
TSA failure: Investigators able to smuggle weapons past checks in 95% of tests - verbatim
http://www.newsnet5.com/news/national/tsa-failure-investigators-able-to-smuggle-weapons-past-airport-checks-in-95-percent-of-tests
======
alukima
I make at least one round trip flight at least once a week. The thoroughness
and extent of my search varies greatly depending on which co-workers I am
traveling with. When I am traveling with mostly white co-workers it's very
quick. When I am traveling with non-white co-workers we always end up waiting
on at least one or two people who have been selected for a secondary
screening.

Nice to know that this time consuming, expensive and racist process is also
pointless.

~~~
smrtinsert
As a brown skin, I love how often they randomly check the person in front of
me OH and me too :) They at least try to pretend its random now as opposed to
pre TSA when I would get picked all the time for random screening directly out
of a large line.

~~~
dhimes
I wonder what the racial profile of the red-teamers are (the ones assigned to
try to smuggle stuff past the inspection points)? I'm really curious as to
whether or not the skin color of the red-team agent played a part in getting
caught.

~~~
tracker1
I wonder that too.. I can only guess that if your name begins with K or ends
in Z, or something with K and Z in the name you get flagged.

My ex-wife's son, Kruz gets flagged _every_ time for secondary screening, from
when the TSA first started, until even recently... he hasn't traveled yet
without being "randomly" selected.

------
arca_vorago
I once got on the air as a caller to NPR or some other beltway radio show
where a TSA rep was trying to justify scanners and all kinds of other things.
I asked if the rep read Bruce Schneier regarding the fact that the TSA was
simply security theatre, and then asked about the former head of TSA who
approved the scanner purchases and then went to work for the company making
the scanners. He deflected like a pro and afterwards I could no longer call
in, as I would immediately get disconnected. Honestly though, I was most angry
because those are the sort of things that real reporter worth their salt
should be asking, but NPR is such a tamed softball throwing limpdick entity I
consider them almost as bad as CNN. Just listen to any given interview with
anyone of note. Never a tough question to be heard. BBC is slightly better but
I shouldn't have to rely on a fucking British propaganda outlet to hear even a
modicum of good reporting. It's sad that these days RT and Al Jazeera english
have better reporting on the US than any other mainstream shows I know of.
(not counting the handful of very good youtube/podcasts,etc)

They know it's all theatre and don't care because the guys at the top are
making tons of money playing the revolving door system, and no one is going to
do anything about it because the beltway is full of kissasses and naive idiots
"just trying to pay the mortgage."

~~~
wahsd
>"NPR is such a tamed softball throwing limpdick entity I consider them almost
as bad as CNN"

I used to have rather high regard for NPR until, and I don't know if this has
just changed or I just started realizing that NPR has significant backers that
are not only Republican and Conservative in spirit, but also beltway bandits,
big recipients of government contracts. I always feel like NPR is really not
all that different than Fox News albeit far less angry and hateful, but always
quick to tuck their tail and throw a flash-bang at any possibility that light
is shone on certain things. It really reminds me of the self-congratulatory
liberal aristocracy that loves to make itself feel better with insignificant
and meaningless efforts.

------
jeffcoat
ABC ran pretty much this same story in 2010:

[http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/loaded-gun-slips-past-tsa-
scre...](http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/loaded-gun-slips-past-tsa-
screeners/story?id=12412458)

    
    
      According to one report, undercover TSA agents
      testing security at a Newark airport terminal on
      one day in 2006 found that TSA screeners failed
      to detect concealed bombs and guns 20 out of 22 times.
    
      A 2007 government audit leaked to USA Today revealed
      that undercover agents were successful slipping simulated
      explosives and bomb parts through Los Angeles's LAX
      airport in 50 out of 70 attempts, and at Chicago's
      O'Hare airport agents made 75 attempts and succeeded
      in getting through undetected 45 times.

~~~
sdoering
Meaning, that the system did not work then and does not work today in
providing security. It only seems to be there to instill the feeling of
security in Jane/Joe Average.

So it really seems to be just security theater...

It is not designed to work - and you could argue it being this way by design.
It detects the idiots (smugglers & the little guys, et al) - but if something
severe happens the only consequences are making the system more secure by
adding to it. not by questioning it. That way the systems is kept alive and
politicians have the ability to be seen doing something, after a tragedy
happens. Everyone is happy - except Mrs. Taxpayer - but she does not get
asked.

# cynisism of

~~~
k2enemy
The TSA is also succeeding in another one of their goals. Their very public
and very disruptive "security" measures are a visceral reminder that
reinforces people's beliefs that there are terrorists behind every corner and
that we need to be protected from them. And as long as we're afraid of
terrorists the government can institute more sinister measures such as mass
surveillance and domestic spying.

~~~
rhino369
I'd argue essentially the opposite. That TSA is there to make people believe
they are safe from terrorism. Fear of flying crippled the airline industry
post 9-11.

People have a very irrational fear of flying. It's the safest mode of travel,
yet, single incidents panic people and multiple panic the entire country.

~~~
ConceptJunkie
That may be true, or at least was true when 9/11 was still fresh in our minds,
but the TSA is also there to get us used to the idea of being manhandled,
questioned and/or detained by government officials.

El Al has had a better security record without the digital "strip searches"
and junk-grabbing. The USA accomplish the same... if it wanted (i.e.,
Congress/the unions/everyone but the taxpayers).

~~~
chimeracoder
> El Al has had a better security record without the digital "strip searches"
> and junk-grabbing.

Actually, El Al is just as bad as well. El Al also had an open and explicit
policy of racial profiling until last year (when it was ruled illegal in court
to practice this policy openly[0]). If you are white and carry a US or Israeli
passport, you'll breeze right through. But the experience of flying El Al is
_very_ different if you:

a) have an Arab name, or

b) "look" Arab, or

c) are Palestinian.

El Al has been very heavily criticized by Arab Jews (yes, they exist) as well
as non-Arab and Arab Muslims and non-Muslim Palestinians for treating the
aforementioned groups very badly. There have been multiple cases of Arabs,
Muslims, and/or Palestinians winning civil suits against El Al for their
shocking treatment of these groups - in many ways _worse_ than what the TSA is
usually criticized for doing.

By the way, this doesn't happen only in Israel, but in other countries as well
(including the US), which let El Al conduct their own security procedures at
foreign airports for flights to Israel. In at least one lawsuit, the
plaintiffs won and were awarded five figures in part because their
mistreatment by El Al happened in New York, where open[1] racial profiling is
illegal.

[0] emphasis on _openly_.

[1] emphasis on _open_.

------
rev_null
I'd like to see this test repeated, but with investigators smuggling bottled
water instead of weapons. I bet the TSA would have a much higher success rate
with that.

~~~
eli
I bet I could get a bottle of water through if I were attempting to evade
detection.

~~~
mikeash
It would be trivial. Go buy a large bottle of contact lens solution, empty it,
and re-fill it with water. Tell them it's contact lens solution and you're all
set.

Doing this with explosives may be more difficult, what with the fancy chemical
detectors.

~~~
DanBC
You'd have to buy the bottle after screening, not before.

You're only allowed to take 3.4 ounces through screening unless you have a
medical need. I'm not sure people have a medical need for more contact lens
solution, even on long flights.

Maybe the TSA rules changed? I'm going by what they said on their website:

[http://apps.tsa.dhs.gov/mytsa/cib_results.aspx?search=Liquid](http://apps.tsa.dhs.gov/mytsa/cib_results.aspx?search=Liquid)

~~~
mikeash
Contact lens solution is considered "medically required", and "reasonable
quantities" is sufficiently ill-defined that nobody really cares. I'm sure if
you had a barrel of the stuff they might ask questions, but a standard 14oz
bottle from the store gets at most a quick swab and you're on your way.

That swab is what makes this scheme impractical for bringing dangerous
liquids, of course.

------
knodi123
One thing I've always wondered - who at the TSA is requesting these tests?
Surely they _know_ their own security is crap. It's not like it's an outside
watchdog agency. It's like if some surgeon lost 19 out of 20 of his patients,
but then asked a nurse to keep count and publish the numbers. Just bizarre.

And whoever set this internal audit process up - what did they have in mind
afterwards? As jeffcoat said, there has been no change over the last 5 years,
so... is it just like "/bin/internal_audit | tee /dev/null"? Aside from
rubbing our faces in how they're wasting their $7 billion annual budget, what
did they intend for this audit to accomplish?

~~~
ams6110
Failed tests justify more spending. Follow the money.

~~~
remarkEon
Unless we're talking about, oh idk, schools.

------
spanktar
Wait, you mean the millions, possibly billions spent already haven't done a
thing? Shocking! And now you can pay (TSAPre) to bypass the security theater
essentially proving that the whole thing is a massive sham. I'm all for
security, but nobody can seem to define what that would actually look like, as
opposed to what we have now.

~~~
mikeash
I don't see how Pre exposes it as a sham. I'm no fan of the TSA and I think a
lot of the stuff they do is useless at best, but giving people differing
amounts of scrutiny based on their risk profile seems pretty smart to me. It's
not as if you pay your money and automatically get through. They check you out
first and make sure that you're a suitably low risk, and only let you bypass
some of the checks if you actually qualify.

~~~
newman314
Paying money into Pre creates a two class system between the haves and
havenots. It does nothing to improve security.

In fact, it pretty much proves that Pre should be the norm instead of
exception.

~~~
zzalpha
You clearly have no idea how Pre works.

You don't just pay money and get a pass. There's a significant background
check involved which, I suspect, does more to enhance security than some
millimeter wave scanner in the security line.

~~~
msandford
So significant that my mother who has flown a total of no more than 30,000
miles in her whole life (spread out over no fewer than eight airlines) has
pre-check, gifted to her by one airline for no discernible reason. She was
very pleased to get it of course, but the "significance" of the background
check is highly questionable in my opinion.

~~~
ubernostrum
Pre was rolled out like this:

Initially there were two large groups of people who got Pre. One group was
people who were already enrolled in another trusted-traveller program like
NEXUS or Global Entry (I have Pre courtesy of Global Entry, for example),
presumably because they'd already been through background checks --
potentially more rigorous ones than Pre strictly required -- and thus were
deemed a useful and trustworthy pilot group. The other group was people in the
upper tiers of frequent-flier programs, who again were deemed useful and
trustworthy (anybody who clears security as often as the top-tier FFs do is
either trustworthy or a complete systemic failure of security).

After running that for a while, they started up another avenue into Pre,
called "Managed Inclusion". This was advertised as a test of real-time
capabilities to assess who does and who doesn't need more rigorous screening,
but from a cynical perspective was really just a way to expose casual
travelers to the fact that Pre exists and give them a taste of it. Managed
Inclusion is why you see random Joe and Jane Traveler told to go to the Pre
lane; it's not a consistent status/membership like the other trusted-traveller
programs, it's just a thing that does or doesn't happen sometimes when they
check in and get a boarding pass.

As an aside: Managed Inclusion has significantly reduced the usefulness of
Pre, because people who end up in it have been conditioned to do the typical
process (remove stuff from bags, take off shoes/belts/etc.), and don't get the
fact that, when their boarding pass has the Pre logo, they don't have to do
that. Which eats up more time as they get lectured by a TSA person, repack
their stuff, put their shoes back on, and so on.

And now you can just enroll directly in Pre by paying the application fee and
getting background checked (though why anyone would, when NEXUS or GE are more
useful and come with Pre as a side effect, I don't know). So the frequent-
flier-status enrollment is being wound down, Managed Inclusion keeps going as
a way to expose the general public to the idea, and that's where we are today.

~~~
newman314
Which leads to my statement of "pay-to-play" unlike zzalpha's claim above.

Managed Inclusion is akin to Movie Preview in hotels back in the day...

I stand by my statement that Pre should be the norm not the exception. Make
Global Entry the premium tier, that's fine but Pre needs to be the new norm.

~~~
zzalpha
What part of "and getting background checked" did you not read? :)

I grant you, though, it sounds like Pre is far less rigorous of a check than
NEXUS or Global Entry. But a check is still involved.

~~~
ubernostrum
I don't know what's involved in Pre.

But GE involves CBP going through employment/address history as well as every
time your passport's been used and any issues you've ever had at a border (I
know because I heard a guy at the next desk being grilled in his interview
about a piece of fruit in his luggage when I was in my interview). And NEXUS
involves having both the US and Canada run checks on you independently.

So in terms of rigor, NEXUS > Global Entry > Pre seems to be the way it goes.

------
meesterdude
How much time has been wasted of people waiting in line, taking off their
shoes, unpacking their laptop to go through security? how much money has been
wasted by the government on the program?

People end up on the no fly list. Kids in wheelchairs and little old ladies
get felt up for bombs and are put through a needless trauma.

Just, amazing. Purely security theater.

TSA: nothing for something

~~~
chatmasta
One could argue that the TSA checkpoints benefit overall airport efficiency.
Optimizing for flow of millions of people per day, it makes sense to funnel
through predetermined pipelines. This way passengers enter the terminal at a
constant rate.

~~~
chrismcb
What? I'm not even sure what you are trying to say. How does creating a
bottleneck that can take an hour or more to go through, efficient? ATL is on
of the worlds busiest airports with about 100 million passengers or about 250K
a day. Some of the busiests European train stations get twice that. Yet they
don't seem to have thus efficiency probably.

~~~
chatmasta
It provides a predictable rate of flow into the terminal.

------
vidoc
When you think about it, the most successful terrorist ever is Richard Reid.
He might not have killed anyone but following up his failed attempt to blow a
bomb hidden in his shoes, literally _billions_ of people have had to remove
their shoes at the airport. This guy changed the society ..

PS: while I hate removing my shoes every time I go through security in the US,
I am glad Richard didn't opt for using his arse as a C4 stash :P

~~~
Abraln
Agreed, it could be argued that those who drive below the speed limit do more
damage than most terrorists due to lost productivity and pollution.

------
graffitici
Just as I suspected. Those that really want to smuggle weapons and such can do
so with some minimal amount of homework. And yet the other 99% of people that
are about to board a 10 hour red-eye have to waste time in lines, taking shoes
off and have semi-naked 3D models made...

~~~
coldpie
You don't have to have nude photos taken. You can ask to "opt out" (that's the
key phrase, the TSA clowns know what it means), and they will take you aside
and pat you down by hand.

I do it because it takes longer. If everyone opted out, the lines would become
so ridiculously long that they'd have to change their system. I'm doing my
part.

~~~
StavrosK
That's half of why I do it too, whenever I (grudgingly) fly to the US. The
other half is that I don't want people taking naked photos of me, and
especially not for security theater.

I wish more people did it, though. Whenever I fly I'm the only one I see
opting out. When I was flying from Munich to DCA they had one of these
scanners installed to a lone US-only gate, and I said I wanted to opt out, and
the (German) airport employee looked at me surprised and said "why?". He
couldn't understand why someone would opt out of the machine, I guess he
thought it was some kind of metal detector or something.

~~~
caseysoftware
I opted out for years and realized that I don't have to anymore.

After they direct you to the scanner, just say "I can't lift my arms above my
head" and they'll put you through the metal detector and swab your hands. They
don't "test" you because if it's true, they could hurt you.

I've been doing it since last fall (30 flights?) without issue now.

(These have all been US domestic flights.)

~~~
yincrash
Doesn't this knowledge completely invalidate any legitimate use case for the
pat down? If a bad actor only requires a simple lie to avoid a pat down _and_
the mm wave machine, what advantage is there to having either?

~~~
TheLoneWolfling
Relevant XKCD: [https://xkcd.com/651/](https://xkcd.com/651/)

------
verbatim
" “[Testers] know exactly what our protocols are. They can create and devise
and conceal items that … not even the best terrorists would be able to do,”
Pistole told lawmakers at a House hearing. "

~~~
NoMoreNicksLeft
This is the most ignorant statement I've read in a month.

$50,000 to some ex-TSA employee, and they'd know them too.

~~~
javajosh
I honestly don't think there's much specialist knowledge required. Just fly a
few times, sans contraband, and keep your eyes open.

The TSA has always been about security theater. Unlike some I feel like their
heart is in the right place (the same for the NSA too). It's too bad there's
this huge expensive machine now with lots of entrenched interests and risk-
averse leadership.

Of course, being the hackers that we are, we might wonder how that money would
be better spent. I for one advocate for a 2 hour "passenger mixer" prior to
the flight. It would be mandatory, but catered, open bar, where you get to
know your other passengers, and _vote_ on whether someone needs further
attention from authorities. A free party _and_ you take your fate into your
hands? And even with premium booze it would be far cheaper than the TSA. Plus
if you get blown up you have no-one to blame but yourself.

~~~
jacquesm
For the price of some booze I could probably get someone else to carry the
bomb aboard in your scheme.

~~~
javajosh
You mean like tricking someone to carry an explosive? Yes, this is probably
one of the real threats that the TSA's scanning procedures guards against.

------
yincrash
Why not link to the original ABC News story?
[http://abcnews.go.com/ABCNews/exclusive-undercover-dhs-
tests...](http://abcnews.go.com/ABCNews/exclusive-undercover-dhs-tests-find-
widespread-security-failures/story?id=31434881)

------
sgnelson
Every few months, the TSA in the fairly large city I live in, with it's fairly
large airport, announces that they have stopped 10 guns from getting on our
airplanes! Thank God for the TSA. They make it sound as if these criminals
trying to bring guns onto the plane, had plans to take the entire plane
hostage and do another 9/11.

What they don't mention, is that in about 99.9% of these cases (internet
statistics), it was a guy who had left his pistol in his bag after going to
the range and completely forgetting it was there. There was no ill intent, no
criminal desire, just plain forgetfulness. But the TSA crows about what a
great job they're doing keeping us safe.

But it's just another case of security theater. It's the way they spin the
story that gets me. They don't acknowledge the fact that these people weren't
too criminals (I still believe in intent), but the TSA, in order to prove
their worth, treat them like such. They're catching the people who are only
guilty of forgetfulness, not the ones who actually are willing and able to do
harm. Like every other giant bureaucracy, the TSA is only interested in self-
perpetuation, not actually protecting our constitution and keeping us "safe."
And all the while, they're really not stopping anything, especially all the
guns that get put on a plane everyday without anyone noticing.

------
dsr_
Clearly the TSA needs more funding to address these threats!

------
barlescabbage
Is it a coincidence that this story appears the same week the senate renews
the patriot act?

~~~
rblatz
I can't think of a better example of how the Patriot Act and all of our knee
jerk reactions after 9/11 have been ineffective and need to be reexamined.
Unfortunately I think the response is going to be even more of the same. Sort
of like the saying "the beatings will continue until morale improves."

~~~
ilaksh
Not, knee jerk, carefully planned years ahead, just like 9/11.

Communism has a tendency to require greater levels of force in order to
maintain state control.

And the the numbers financially are just getting too lopsided to maintain the
uneven consumption for much longer. China will start to get a much larger
share, and the bankers will have to go along with it, because of basic
realities of math.

So the global military and economic control will shift to China, but
before/during/after the primary economic model in places like the US will have
to shift.

This means some people will have violent disagreements with the new control
structure. So they are trying to lay the groundwork for a carefully monitored
and controlled population now. Part of that is conditioning to not expect
privacy, which is one main function of the TSA.

This is not a new situation or process really.

~~~
bediger4000
Your article seems like warmed-over John Birch Society material from the 60s.
That is, you posit some world wide hidden planning or conspiracy that is set
on degrading some Pure American state we've got now (or in the 60s, according
to the Birch material), and substituting some centralized control system led
by non-Americans.

------
DanBC
If you read the TSA blog you see they catch about 20 to 30 handguns per month.

So does that mean that they don't catch about 400 handguns a month?

How many people have been injured by a handgun on a plane or in an airport in
the past 20 years?

~~~
wlesieutre
I would bet most of those handguns are from idiots who forgot they were
carrying it or knew they had it but forgot that they needed to move it to
their checked bag and declare it.

Someone sneaking it through the x-ray machine would probably try harder to
pack it in a way that makes it less obvious.

------
ck2
TSA is completely and only for security theater.

Wanna bet the NSA also has a 95% failure rate?

How about agencies ignoring actual intelligence like "bin laden determined to
strike" ?

------
ChuckMcM
It would be nice if they just decided that the security theatre doesn't work
but I doubt it. And there is an argument that without 100% chance of success,
and the number of steps that have to go right for a "big" event, that even a
small detection rate is sufficient. But I would much prefer a more systemic
fix.

------
tholmes
_“[Testers] know exactly what our protocols are. They can create and devise
and conceal items that … not even the best terrorists would be able to do,”
Pistole told lawmakers at a House hearing._

You know, like taping a bomb to your body. How would you ever think that up
without the playbook.

------
njharman
Calling this a TSA __failure __, is failing to understand what the real
purpose of the TSA is. Hint, it 's not security.

It is a failure of leadership / government to do something effective rather
than political.

------
ilaksh
The TSA is not actually there to catch 'terrorists'. Its mainly there to play
a role in the mythical world that supports war and hegemony, and despotic rule
domestically.

~~~
dragonwriter
It was mostly created to relieve the airlines of responsibility and potential
liability for security incidents: airport security, including federal
regulations of what you could bring on to planes and what had to be verified
before you got on them, existed before the TSA federalized the actual
screening.

~~~
Karunamon
Did the airlines ever have that responsibility? My understanding was that
third party security companies were responsible for screening pre-9/11.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Did the airlines ever have that responsibility?

Yes, and several were sued based on screening responsibility that for damages
resulting from the 9/11 attacks.

> My understanding was that third party security companies were responsible
> for screening pre-9/11.

Yes, the function was outsourced and often provided jointly by one contractor
contracted to the the airlines at any given terminal, but the airlines were
responsible for it. The proposal to federalize the function going forward
first arose, IIRC, as part of discussions about the legislation to bail out
the airlines by capping liability stemming from 9/11.

~~~
simoncion
You can sue anyone for anything. A skilled prosecutor can indict anyone for
anything.

Can you provide a citation of such a case that either went to trial, or
reached a non-trivial settlement? Links to random blogs won't cut it, unless
they _actually_ link to court papers.

------
gesman
The sooner TSA will (or be allowed to) learn from El Al security - the better
it will be for everyone.

~~~
selimthegrim
So, uh, you mean relentlessly profile people based on micro expressions and
ethnic background from the time they walk into the ticketing hall?

~~~
gesman
No, I mean using more of human intelligence instead relying on expensive
machinery and dumb routines on a mass scale.

------
pcarolan
Anyone have a rough estimate of what we've paid for enhanced security since
911?

------
a3n
But our junk is has been checked. So we've got that going for us.

