
'My £1,000 Macbook Air was stolen at airport security and no one cares' - raattgift
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2018/may/04/my-1000-macbook-air-was-stolen-at-airport-security-and-no-one-cares
======
wafflebear
Singapore has the best system, you are given a plastic token with a number
corresponding to the number on your tray. When you come out the other side of
security and want to collect your tray, you have to present the plastic token
otherwise they won't give you your tray back.

That other airports don't implement this system continues to astonish me.

~~~
sitepodmatt
It surprises me that other major airports choose to independently innovate
without just copying Changi (Singapore's airport). Everything from free
cinemas, to carpeted walkways, to water taps, to efficent immigration and
security and more.

~~~
ASalazarMX
> efficent immigration

A couple of years ago I had to take a connected flight where one of the stops
was in USA. I was never going to leave the airport, yet I had to form in a
line while immigration was doing the routine bottleneck check on dozens of
travelers, while my flight time was getting dangerously close. We just had to
suck it up, any complaining just brought additional delays. The check was
fairly automated, I guess they just needed more agents, or less gratuitous
revisions.

~~~
chimeracoder
> A couple of years ago I had to take a connected flight where one of the
> stops was in USA. I was never going to leave the airport, yet I had to form
> in a line while immigration was doing the routine bottleneck check on dozens
> of travelers, while my flight time was getting dangerously close. We just
> had to suck it up, any complaining just brought additional delays. The check
> was fairly automated, I guess they just needed more agents, or less
> gratuitous revisions.

I had this exact same experience with LHR (London Heathrow). I was never even
trying to leave the airport, just make a connecting flight.

Not only did they decide that having a single security lane open was
sufficient, but they also (effectively) only let one person unload their bag
into the trays at a time, for a max bus throughput of 1 person at a time. If
you left _anything_ in it - and I mean _anything_ [0] - they pulled your bag
and tray to the side, and you had to wait for one of two agents to inspect it.
The wait time for that was about 10-15 minutes. At no point did anybody have
any sense of urgency whatsoever with their work, despite all of us being there
to make connecting flights. They shuffled back and forth between the body
scanner, X-ray machine, and the break area, chatting with each other. I was
seventh in line, and in all, the entire process took literally 30 minutes (I
timed it).

I was floored, because I've traveled around the world and never seen anything
this bad. Even Heathrow security has never been _that_ bad for me when taking
off from London. There was an agent from our departing flight there to escort
us, because we were holding the whole flight up. I asked her if this was
typical or not, and she just rolled her eyes and laughed, "yeah, this is how
it usually is".

[0] One guy next to me had his back selected because he had left his
eyeglasses inside his bag, in a plastic (not metal) case.

------
hedora
The only counter example to this story I’ve heard involved San Francisco
International.

The TSA / luggage handlers were repeatedly stealing things from checked
luggage. Of course, nothing was done to follow up on the police reports that
were filed.

Then, one day, airport security stole a checked service revolver from a
retired cop. Once that was reported, the police immediately ran a sting
operation, and arrested the perpetrators.

Not sure what the moral of the story is.

~~~
sseveran
SFO is hardly the only airport where this has been occurring.

A TSA employee at Newark stole $800K worth of items.

[https://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/convicted-tsa-officer-
reveals...](https://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/convicted-tsa-officer-reveals-
secrets-thefts-airports/story?id=17339513)

~~~
gowld
Wow. I'd love for a campaign to raise fund to buy airport ads (or post
guerrilla flyers) warning travelers about TSA criminal activity.

TSA is more dangerous than what they are supposedly protecting traveler from.

------
jaysonelliot
I left BOTH of my laptops at the TSA checkpoint at O'Hare a few weeks ago. The
TSA folks actually went to the trouble of opening the laptop, saw my flight
info which happened to be on the screen, and contacted the gate, who called me
up so I could go get it.

Experiences vary. In my case, the TSA went above and beyond to save me from my
own stupidity.

~~~
rhodysurf
The screen wasnt locked?

~~~
gowld
Does the TSA have a key to open laptops?

~~~
merinowool
They have master password

------
galfarragem
Unfortunately this is a recurrent pattern in our times: unless is something
really serious (like a murder) no one cares.

A friend of mine waited 3 months to get police to read his report about an
e-robbery despite presenting concrete info about the robber. No one cares.

~~~
zelon88
Someone I know wanted to take apart an old car I had for a project to take
parts he needed. When I declined he came back when nobody was home and tried
to cut the parts out in a hurry, damaging a lot of the engine and smashing
both headlights for fun. I filed a police report and even gave them a name,
address, and phone number. There was no doubt in anyones mind who had
committed the crime, but because Police work in a small town must be so
difficult nothing ever happened. No phone calls, no follow-ups, no
consequences. Makes me wonder if the police only take action in personal loss
cases when the person losing is a business. They'll send three cruisers and
half a dozen cops to a shoplifting incident at a grocery store with an
impoverished perp, but if there's going to be any kind of he-said-she-said and
nobody's dead or injured you're on your own.

I believe that policing in the United States is becoming more and more a
method for controlling the masses rather than means to an end.

~~~
busterarm
Policing, since the very beginning of its history, has only ever been about
controlling the masses.

~~~
gowld
Not "only".
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles)

~~~
Someone1234
And it actually works.

Police in the UK are far from perfect, but they definitely feel a lot closer
to part of the community than elsewhere. When you see those videos of a police
officer dancing or getting involved in the activity they're protecting, it
isn't uncommon for it to be British police officers doing it.

Unfortunately they're under-funded and given too much paperwork, but
regardless other police around the world could pick up Peelian as a way
forward. It is definitely quite different from an "Us Vs. Them" attitude
though.

------
andrewla
I understand that this is a bad experience, but I have to think that it is so
rare as to make any attempt at mitigation far worse than the current system.

Since everything is on camera, and strong identification is required to pass
through security, committing a theft like this is tantamount to turning
yourself in to the police. While there may be a short-term gain from such a
theft, in the end, the police know exactly who you are and you will get
caught.

The timeframe of closure is an unpleasant experience, but far better than if
someone just grabbed your laptop in a Starbucks and ran off with it.

~~~
curun1r
I've got a mitigation strategy that won't be far worse than the current
system. Stop requiring expensive gadgets like laptops and tablets to be
removed and scanned separately. It's all security theater anyways, but that
policy just separates valuable, easily-to-fence items from luggage and
facilitates theft. While we're at it, stop requiring us to take off our shoes,
since that policy stemmed from a comically failed attempt at terrorism that's
just a dumb idea to begin with. There is less opportunity to steal from people
when they're not forced to waste time and attention reapplying footwear.

------
analogmemory
This has always worried me. Once you're through the scanner you're free to
loiter at the end of the conveyor belt. No one will bother you and I doubt TSA
will blink an eye if you were to grab something and put it in your bag.

------
etaty
Airport security is a farce. DutyFree shops are selling what should not be in
a plane, not even discussing the batteries. The experience feel like an animal
going to the slaughterhouse, except they don't put you to sleep yet.

~~~
nickjj
Last month I flew out of San Jose, CA's airport.

They were very behind schedule from what I gathered from talking to people in
line (it was my first time there).

They didn't even ask us to take our shoes off or go through the spinning metal
thing or unpack electronics / liquids from our carry-ons.

I walked clean through with a do it yourself mBot robot kit[0] that wasn't in
the box. It was just a bunch of loose parts thrown into a compartment of a
backpack. I imagine from a random person's POV, this could have looked like a
build your own bomb kit.

In the TSA's defense they did have a dog sniffing around the line. Not sure if
that's standard. It was the first time I've flown since the TSA started.

[0]:
[https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1818505613/mbot-49-educ...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1818505613/mbot-49-educational-
robot-for-each-kid)

------
rdiddly
_By no means do the following ideas intend to imply that this is OK or that it
's a problem that should exist, or that the victims deserve blame._

Ugly-up your laptop lid with stickers like a teenager. That makes it
distinctive, easy to spot, just slightly less valuable, and just slightly
harder to fence.

Hang onto your laptop-in-a-tub until the very last possible second before you
go through screening, and then insert it on the conveyor? (I've never tried
this. For all I know it may work fine or it may get you detained for 17 hours
and cavity-searched by over-enthusiastic fascist bureaucrats who are immune to
all explanation.)

Rise up _en masse_ against our military-industrial overlords?

Boycott or curtail air travel? (My personal favorite, even though it's
probably playing into somebody's hands.)

In case it happens anyway: Encrypt all your drives, keep daily backups, and
maintain an insurance policy that covers replacement cost.

------
Gys
> However, Manchester and Luton both told Money that they had no set procedure
> and it was up to the passenger to call police themselves.

So first you are forced to be separated from your belongings ('never leave you
possesions out of sight') and if something goes wrong it your problem. How
convenient.

Welcome to a brave new world.

------
tedunangst
> The pain is made worse by the ransom note she received from the thief. She
> had remotely shut the Apple Mac down and left a message stating that she
> needed it back as it contained vital dissertation and other work, and would
> pay a reward for its return.

What's the ransom???

~~~
jwilk
I don't follow. She's willing to pay a "reward for [the laptop's] return", but
not the ransom? What's the difference?

~~~
jstarfish
Some order of price, surely.

Random is demanded. Rewards are offered.

------
kylehotchkiss
Would the police in this case still provide a police report? Maybe that +
insurance could cover a new laptop.

It's so easy to backup everything for free these days. Google Drive/Dropbox if
you don't care about encryption or Arq.app if you do, Time Machine if you have
a spare hard drive at home.

~~~
gruez
>It's so easy to backup everything for free these days. Google Drive/Dropbox
if you don't care about encryption

those let you back up _maybe_ 50GB (if you abuse all the promos), which is
pretty small.

~~~
CoachRufus87
Use Arq, backup to Backblaze storage, and pay $0.005/GB/month. That 50 GB
would cost $0.25 a month. If you can afford a MacBook, you can afford an
encrypted cloud backup of your HD.

~~~
jethro_tell
I think that once you've paid for enough school, you can't afford not to
backup your dissertation.

------
drdebug
So the only safe way is to not take the laptop out, then they'll call you and
ask you to get it out ?

~~~
FearNotDaniel
This should be the top reply here. As a frequent flyer, I am worried about
this issue every single time. But your suggestion is awesome: the suitcase
containing the laptop will be kept safely behind the security line until you
have passed through the bodyscanner, shoe swipe, blah blah security theatre;
then you can wait there and watch it like a hawk when it comes back out of the
machine.

Of course, at a seriously inefficient spot like "London" Stansted this will
add about 20-30 mins to your time to clear security, thanks to understaffing
and the enormous proportion of Italian/Spanish teenagers who don't pay
attention to any of the warnings about removing all the cosmetics from their
luggage. End result being a constant backlog of bags to be hand-checked. But
that's probably better than losing your laptop. And at a well-run terminal
like Heathrow 2 you're only looking at an extra five minutes to get it
rechecked. I might just try this on my next flight...

------
soapdog
a somewhat similar situation happened with a friend of mine in LAX. It is not
the same because the laptop was not stolen, what happened was that he picked
someone else macbook pro and the other person picked his.

He only realized that upon arriving here in Brazil. After phoning the airport
and having a friend from LA walk there. He got hold of the real owner of the
laptop (he noticed before flight and filled a missing item request at the
airport). After some back and forth they managed to exchange their laptops
back over FedEx.

So in the end, nothing but money was lost as they both got hold of their own
laptops back but this should have never happened in the first place if the TSA
or whoever is in the scanning machines took care of what is happening. If we
can put with all the trouble regulation and schemes, they can do a better job
of paying attention to the process. There are more than one person per machine
already...

~~~
jgh
Some backpack makers (such as North Face) make TSA Approved backpacks that
allow you to keep your laptop in the bag through the scanner. They basically
open up like a book and the laptop is held in a pocket where the shoulder
straps attach, so there is nothing above or below it.

~~~
soapdog
I have one of those (from Timbuk2), the main reason I purchased it was because
it was TSA Approved and yet TSA never allowed me to keep my laptop inside it,
even with it open like a book, nothing else inside it, they still required me
to remove it every time...

~~~
jgh
Really? I've never had problems with my Surge II Transit. The only time I've
run into troubles is when I'm in an international airport and go "But this is
TSA approved..." to which the usual response is an angry "Sir, we're not TSA."

------
gnode
I don't really understand this. It says in the article that she was advised to
report the theft to the police, and that they would cooperate with the police
investigation. Did she refuse to do so for some reason, but instead go to the
press?

------
abritinthebay
This is why I use one of those "TSA friendly" bags for my laptop: it never
leaves the bag, I just unzip it and lay the bag flat.

I'd be furious if this was me tho.

~~~
dijit
FWIW; you're not allowed to do this in Europe (at least in the airports I've
been in). I spent extra money on a TSA friendly backpack too, so I'm bummed.
:(

All items must be in a tray, electronics have to be in a separate tray and not
stacked.

~~~
sitepodmatt
Yep same in most airports in SE Asia too. TSA made everyone's job harder,
sorry I mean travel safer, by banning more than 100ml of liquid, so nowadays
probably reluctant to adopt more TSA rules even if they are now somewhat
logical.

~~~
gowld
SE Asia airport security procedure is determined by TSA, even though they
don't follow TSA procedures?

~~~
sitepodmatt
I don't know the exact details, but everyone adopted the silly 100ml liquid
max per bottle nonsense post 9/11?, but the rest of stuff such TSA approved
laptop bags are not in practice or at least not known by the contracted staff
operating the machines and scans I've experienced in SE Asia.

~~~
wafflebear
I believe the regulations on liquids are set by ICAO which is part of the UN.
Sometimes the US sets extra security requirements for flights to/from/in the
US.

------
ypeterholmes
Certainly the story here is about the negligence of Airport Security, but let
this also be a lesson to the girl about backing up your work to the cloud.

------
Cypher
They don't care because it happens all the time.

------
fareesh
> She has been refused access to footage identifying the crook because of data
> protection rules.

I am really speechless

~~~
tedunangst
Tomorrow: "the airport gave my picture to a stranger without a warrant!"

~~~
fareesh
Isn't the whole point of collecting security camera data for security? I don't
understand how using the data for its intended purpose is breaking the law

------
merinowool
She could have said she had cocaine hidden in place of battery. That would
have been found in no time.

