
 The Two Classes of Airport Contraband - raju
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/09/the_two_classes.html
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biohacker42
Once again Bruce Schneier makes sense. Rock solid, perfect sense, as always.

And yet society will continue to be dominated by theater rather then common
sense.

That's just how the world is.

~~~
ken
I'm reminded of a surprisingly profound exchange in the otherwise zany
classic, "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World":

"Now take it easy, honey. These things happen, ya know."

"Now what kind of an attitude is that, 'these things happen?' They only happen
because this whole country is just full of people who, when these things
happen, they just say 'these things happen,' and that's why they happen! We
gotta have control of what happens to us."

(I'm not saying you aren't taking action, or that you would be able to change
this. Please don't take this as an accusation. I might have posted exactly the
same thing as you, if I'd seen it earlier. I don't actually have a point.
Maybe I just like imagining Ethel Merman responding to your comment.)

~~~
biohacker42
I think I know what you mean. One thing I've noticed living in many countries,
is that every culture has a different level of BS it is willing to put up
with.

I guess that's the bright side.

The other side is that culture changes slooooooooooowly.

------
mattmaroon
"No terrorist is going to base his plot on getting a gun through airport
security if there's decent chance of getting caught, because the consequences
of getting caught are too great."

That wouldn't seem to apply to lone suicide bombers, since the worst
consequence for them comes if they don't get caught. And if they were caught,
they could at least detonate in the airport and cause some havoc.

~~~
jgrahamc
A suicide bomber doesn't need to worry about airport security at all. They
just need to figure out when the airport is at its most crowded and stand in a
check in line and detonate their bomb.

~~~
hugh
A wearable bomb can only kill (say) few dozen people, even in a crowded area,
but the same bomb detonated on a 747 could kill 400.

It could also allow them to gain control of the aircraft (maybe, depending on
whether they can persuade the people on board that they aren't planning to
crash it into anything).

Suicide bombers generally aren't rational folks who multiply "number of
infidels I can kill" versus "chance of being caught" though. And we should be
thankful that they aren't so rational.

------
koblas
Last time I was walking through security I started to wonder if you could fill
your 1 Gallon zip lock back with as many 3.5oz bottles of water? What would
happen if you had everything correctly packaged...

All because there were _two_ checkpoints at security when I last flew
internationally... First one was the "gun check" the second was ... oh, you're
flying to US so that bottle of water you just bought while roaming around the
"mall" for the last hour, that has to go...

------
rudyfink
Would someone please put him in charge (or at least make him the power behind
the throne) of Homeland Security. This cannot happen soon enough.

