
The scary truth about TSA's PreCheck security vulnerabilities - CapitalistCartr
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-hawley-tsa-precheck-vulnerabilities-20161223-story.html
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benchaney
TSA precheck is working exactly as it is supposed to. The purpose of airport
security in general isn't to make anyone safer. It is security theatre.
Precheck allows people to opt out of the pointless security screening for a
cost. It is just a racket. I'm sure a determined attacker could get around
precheck, but that missed the point. TSA screenings were never intended to be
secure in any meaningful way anyway.

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pzone
I'm glad this is the only comment on this article, the TSA is an inane joke.
It's easy enough to slip weapons etc. through airport security. (I've brought
a pack of blades for my safety razor on almost every flight I've taken since
around 2010, and never been questioned about it.) Even if security were
actually tight, the fact that pilots are armed and behind blast doors during
flight means it would be pointless anyway.

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muzz
No, that would only be "pointless" if someone wanted to hijack the plane. If
they wanted to blow it up, then armed pilots behind doors wouldn't make a
difference.

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x1798DE
If they're going to blow something up, why not a bus or a train or a bridge or
a cruise boat or something? There's not so many people on an airplane that
it's like it's your only opportunity to kill a lot of people.

The only (rational) reason I can imagine that makes planes different is that
you can use it as a missile to attack a larger target.

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ibejoeb
I don't know much about Kip Hawley other than he worked at TSA and was the
brain behind disallowing liquids, for whatever that is worth. This is a
nonsense piece. Not sure who he's shilling for now.

> Just to be clear, unless a PreCheck passenger is randomly tagged for a more
> thorough check, he or she need only avoid setting off a metal detector to
> gain access to the secure areas of airports. In other words, these travelers
> could carry a pound of C-4 plastic explosive in their pockets and get onto
> any airplane in America.

Let him. We could hand out C-4 to everybody during boarding. Without a
detonator, the terrorist would have to gag each passenger his pound of might-
as-well-be Play-Doh.

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Scaevolus
Given how easily independent auditors have brought guns and knives through
security, why would a detonator be difficult? It's just another wire on the
x-ray scan among the normal chaos of portable electronic devices.

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gumby
> "PreCheck, however, is ... a security hologram — it looks plausible, it’s
> pleasing to the eye, but its protective value is illusory."

...making it utterly consistent with the rest of the TSA process. Its sole
function is to allow rich people to reduce their inconvenience and therefore
not agitate to have the TSA procedures simplified.

Where, then, is the problem?

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grogenaut
Rich? You can get any of the trusted traveller programs for less than $122 for
5 years. If you live near the canadian border you can get Nexus for $50.

[https://www.dhs.gov/trusted-traveler-comparison-
chart](https://www.dhs.gov/trusted-traveler-comparison-chart)

Thats $23/year. You pay more than that in airport taxes on a single flight. Or
like 2 meals in airport. Meals you might skip if you were pre-check :)

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technofiend
This is just another "Boogie, Boogie, Boogie" scare piece. Kip Hawley is the
same genius who got us the full body scanners and then was unable to get them
back out after the luggage scanners improved to the point they were no longer
needed.

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heisenbit
There may be valid concerns about this program. However this article smells
partisan.

Starting:

> When President Trump’s nominee for Homeland Security secretary, John Kelly,
> takes over,

Ending:

>For everyone’s safety, however, let’s hope that with this change in
leadership, PreCheck gets a hard, fresh look.

>Kip Hawley, the author of “Permanent Emergency: Inside the TSA and the Fight
for the Future of American Security,” was TSA administrator from 2005 to 2009.

So she was leading the TSA before Obama and now claims Trump could save the
day.

Bruce Schneider wrote in response to this article and that has more context
and perspective:
[https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2016/12/security_risk...](https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2016/12/security_risks_12.html)
. The current program has real problems but then what was there before was
also not golden either.

