Report poor security?
 

Recently returned from a trip to DXB and IST. In DXB after I got my ticket and went thru the screening, the guy watching (or not watching) the monitor was talking to the guy checking us as we walked thru the portal. He never even looked at the monitor. As I picked up my bag I stopped and watched a little more. While I was standing there at least 5 more people went thru and the monitor person -never- looked at the monitor just continued laughing and continuing his conversation with the other guy.

Then when I returned from IST and were going thru in transit screening, the same thing happened - the attendant were very busy in iving conversation and laughing, ignoring the monitor and not really watching people walk thru the portal.

Wanted to stop and say something - after all it is -our- safety that is being put at risk bt didn't. Thought well here I am in another country, I don't speak the language, and could be inviting all sorts of trouble for myself.

Would you have spoken up? Still bothers me.

Nothing that happens at a TSA checkpoint contributes to aviation safety*. It's all just for show anyway, so what difference does it make whether the actors are playing their roles passionately or passively?


*except, possibly, the swabbing

Swabbing works best.
X-rays are pretty marginal at best, requiring a hand inspection.
Everything else is for security theater.

I know this forum is obsessed with the TSA but I can assure you they do not work in DXB or IST, having recently passed through both of those airports...

Nice try though.

I wouldn't have bothered to report it either.

Heck, if it was in the US and somebody got away with it I don't know that I'd bother. Stateside it might cause a terminal dump, or at least do something else to inconvenience everyone. (The only thing that would motivate me to do it here is to embarass the TSA.)

These clowns don't come to my place of work to help me with my tasks. Why should it be my responsibility to do their jobs for them? If they're taking responsibility for security in the terminals, then they need to actually do their jobs and quit spouting off this "security is everyone's responsibility" nonsense. The day security becomes my responsibility is the day they allow me to carry loaded firearms past the security checkpoint and onto the plane.

As usual, some people don't bother to read the OP . . . :rolleyes:

amend my post to say "Nothing that happens at a checkpoints in the U.S. or countries that allow themselves to be influenced by U.S. standards contributes to aviation safety*. "

You need to report it when you see it. There are cameras all over the place at most airports and they will verify your story and action will be taken.

Wow that is an ignorant statement/

Unbelievable. Have you ever actually left the US? Any experience whatsoever of these countries in particular, their screening processes, their level of co-operation with the US?

Or is this just another blindly ignorant comment that further damages the credibility of the "get rid of the TSA at all costs regardless of what the topic is about" mob? Yeah - thought so. Your statement couldn't be further from the truth.

I am positive that both questions can believably be answered in the affirmative.

TSA has engaged in "security" theater at DXB and IST -- repeatedly so -- although there is "security" theater at DXB and IST that continues to exist independent of TSA engaging in "security" theater at DXB and IST.

The *only* area where there is any involvement from US security authorities in either of these airports is for flights that depart non-stop from them to the US. Extra checks are requested, and the airport must be able to demonstrate that it is performing them to allow these flights to operate.

To facilitate this (again, I'm talking about these 2 airports specifically) dedicated "US" security checkpoints are used, to spare the rest of the world from having to endure them.

So - where's your point here? There are two options:

(1) The checkpoints described above were just the regular checkpoints where there is no taking laptops out of bags, no shoes off, etc (I suspect so from the description of the behavior - seen this many times myself) - in which case these checkpoints are nothing to do with the TSA or their ugly policies, or;

(2) The checkpoints were the US specific ones at the gate(s) for US departing flight(s) in which case the security agents should be applauded (in true TS&S) fashion for giving the middle finger to the TSA's ugly policies and sleeping through it ;)

Serious question for you - since you claim to have experience with these airports too. What part of the regular (non-US) security screening process in DXB or IST would you call "theatre"? Or would you just have the whole checkpoint thing abolished?

The above post starts with another false representation and goes on with the presentation of false choices and of yet more false choices. :rolleyes:

Some of us don't ignore that it's DHS/TSA that tries to push or maintain various kinds of "security" theater around the world and then complains to no end if foreign or domestic "persons" don't respond as Uncle Sam's TSA footmen demand of such.

Instead of lamenting this "fact" and making somewhat misguided comments related to it, would you like to elaborate? Or are you just talking about this in the "black helicopters" sense, rather than any specifics? That's certainly how it appears, looking at this from an objective viewpoint.

From previous experience this is a favourite tactic of yours - and it completely avoids the issue at hand.

No, you don't need to report it. If security can't do their job properly, that's their problem. The last thing this world needs is another narc.

I experience this every month in a non-English speaking country and it really speeds things up and, doesn't bother me. Take my laptop out? No, don't bother. When they do look, not always, and they do see something they don't recognize they ask, hey around this spot, what's in there? A camera (I guess) , I say. OK, great they say.

Metal detector - remove one metal item , usually the cell phone since it is close by (though it probably has less metal in it than other things) . Skip the watch, belt etc., Set off metal detector. Half-hearted wave of the wand. OK, go through. Because they can see the watch and belt and they can draw a sensible conclusion.

At my connection point they have a lot of dogs looking for weed and cocaine, a bigger priority. They have one dog trained to sniff money but mistakenly included coins in his training. When I was caught by Snoopy he found 36 Trinidadian cents (worth about zero). I asked the policeman since the limit for currency is US$10,000 and therefore 40,001 quarters would be the minimum for a law breaker do they find many guys with their pants looking like they have elephantiasis, and walking slow since they have 995 pounds of coins on them? They don't (find any) and he regretted the coin part of the dog's training.

I think the strength of security is that the miscreants just don't know how thorough it will be nor when, so it really doesn't have to be that thorough that often. That's why sampling works in other areas. I sure would not then say you guys are really bad at this security thing you know. They won't change anyway and I look like a troublemaker.

Go ahead and report it if you think the people/person/group that receives the complaint will care and then make a change. Security anywhere is not about catching anyone doing something, but to intimidate anyone from wanting to do something. The fact that the bag goes through screening means someone will take the chance of getting caught seriously. But if someone wants to do something, they will figure out a way, and it wont be as simple as trying to use a line where no one really looks. They will put what they need where no one can, or dares, look.

Hitherto, the only one here having asserted an issue about "black helicopters" is to be found in your posts. Any objective viewpoint would be capable of recognizing that my posts on this topic are informed based upon operational facts.

Your previous experience and attempted characterization of me is irrelevant -- all it does is do is: "completely avoids the issue at hand".

TSA-wanted-and-approved "security" theater covers DXB and IST too.

I can't speak for the person you ask. But I did indeed leave the US and saw what goes on in other countries.

I can confidently assess the TSA a higher level of professionalism than the security forces in Sierra Leone. (not going into the details here but these poor guys didn't even have a WTMD etc.)

I can confidently assess that the security screeners in Japan, Thailand, Scandinavia (Norway and Denmark) and Germany are both MUCH friendlier to their customers and seemed to be very accurate and detailed in their procedures.

I experienced very detailed security (for instance in the Middle East) and extremely friendly ones (e.g. in Ghana). I have yet to find a country where security is at the level of my US experiences in terms of unfriendlyness and inefficiency.

I would like to get the TSA to work and I rely on a working TSA as a frequent flyer. But the TSA is ineffective, wasteful and unfriendly. If the TSA was efficient and friendly I would certainly not complain.

These days, if you want to be yelled at, you just go to an airport in the US.

That's a lot of false statements in such a short post. If you had taken the time to read my posts, you would have seen a clear description of how security in these two specific airports is structured, with a separate area for US-bound flights, and standard security elsewhere. I know this, because I've been there, and I'm describing what I've seen. Have you?

I asked some specific questions - most importantly this: (I'll phrase it nice and simply) - what proof ("facts") do you have that "TSA-wanted-and-approved 'security' theater" exists at the non-US-specific security checkpoints at these two airports?

You are dramatically over-asserting the authority that the US wields over sovereign states, and more importantly the level of interest that such states have in co-operating with them. To be clear - the approach adopted by the vast majority of countries, including these two, is basically that they don't give a cr*p about what the US does or thinks with regards to security, but will perform the bare minimum needed for US-bound flights to depart from their airports. Everyone else, thankfully, gets spared.

Now - and this is an important point - plenty of countries do have their own version of security theatre, and there have been some crazy things dreamt up (thankfully most pale in comparison with the TSA), but giving the US credit for this is just ridiculous.

I agree 100% with this, and my experiences are very similar to yours, in a similar set of countries also.

No, but there you go providing a false statement above. ;)

I've been to IST and DXB repeatedly over the course of the past 12 months and much more before too, and I am very well aware of what goes on that is generally observable by passengers flying to the US directly on US carriers or otherwise and of what goes on at government-to-government levels.

Lots of proof, but I'm not in the business of spoon-feeding on demand. ;)

I am not dramatically over-asserting anything, but I am certainly not dismissive of the fact that DHS does what it can to get its way in as much of the world as it can -- IST and DXB included.

Yes, but it's not ridiculous to give the US some credit for this ridiculous "security" theater on display at DXB and IST too.

.... it's not too hard to observe "security" at LHR shouting at passengers daily too.