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Noticed this at YOW today. Basically you stand in the lineup, they check your BP, then you stand on a mat. The indicator will then flash an arrow pointing left or right. If it points right, you get a regular check. If it goes left, it's your lucky day - full pat-down after the metal detector. Since I have all the luck in the world, I of course was directed left. They also said that they aren't allowed to patdown if you're under 18. Any other airports participating in this or just YOW?

Do they check ID if you look young?
Glad to see our government thinks are no child terrorists.:rolleyes:

Security theatre!

I thought all the years of extra security fees we've paid would yield something more advanced than a pat-down?

Even the CN Tower has sniffing machines that blow air over you and read the results.

But airports, as far more risker places, do not have this basic technology. Does this make one iota of sense to anyone?

Still, we are not to protest but only to hand over our $ and feel the fear that our TV sells to us.

The left / right arrow thing reminds of arriving at CUN. You had to press a button there - green means go, red means your bags get searched on arrival.

I'm not sure that the random search thing is terribly useful myself, but I'm not a good sample statistically because I think a lot of this extra "security" is a waste of time. My bottle of water for example isn't any more lethal then the next guy's. Ditto for my tube of toothpaste.

On the CN Tower sniffing machine - it's terribly slow. I don't see it as a practical solution in airports where there's limited space, limited personnel to operate the machines and a very large number of people who need to be scanned.

I thought this was a thread about searching for a pilot...

No ID required, they just ask. Similar to if you appear to be under 18, you don't need ID to board a plane.

This topic is more suited to the Travel Safety and Security forum, Please continue the discussion there.

Thanks

Sean
Moderator - AC/Aeroplan, Westjet, & Canada

Had my first brush with this new technology today. It was like playing DDR: step on the mat, step off the mat. Step back on the mat. Step to the right.

Apparently the sensors aren't great; it took everyone a few tries of dancing around to get it to go off.

Hopefully it'll be yanked soon, it's just slowing things down.

reminds me (unfortunately) of another "system" which said, "you to to the left, you to the right" :mad:

you put your left foot in...... you put your left foot out.....:rolleyes:

CVG has those.

Are these people frickin' retarted???

They needed to spend MONEY to BUY a piece of equipment to randomly select people for a patdown instead of telling the screener to choose randomly (every nth person)?

Good thing this wasn't bought with MY tax dollars.

TSA bought 207 of the puffers, deployed 94 before discovering that they don't work if there's dirt or humidity (:confused:), still has 33 in place. US$29.6 million. :rolleyes: Whole stupid story is on PV over here.
A pair of dice ("roll a double and get a patdown!") or the spinner thingie from Twister ("spin today's alert level and get groped!") would not look as, umm, what's that word?, uhhh, professional. ;);)

Actually, "every Nth person" isn't random at all. It may be "arbitrary", but "arbitrary" and "random" aren't the same thing at all. One element of randomness is unpredictability, and picking every Nth person is completely predictable. Not to mention observably predictable ... imagine the chaos in the line, when people who have figured out today's value of N are jockeying for position in the line to make sure they're not selected.

Telling the screener to just choose people randomly isn't good, either. People are notoriously bad at making random choices. Plus, it opens screeners up to the charge of choosing people on non-random criteria ... retaliatory screenings, ethnic bias, and so on.

A device like this eliminates all of that. An impersonal device can't initiate a retaliatory secondary. It can't tell if your ethnicity is different from the person running the device. Whether it's the most cost-efficient way to make the choice is another debate ... but it does present some distinct advantages. We shouldn't disregard it so quickly.

Randomness is simple and I believe that at one time the TSA was doing it with the "continuous" secondary thing. You have a screener whose sole responsibility is to do these; the screener picks the next passenger in line, does the thing, then immediately picks the very next one and so on. Completely unpredictable and you can't "game" it because each secondary takes a slightly different amount of time.

Not that I approve of this nonsense for one moment, but you don't need expensive technology(sic); unless you are the ones supplying it of course.

Security is simply a big fat money pit.

Actually, you can still game the system a little bit, at selected moments. Suppose there's no-one in line at the WTMD. (It does happen ... smaller airports, out-of-the-way checkpoint, lull in the middle of the day, etc.). If I approach the checkpoint and see that the "continuous screener" is standing just past the WTMD, just waiting to select the next person through the WTMD for "random" screening, I know that I'm going to be randomly selected.

So ... I can game the system a bit. If another passenger approaches the checkpoint at about the same time, I can courteously allow them to go first --- say, by fumbling with my carry-ons, trying to figure out where I put my liquids bag, dropping stuff, etc.. Or, I can hang back from the checkpoint and wait until someone else goes ahead of me. At a minimum, I can wait until the checkpoint gets busy, to at least decrease the odds that I'll get picked.

There are numerous stories here about gate-screenings being conducted by TSA using the same "continuous screening" method ... and the amusing results when the gate agent calls for first-class boarding and no-one heads for the gate because they know the first person will be "randomly" selected for screening.

I'm just saying that "randomness" is a lot harder to achieve than you might think. This is one reason why casinos are so heavily regulated.

CBP has been using every 'nth' for years. There is no problem with what I proposed, and yes, this stupid device should be abandoned forthwith.

Firstly, random patdowns are useless. Either patdown everyone or no one.

Second, the 'n' number can be changed frequently and vary between WTMD queues - it's far easier and cheaper to spend 30 minutes coming up with an understandable and fair randomness policy than spending millions of dollars to buy someone's high school science fair project.

And, on the whole, I don't have a problem with every "Nth". But that procedure is not "random"; it's "arbitrary". We should call it what it really is. (Yes, I've got a big old stick stuck up my backside about this issue. Comes from having studied too much math.)

And now, you open the screeners up to charges of bias. A screener just changes the value of "N", and the next person selected just happens to have an ethnicity different from the screener. Did the screener change the value of "N" truly arbitrarily, or did the screener choose "N" because of racial bias? There's no way to know, either way --- either to prove bias, or to absolve an honest screener from charges of bias.

That's why investing 30 minutes in drawing up a written policy is sufficient. CBP can change the N value on the hour, or according to some other policy. It's not rocket science...just think it out and write it down.

No matter how often you change it the fact remains that it's NOT random.

It doesn't need to be random - either arbitrary or random won't skew results when the chance of someone walking undetected through the WTMD with a gun or bomb is so small to be statistically insignificant.

I agree. So, let's just agree to call it "arbitrary", okay?

Excuse me ... I see a windmill over here that I need to attack ...

Any word on when this ridiculous project will end? The lines at YOW are insane thanks to this hokey pokey dance. I'd hate to see the resulting lines at Pearson if it went ahead!

Actually, Customs and Border Protection discontinued random searches several years ago. They found that it detracted from their ability to look for actual threats. There is a GAO report about this.

There is actual data to suggest that random (or arbitrary) searches interfere with screening functions.

But the TSA isn't interested in research or common sense. They don't live in a world of evidence-based practice.

This is CATSA, not the TSA. Marginally less crap to deal with.

They can be patted down if they are 6 and over with family. If they are under 16 they need an airline agent with them. The system sucks, we end up having to pat down kids. No one wants that and we feel dirty for do it.

Same amount really, just different smell.