japanese descent.



[This message has been edited by flytoeat (edited 02-03-2002).]

Fly naked and carry nothing.. (except then, the NotSoBright rubber glove team will start cavity searches)

I haven't had any problems with the security screeners, maybe that's because I treat them with respect and they return the favor.

The people I have problems with are the passengers:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum1/HTML/006293.html

d

i was stopped in mco on thurdsay because of one of those little cold pills wrapped in plastic and foil. i had 2 in my coat pocket and it set of the alarm.

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f

do you use the foil to keep them cold?

You know *security* is getting out of hand when the list of what to leave at home is longer than the one for what you pack. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/eek.gif

This just keeps getting more ridiculous.

Pretty soon, they are going to conclude that people could hide explosives in their body cavities and that they need to check for that. At least when this happens we'll honestly be able to call the security screeners a bunch of ***wipes then.

Haven't there already been cases of people hiding bombs in walkmans? I seem to remember something a bunch of years back where this happened or was stopped, but I don't remember the details.

d

Just an evil thought:

if I was a terrorist and wanted to disrupt American air travel and cost people and industries money-- I wouldn't go as far as blow up planes, etc.: just send my people with clean backgrounds on flights, with "explosive residue" on their otherwise clean shoes, electronics, etc. They would be eventually cleared, but the resulting slow-downs, delays, and mass cluster-f's would wreck as much havoc on the system as 9-11 did, and with little or no cost. If my people get hassled because of their headgear, appearance or "racial profiling": all the much better, a team of CAIR or ACLU attorneys would be standing by to cause even more trouble...

well, on sunday i was caught in part of this in denver. on a connecting flight i was randomly selected for additional screening at boarding.

the security professional asked if i had heard of the new screening procedures for computers. i said i had. she asked me to turn the computer on, but once they saw it light up, i could turn it off.

i told them it must completely boot up before i shut it off, otherwise i might incur damage to the software. they were suprised that something like that could happen as they have never heard of it before. being that they are high paid security professionals, i am sure they have $3000 notebook computers with $25,000 of software on them.

anyway, while it was booting up, they kept telling me to shut it off and i kept telling them no, i cannot do that until it is done starting up.

all the while, the next randomly selected passenger was waiting to be screened. i guess i clogged their well oiled machine.

one note. the person behind me had scissors removed from her sewing bag. i am happy to report that no garments were manufactured on the flight and we arrived in orlando safely, although with the same wardrobes we boarded with

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f

keep a floppy in the "A" drive - it'll go thru the attempt to boot, but won't and you can shut down... I also know there are some key combinations you can use to abort boot w/out damage, but I don't know what they are.. so I just use a non-start diskette in the "A" drive.

floppy drives are so 90's. i have an extra battery in the bay. i usually hybernate the beast just for such events, but i didnt this time.

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f

Set a boot password. It will stop and ask for the password near the end of the POST, before it tries to boot the OS; you can safely turn it back off at that point.

--Laird

Had to laugh. Same thing happened to me at SFO. Was selected for a secondary screening, and I turned on the computer at the same time they told me not to. That added about 30 seconds or so to the procedure.

In my carryon they also found a plate of aluminum, with stuff taped to it and wires coming off that were attached to a taped-up battery pack, with some electronics dangling nearby. They asked me what it was. I told them 'a new, high-tech heating element from China.' They believed me because, I guess, I was telling them the truth.

I had two cell phones, and they only had me turn on my Thai unit. They also found several digital cameras, a pda, digital recorder, remote-activated alarm unit, and a few other interesting electronic articles that they could have cared less about. However, for some reason they found a pair of my sunglasses fascinating.

thank you for the technical advice. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/rolleyes.gif



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f

I can't help but mention the second-last episode of "24" on Fox. Wasn't there a gun hidden inside a 'laptop' that they turned on at security and once they saw the screen light up they let Kiefer Sutherland into a political rally?

[This message has been edited by PunishedEdmontonian (edited 02-04-2002).]