Should Airports Use "Smart Screening"?

[Warrior-Mentor]

VIDEO:
http://www.investigativeproject.org/...mart-screening

[peshguy]

Hell yes we should be using these scanners. The scanner can detect drugs, bombs and bundles of money. The scanners require little raining and can be set to record which operator was on duty when passenger xyz went through. No ethnic profiling, just scan every single passenger and stop all the other stupid (useless) crap that TSA makes us do. Start with international flights then transition to domestic fights. The more of these things that are used the cheaper they will become. If the price drops enough they can be used in prisons, jails and courthouses.

Originally Posted by peshguy

Hell yes we should be using these scanners. The scanner can detect drugs, bombs and bundles of money. The scanners require little raining and can be set to record which operator was on duty when passenger xyz went through. No ethnic profiling, just scan every single passenger and stop all the other stupid (useless) crap that TSA makes us do. Start with international flights then transition to domestic fights. The more of these things that are used the cheaper they will become. If the price drops enough they can be used in prisons, jails and courthouses.

I don't know about you, but I have a Constutionally garunteed right to privacy. I don't intend on giving it up. This smacks of pervasive fear. As long as we live in fear, they have won. If you think that TSA will be not saving stuff, you are naive.
I might as well just strip on the sidewalk and then enter the terminal.

Tell me just whom is going to pay for all this ultra expensive equipment?
Dogs are cheaper, and better and less invasive.

Tell me do you want your wife to be viewed by some stranger?
AM

[frostfire]

Originally Posted by Brush Okie

What they should be using is dogs.

Originally Posted by armymom1228

Dogs are cheaper, and better and less invasive.

Let's see. The latest t-wannabe hid the goodies in his underwear. Where exactly, I really don't want to know, but I can see it now: "Alright Sir/Ma'am, spread it and let the dog sniff the "area"

[GratefulCitizen]

Originally Posted by Brush Okie

What they should be using is dogs.

That would be hilarious.
Dogs are unclean to muslims.

...maybe we should start to train bomb-sniffing pigs!

[happyg]

As someone that use to work for the TSA I believe comedian Lewis Black summed up airport security best with this stand up act.

http://www.last.fm/music/Lewis+Black...rity?autostart

[PSM]

Profiling! First, last, and always! The Sky Caps, the ticket agents, TSA, other passengers, the gate agent, the FAs, and my favorite, have the cockpit crew walk through the cabin and look everyone in the eye.

If they know that EVERYONE is watching, the less committed will get hinky.

Then again, what the hell do I know? I thought that they'd drop this bone.

"Nappie, you're doing a heck of a job!"

We have enemy inside the wire!

I'd like to say "Rant, over!" but I can't.

PSM

p.s.: GWB got reamed for reading "The Pet Goat" (not "My Pet Goat") for 7 minutes to kids. What was B-HO doing with HIS pet goat for three days?

Originally Posted by frostfire

Let's see. The latest t-wannabe hid the goodies in his underwear. Where exactly, I really don't want to know, but I can see it now: "Alright Sir/Ma'am, spread it and let the dog sniff the "area"

CNN was showing the offending garment all day yesterday.

Since I am going to soon be handing over my undies to the nice TSA guy, I guess I need to go visit Vicky's Secret and get something less granny panty eh?

AM

[FirstClass]

Pretty soon terrorists will not need to conceal their bombs because it would be profiling, there for unconstitutional to inspect someone who is holding what "appears" to be a bomb.

Frankly, we have a long road ahead of us, seeing that two people with opposite views cannot sit across from each other and discuss their differences and listen to each others points, even with a moderator between them. You see that alot in politics, our country is run by children, children with bombs and endless bounds of money.

They are comfortable with how things are, when people get comfortable, especially the people in charge, it takes ALLOT to get them to do anything.

I think profiling will happen. But not for another two years or so when attacks become more frequent by the same type of people, or perhaps a change in presidency.

[peshguy]

We all like the idea of bomb sniffing dogs, but the logistics of having that many trained dogs as well as dog handlers would prove problematical. As far as a constitutional right to privacy at airports, I cant find it in the constitution, nor has it been specifically recognized by the courts.

The TSA or US Customs (ICE) can arbitrarily pull people out of line and do a detailed search of their persons, laptops, cell phones and carry on items without a warrant if they fit an incredibility vague profile. The scanning machine is much less intrusive them this.

I understand all the sensitivities with a scanner, as someone who has both shrapnel and retained metal hardware in my body I certainly understand these scanners will bring me extra scrutiny, but they can search a lot of people quickly and effectively with very little training.

As far as the TSA retaining the scanned images, I want them to retain these images for 72 hours so we can go back after a bombing and fire whatever incompetent TSA dork missed the next shoe/underwear bomber. Also how is this information any more prone to abuse then DMV photos, passport information, credit card information or medical files?

Don't get me wrong I'm all for profiling, dogs and armed pilots, but we lack the political will to do these things, and we will lack the popular will to do these sort of things until we have a series of mass murders in the skys.

[Dozer523]

During the Second World War you couldn't get on a passenger plane without a priority designation. Since there were few passenger planes only those vetted and with a reason to fly, flew.
Same thing with the trains. You wanted to travel? You went to the government office and got a priority to use.
You wanted to drive? You were screened when you got your gas ration.

Anyone want to get in line for that kind of government involvement?

[nmap]

Scanners won't work. Neither will dogs.

LINK

Al Qaeda Bombers Learn from Drug Smugglers
New Technique of Storing Bomb Materials Inside Body Cavity Nearly Kills a Saudi Prince

(CBS) Al Qaeda has developed a new tactic that allows suicide bombers to breach even the tightest security, as CBS News correspondent Sheila MacVicar reports.

Inside a Saudi palace, the scene was the bloody aftermath of an al Qaeda attack in August aimed at killing Prince Mohammed Bin Nayef, head of Saudi Arabia's counter terrorism operations.

To get his bomb into this room, Abdullah Asieri, one of Saudi Arabia's most wanted men, avoided detection by two sets of airport security including metal detectors and palace security. He spent 30 hours in the close company of the prince's own secret service agents - all without anyone suspecting a thing.

How did he do it?

Taking a trick from the narcotics trade - which has long smuggled drugs in body cavities - Asieri had a pound of high explosives, plus a detonator inserted in his rectum.

This was a meticulously planned operation with al Qaeda once again producing something new: this time, the Trojan bomber.

The blast left the prince lightly wounded - a failure as an assassination, but as an exercise in defeating security, it was perfect.

The bomber persuaded the prince he wanted to leave al Qaeda, setting a trap.

Al Qaeda has an animated movie showing the meeting between the bomber and the prince. Asieri says more senior al Qaeda figures want to surrender and convinces the prince to talk to them on a cell phone.

In the conversation recorded by al Qaeda, you hear a beep in the middle of two identical phrases that are repeated by the bomber and his handler.

Explosives experts tell CBS News that beep was likely a text message activating the bomb concealed inside Asieri.

The Trojan bomber hands the phone to Prince Mohammed. He's standing next to him, and 14 seconds later, he detonates.

"This is the nightmare scenario," said Chris Yates, an aviation security consultant.

On a plane at altitude, the effects of such a bomb could be catastrophic. And there is no current security system that could stop it.

"Absolutely nothing other than to require people to strip naked at the airport," said Yates.

And al Qaeda says it will share its new technique via the Internet very soon. There is nothing that can stop that either.

[CSB]

For a well executed security system, you need look no farther than El-Al Israeli Airlines for international flights. You are individually taken, alone, into an interview room, where the interviewer (who has complete knowledge of your name, address, your ticket, your seatmates, how and where the ticket was purchased, luggage checked or otherwise, your passport, etc.) asks you a series of questions.

While looking you square in the eye.

That's smart screening.

I remember being questioned once by a beautiful agent who, if she had wanted to do a full body search of me would have met with no objection whatsoever (but certainly a request for equal time) and during the questioning she asked me:

"Has anyone given you anything to carry on the airplane? A package? A parcel, perhaps?"

And I said "Of course not."

And she smiled warmly and said: "You mean 'of course not' that you wouldn't take such a parcel, not 'of course not' for my asking."

[Richard]

Went through several body searches returning to München from the Med in the mid-70s - you'd go into an enclosed cubicle where one BGS guy would go through your stuff and watch as you stripped to your underwear and another BGS guy armed with an MP5 stood to the side watching you. Terrorists/airline hijackers came in all nationality types - European, Asian, Middle Eastern, and African.

You'd go to the München Flughafen back then and there were also several manned BGS armored vehicles on duty around the perimeter.

Inconvenient - sure - but that was the way it was back then.

And so it goes...

Richard's $.02

[Soak60]

Originally Posted by GratefulCitizen

That would be hilarious.
Dogs are unclean to muslims.

...maybe we should start to train bomb-sniffing pigs!

Israel's 'bomb squad pigs'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3159010.stm (Looks like an Israeli dog trainer is trying this?)

That's actually an excellent point, and a way to profile discreetly. Of course, unbelievers are unclean as well. But it would add another useful layer. Another way would be to place images that a Muslim who interprets the Koran literally would take offense to. Then have that area monitored and stop those who exhibit a strong reaction but do not complain...is that profiling? Not sure about the law on that.

No need to be invasive.