Last week at LAX were doing it.

This scenario is reminiscent of the disaster a few years ago at BNA when they upgraded the software for the carry-on X-ray machines. The genius in charge decided to do all the machines at once. You know what happened: 1. the upgrade was bad and thus, 2. every X-ray in every lane in the airport was disabled. Hand inspection was required for all carry-ons. The line was literally 1/2 mile long.

And TSA expects to put another piece of computer technology into the mix which, with periodic key changes, will require constant updates? Forget the privacy concerns, this is an administrative disaster waiting to happen.

A strong AES 256 encryption doesn't need a lot of computer power, doesn't add a lot of data to the bar code and can't be hacked or manipulated. Deutsche Bahn and Deutsche Post use encryption on their online-tickets and online-stamps and the system is safe.

To put plain unencrypted data on bar codes is a high security risk.

It also doesn't add any extra time to the security screening process. At Dublin Airport your boarding pass is already scanned when you go to the security check point to see if you actually fly that day. Very easy and painless.

Or if the money is to be spent solely on saving probable loss of life in civil aviation, how about:
Weeding out pilots who develop their personal, non-standard, wake vortex recovery techniuques that overstress a commercial flight air-frame. (AA 587; 2001)
Retraining pilots who may decide it's OK to land with > permissible tailwind velocity and can't/don't determine required landing runway length correctly. (WN 1248; 2005)
Retraining/weeding out pilots who can't assess > a dozen clear clues they're taking off on the wrong runway. (Comair 5191; 2006)
Aggressively implementing the "icing on aerofoil" lessons learned from CO 3407 (whatever they may finally be) and from AA 4184 (1994) (Note: that would be 2 strikes on this issue now)
Imparting the skill and professionalism shown by the Captain of US 1549 to as many other airline crews as possible.
The thought that we're spending irreplaceable government resources on boarding passes and passenger identification while the above real needs that involve actual fatalities are left unmet is beyond sick.

What was the line situation like at LAX T4?

I can only hope it has improved since I last dealt with it. It should only take a second, if that to scan the barcode on the boarding pass. I've heard it's operating smoothly at ORD.

If not, I'll find out soon - I've never found the LAX T4 security line to be extremely efficient, but when I went though last it was moving like molasses with the scanning of the boarding passes. The FC / Elite line was snaking through the first class check-in area of the lobby in T4 and the regular screening line was even worse.

I can only hope they don't start this nonsense in T2. While T2 can be hit or miss, I've come close to missing flights in T2 even when I've showed up 2+ hours in advance (i.e. managed to clear security and run to gate during final boarding).

Make the scanner available for those who want to use mobile devices for their BP's (if that is even necessary .. just read the screen), otherwise don't waste any more of my time at TDC with a circus act.

SDF_Traveler

Bad, really bad. It was back to the far-end escalators on Monday mid-afternoon when I arrived. I'm through there tomorrow morning. I'm allowing 2 hours.

Can you check when you're going thru if the extraordinary delay is due to this testing bp scanning ?
If so, time for us to complain and stop the test.
Its a failure.

15 minutes to get through the PriorityAccess side this morning. The delay in my lane was a slow and overzealous X-Ray screener. He was calling bag checks for anything he thought might be a bottle of water. The other x-ray on the elite side moved a little faster.

I couldn't draw a conclusion as to whether the BP scanner was causing delays or not. The doc clerk I had carefully examined everything (including my passport) with her blacklight, then scanned the boarding pass and carefully read the info on the screen. I estimate it took twice as long as normal, though the x-rays were backed up today.

Oh, and we were delayed by another 5 minutes even getting in to the airport thanks to a backup from the airport cops doing car searches on the entrance ramps.

@ DCA?

LAX.