Posted by Seth on May 13, 2011 under News, TSA | 
For a guy who sees so many of his constituents benefit from a program, New York Senator Charles Schumer doesn’t really seem to care too much for the organization. Indeed, the Senator has been making noise in the past couple weeks that will likely cause irreparable harm to Amtrak, destroying one of the few small advantages America’s national rail company has over air travel. Oh, and just for good measure, the rules he wants to apply are ridiculously unfair to all passengers.
The word is that, among other "security" efforts, Schumer wants to see the Department of Homeland Security expand their Secure Flight program to cover rail travel as well. Secure Flight is the rather un-American program that maintains a secret list of folks considered a threat to air travel. The people are never told that they are necessarily on said list. The details of how one gets listed or, more significantly, how one proves they should not be listed are not public and what little information is available suggests that the process doesn’t really work to help make anything or anyone more secure. Nonetheless Schumer wants to see the program expanded to cover rail travel as well as air travel.
Never mind that one of the justifications the TSA and DHS have used in the past to justify their overly-invasive passenger screening policies is that the passengers always could take a train if they didn’t like the rules. Never mind that the effort would essentially require the creation of TSA-like checkpoints at rail stations, increasing the boarding time and generally making a mess of the process. None of that is important because Schumer sees a potential threat that he believes can be exploited to drive both spending and fear, the latter being the more fun way for folks in charge to stay that way and screw over the public.
So instead of investing money where it can be used to help rail travel in the USA. Instead of working to increase high-speed rail for regional inter-city transport. Instead of investing in actually providing security to any part of the travel experience we have this ridiculous plan. Instead of identifying actual security threats we have this list of names that may or may not mean anything related to security, other than job security for the folks who compile, maintain and perform checks against the list. This plan that does nothing for security. This plan that doesn’t actually identify the people who are really threats because they might find out we know about them. This plan that unduly subjects citizens and visitors alike to a screening process that completely circumvents the principles of our justice system. This plan that will destroy the one last chance we have to make intercity rail travel a legitimate alternative to air travel in the United States.
Thanks, Senator Schumer. Thanks for distracting attention from the real problems. Thanks for fear-mongering instead of providing meaningful and functional plans.
In short, thanks for nothing.
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Posted by Seth on May 4, 2011 under Flying, Trip Reports, TSA |
Flying standby used to be a relatively simple endeavor: you showed up at the gate and if there was a seat you got it. Not too difficult to manage, really. Then the airlines realized that they could make money from folks who wanted to fly standby and things got way more complicated. But on my JetBlue flight from JFK to Boston yesterday I experienced the most interesting version of a standby policy I’ve ever seen.
I arrived at the airport expecting to just relax a bit before my flight, not even thinking about flying out early. That was before I got the notice that my flight was going to be an hour late and likely cause me to miss my dinner in Boston. With a bit of motivation and luck that the TSA line was pretty quick I was through to the gate 20 minutes prior to the earlier flight’s scheduled departure time. Surely it would be no problem to get myself on a standby list and, with any luck, up to Boston in time for dinner. The gate agent was busy so I stepped over to the service center right next to the gate.
"Sorry, but you cannot be added to the standby list. The flight is closed."
Mind you they were still boarding the flight and they had a dozen or so folks standing around waiting to see who would clear off the standby list into one of the few empty seats still available, but they guy I was speaking with insisted the flight was "closed." I tried with the gate as well and couldn’t even get a word in before I was dismissed by the agent. At this point it was pretty clear I was not getting on the flight but I was also curious to see how the event would play out as there were a number of non-revenue passengers also waiting for seats and I was curious how many of them would get to fly ahead of a revenue customer. The answer was at least 5.
That number would have been lower as the gate agent was clearing all the standby customers into seats, including the non-revs who could ride jump seat. I give a lot of credit to the pilot who was flying as a non-rev who insisted that they put her in the cockpit for the sake of getting one more standby on the plane. The gate agent working the flight was actually annoyed by this as it meant more paperwork for her.
When I asked for an explanation at the gate I was told that there was nothing they could do for me there and that I should proceed to the Service Center for a supervisor to explain the situation to me. I walked the 20 steps back over there and asked the same guy I was speaking with earlier to speak with the supervisor as the gate agent instructed me. He picked up the phone and called the supervisor on duty. It was the woman working that gate who sent me away. Apparently she had no desire to explain what the policy was or why they were taking non-revenue customers over revenue ones so I was told I could wait a few minutes for another supervisor to show up.
I guess they figured I’d eventually leave as the supervisor I was promised never materialized. I waited 90 minutes and he never showed. He did call in at one point and I explained the situation to him so I believe he really exists, but I sat there for 90 minutes and he didn’t actually show up and answer the questions at hand. I also left my contact information so that he could call or email me once he did get an answer. Sadly, though not surprisingly that call never came. They did give me a $12 meal voucher for my trouble but that isn’t worth nearly the same as actually getting where I wanted to be when they should’ve been able to get me there. And the 90 minute wait for a supervisor because the other one couldn’t be bothered to explain the policy was pretty poor form.
The JetBlue website help page on the topic doesn’t have any more useful details. There is no mention of a cutoff time or anything else that suggests that non-revs should be seated ahead of revenue customers. And the conversation I had on the phone with the supervisor suggests that they screwed up but no one can confirm the actual policy for me. Even reaching out to a contact inside the company only got me some maybes and sortofs rather than a real policy. Really quite frustrating.
Will this stop me from flying with JetBlue in the future? Probably not. The product in the air is still probably the best coach flying available in the USA. But the inexplicable policy of restricting the waitlist so far in advance and taking non-revenue customers over revenue passengers is certainly that rubs me the wrong way and will certainly make me consider other options, particularly when I know that there might be some give in my schedule and that I might want to fly out a bit early. They may not charge, but the inability to actually get on the list within 30 minutes of departure makes that benefit rather less valuable.
Other than arrive 45 minutes late the flight was fine. No real complaints there. But the standby policy appears to have a rather notable problem.
Posted by Seth on April 25, 2011 under News, TSA |
Can you list every address you’ve lived at since birth? What about every employer – including the name of your supervisor and their phone number – you have ever had? Every school you attended, including address and phone number? If not, you might not be able to get a passport if the State Department has its way. And those are the easy questions on the newly proposed form DS-5513.
Here’s the justification for the new form as provided in the Federal Register filing:
The primary purpose for soliciting this information is to establish citizenship, identity, and eligibility for a U.S. Passport Book or Passport Card. The information may also be used in connection with issuing other travel documents or evidence of citizenship, and in furtherance of the Secretary’s responsibility for the protection of U.S. nationals abroad.
If you can demonstrate (arguably via a certified birth certificate) that you were born in the US then the above questions are the only ones you really need to complete. If not, however, the questionnaire gets way more detailed. Here are some of the specifics that are asked for:
- What type of document, if any, did your mother use to enter into the United States before your birth?
- Please describe the circumstances of your birth including the names (as well as address and phone number, if available) of persons present or in attendance at your birth.
- Was there any religious or institutional recording of your birth or event occurring around the time of birth? (Example: baptism, circumcision, confirmation or other religious ceremony. Please provide details including the name, location of the
institution, and date.)
They even ask for specific details regarding any medical professionals that may have been involved, including a history of appointment dates. Oh, and the mother’s profession, address and, because we don’t want to be particularly obvious that we’re discriminating against immigrants, "What type of document, if any, did your mother use to enter into the United States before your birth?"
In case you’re curious, they estimate that compiling all this information will take only 45 minutes on average. I only have to answer the easy questions and I’m not sure I can do it that quickly.
Sadly, this will almost certainly become the rule, just like all the other asinine things the government is doing to infringe upon our rights "out of an abundance of caution." Today is the last day to register a complaint to the appropriate officials. The easiest way to do so is to email GarciaAA@state.gov. You must include the DS form number (if applicable), information collection title, and OMB control number in any correspondence. For this particular abomination those details are DS-5513 and Biographical Questionnaire for U.S. Passport; there is no OMB control number currently assigned.
UPDATE (17:55 EDT 25 APR): This form is supposedly only to be used if the veracity of the initially supplied documentation is in doubt. So it probably won’t apply to everyone. Still, there is a TON of data in here way beyond what should be needed to establish citizenship and well beyond what the government should need from us.
Here’s the letter I’m sending. I encourage you to contact them as well. Oh, and the 60-day comment period started on February 24th so it is pretty much over so it is important to act quickly (i.e. TODAY) on this issue!
To: GarciaAA@state.gov
Subject: Comments on proposed rule for DS-5513 – Biographical Questionnaire for U.S. Passport
To whom it may concern:
I am writing to comment on the proposed rule change published in the Federal Register as Public Notice 7345 regarding form DS-5513 – Biographical Questionnaire for U.S. Passport; there is currently no OMB control number assigned to this document.
The proposed form is collecting an excessive amount of data, well beyond what is necessary to confirm citizenship and issue a passport for qualified individuals. The time burden suggested – an average of 45 minutes – is a gross underestimate of how long it will take to collect even the basic information; answering questions 5-12 will take significantly longer. As an adult in my 30s who is qualified to answer only the basic questions I found that it took me well over one hour to compile the information and it is still incomplete.
My schooling and job history have no bearing on my citizenship status, yet the form asks for full details of both. If I fail to provide it (and potentially if I miss something) the State Department can deny me a passport, even though I am a naturally born citizen.
The form show significant bias against home-birthed children, requiring them to complete extensive documentation as though they are an undocumented alien in this country. Similarly, the extensive details requested about the circumstances of the birth – names and phone numbers of everyone present, for example – are excessive and go well beyond what is necessary to document citizenship.
Travel is a wonderful thing. It provides education, experiences and perspective all at once, helping to better both the people doing the traveling as well as those whom they visit. It should be encouraged and facilitated by our government, not impeded. This form represents an excessive data collection against US citizens and is an undue burden for demonstrating citizenship. It is working against these goals, not towards them.
Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Wandering Aramean.
Posted by Seth on March 9, 2011 under News, TSA |
It is a bit complicated to fire someone that does not really work for you. Just ask Cosmo Kramer about getting fired from a job: "I don’t even really work here!" To which the boss replied, "That’s what makes this so hard." So when Amtrak‘s Police Chief John O’Connor caught wind of an apparent rogue screening checkpoint set up by the TSA at the Amtrak station in Savannah, Georgia, firing them was all that much more difficult. But that didn’t stop the Chief. Amtrak stations are currently off limits to TSA personnel until "a firm agreement can be drawn up to prevent the TSA from taking actions that the chief said were illegal and clearly contrary to Amtrak policy."
Apparently a TSA Visible Intermodal Protection and Response ("VIPR") team showed up at the Savannah Amtrak station, posted a note that anyone entering the building was subject to search and then proceeded to make good on that promise. Skipping over the fact that one can apparently board or depart trains in Savannah without ever entering the station, it is not clear who authorized or even requested the search. It is clear, however, that the actions were not in compliance with Amtrak’s policy regarding security.
“When I saw it, I didn’t believe it was real,” O’Connor said. When it developed that the posting on an anti-TSA blog was not a joke, “I hit the ceiling.”
The TSA’s comment on the event is, typically, a non-comment that avoids the issue. They actually come close to suggesting that they might have done something wrong, but do not go so far as to acknowledge that the VIPR action apparently violates Amtrak policies.
However, after looking into it further, we learned that this particular VIPR operation should have ended by the time these folks were coming through the station since no more trains were leaving the station. We apologize for any inconvenience we may have caused for those passengers.
Chief O’Connor is on record as believing that the TSA’s intrusive searches are excessive for his organization’s needs and possibly unconstitutional. The VIPR searches in Savannah affected all passengers, not a random sampling as Amtrak policy dictates. The VIPR searches also included the "wanding" of passengers and isolation of "sterile" and "non-sterile" environments, a policy that Amtrak does not implement at any of their stations.
It looks like the TSA has once again messed up. Not really much of a surprise there, but certainly depressing. Watch the video. And cry a little. Next time the TSA agent groping you at the airport suggests that you have other options if you do not want to fly, remember that you really do not.
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Posted by Seth on March 3, 2011 under News, TSA |
Sure, there was tremendous uproar when Spirit Air announced their plan to charge passengers to have larger carry-on bags on the plane. But what if the TSA, the idiots charged with securing our transportation infrastructure, suggests something similar? Will the same congress-critters who displayed outrage maintain it or will they roll over to the "anything for security" mantra?
It looks like we are all going to find out soon enough. The Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, testified to congress this week that the costs related to carry-on bags are in the range of $260MM annually because of the need to have TSA agents screening those bags. These are the same agents who are great at spotting bottles of water and apparently not so much at spotting things that are actually arguably dangerous, but that’s a whole different rant.
The Secretary conveniently managed to skip over the part about how there are other agents who are inspecting all the checked baggage; if the bags are checked instead of carried on someone is still going to have to check them. Then again, the checked baggage systems (particularly the new ones) are much more automated and faster, in part because there is more space to work with in those sections of the airport and in part because they’re actually looking for dangerous goods instead of extra large tubes of toothpaste or sunscreen.
The statement from the Secretary was in response to a rather leading question from Senator Mary Landrieu:
Checked bagged fees are increasing, it looks like, the cost to TSA because people don’t want to pay the fees so they are not checking bags and putting more on the planes. My question is, do the taxpayers have to pick up this fee? Or should we be looking at the airlines for some of the profits that they make from these fees to offset the cost the taxpayer.
The Secretary is trying to convince Congress to increase the fees paid by passengers to the tune of $600MM annually. No word yet on what other wasteful projects the spare $340MM will be earmarked for. Apparently the Senator is just looking for a cash-grab.
Our government, hard at work.
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Posted by Seth on January 27, 2011 under News, TSA |
The Department of Homeland Security is finally going to get rid of their Rainbow Brite security system according to published reports. The system, established to aid in fear-mongering in 2002, was pretty much a waste of time and energy. Now it is being retired.
The system will be replaced in April during a presentation by DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano. The details will be included as part of the first annual "State of America’s Homeland Security" address. Get ready to hear the DHS brag about how they’ve spent billions upon billions and not actually improved security all that much. Should be a great time.
Seriously, though, I’m glad to hear that the DHS is moving towards a system that identifies specific real threats and reacts to those. Here’s hoping they can manage to do it without only being the reactionary fiasco that they have been to date. Deciding 3 days later to ban whatever last month’s attack du jour was doesn’t say much for their foresight.
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Posted by Seth on November 23, 2010 under News, Screening Management SOP, Trip Reports, TSA |
Part of me says that I should have seen this all coming. The TSA has been pretty good about demonstrating just how incompetent they are and their latest moves really are just a continuation of that trend. Still, I’ve found myself so completely dumbfounded over the past 3 weeks that I’ve not been able to form a coherent set of thoughts about just what specifically I find so objectionable. As National Opt-Out Day approaches tomorrow, however, I’m going to try.
It was about 50 weeks ago that I posted what I thought was a relatively tame post here on this blog: The TSA makes another stupid move. Just another example of the TSA being stupid, right? Actually, this one was worse then most. The story got some legs and before I knew it there were congressional hearings where I was excoriated as part of the problem (“Rest assured that we will hold the department to account”) while the Acting Director of the TSA sat there, smiled, declined to actually answer any of the questions posed and then went back to running the circus that is the TSA. Congress promised changes but no oversight of the agency materialized.
Fast forward 11 months and we’re dealing now with outrage and near revolt on the part of the passengers in many camps. The Director of the TSA has made statements effectively blaming us, the passengers, for causing the problems and reminding everyone that if they are delayed at security and miss their flight on Wednesday it is because other passengers have decided that being strip-searched was simply too much, not because the searches are happening.
I hear people say “Well, as long as it makes us safer,” as a justification for the searches. They do not. These searches are not based on any actionable intelligence report. They are based on random reactions to previous events and to extensive lobbying on the part of former DHS employees to score huge contracts to sell the strip-search machines.
I hear people suggest that doing it “Israel-style” will make us safer. Probably not, and even if it would our society is not willing to accept the costs – time or dollar – to go there. And we shouldn’t. The threats and the infrastructure being secured are very different.
Some airports (Orlando and Colorado Springs are the two most recent to suggest such) want the TSA out and replaced with private screeners. Sadly, however, the screening policies are still set by the TSA and ultimately it is these policies that cause the problems. Having transited security at SFO several times in the past couple years I can safely say that the private contractors performing the unreasonably invasive searches are no better than anyone else performing the same.
When I can walk through the checkpoint and see a document out in plain view labeled “Unpredictable Screening Checklist” complete with the details on what types of events are considered “unpredictable” and how often each TSO is expected to perform such there is something VERY wrong with the SOP. When I explain to the folks running the checkpoint that they probably shouldn’t have those documents in plain view they generally shrug and move them somewhere else that is still in plain view of the passengers.
Lots of people suggesting lots of things, except the obvious solution: hold the TSA accountable. Elected officials are only just now starting to consider suggesting that the TSA isn’t perfect. Doing so when it was not clear that the public was opposed to the TSA was political suicide as their opponents would campaign against them on that front. But now that there is some political cover – hard for their not to be as the TSA is groping passengers, adult and child alike – the politicians are finally starting to speak up. Not enough, yet, but the movement is afoot.
Here’s hoping the uproar continues. Here’s hoping that passengers see the TSA for what they really are. Here’s hoping that our country can finally choose to not live in fear. These will be my thoughts as I travel this week, knowing that I have the right to not be strip-searched just to get on an airplane.
I will fly proud, not afraid. I will not let anyone terrorize me, including my own government.
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Posted by Seth on February 21, 2010 under News, Screening Management SOP, TSA |
In a report that should come as no surprise to anyone following the story, the Department of Homeland Security Inspector General has blasted the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) for a series of failures that let to the disclosure of data classified as Sensitive Security Information (SSI) last December. Among other things, the report identifies as “deficient” the TSA’s information handling policies. Even more damning, however, are some of the details in the back-story that explain how the TSA managed to get themselves into the situation they were in. Indeed, the whole issue stems from concerns about privacy and handling of personal data, something that the TSA has been blasted for in the past. And while changes have been promised in response to the report, it remains to be seen if actual change can come from this event.
In prior years the TSA controlled public access to information that was considered SSI – whether redacted or not – through the use of a password-protected intranet site available only for potential bidders on projects associated with the documents.
Prior to a 2007 solicitation for requests for proposals to implement privatized screening at the Key West Airport, TSA required potential vendors to sign a nondisclosure agreement before providing the SSI Screening Management SOPs via its SPPO web-board. The web-board controlled access via login/password to vendor personnel who had submitted a signed nondisclosure agreement.
TSA officials reported to us that over time, TSA’s Office of Privacy and the Office of Chief Counsel’s Information Law branch informed SPPO and the Office of Acquisitions (ACQ) that the program’s prior process for vetting vendors, which included completion of a nondisclosure agreement, violated their privacy rights. TSA does not have a Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) in place for the collection of personally identifiable information provided through the nondisclosure agreements.
In other words, the TSA was inappropriately collecting information from potential vendors and was unable to assure those vendors that the information collected was being handled in a reasonable manner. At this point the TSA had a choice to make: establish a PIA or stop collecting the information. For reasons which are not particularly clear and which are not addressed in the report the TSA chose the latter. They simply stopped collecting the information in question and stopped providing access to SSI documents associated with contracts that were up for bid. This issue came to a head with the 2007 solicitation for security vendors in Key West.
…TSA released the solicitation to implement privatized screening at the Key West Airport with limited information, did not have vendors sign a nondisclosure agreement, and did not release the SSI Screening Management SOPs. After the contract award, one vendor that had proposed to undertake and perform these duties at Key West Airport conveyed to TSA that not having access to SSI Screening Management SOPs placed them at a disadvantage, as other vendors had those documents through previously signed nondisclosure agreements.
In reviewing the Key West solicitation, the Offices of Chief Counsel and ACQ determined that TSA provided too little information and risked receiving an award protest. The expressed view was that incumbent contractors who already possessed the Screening Management SOPs would have an unfair advantage.
That decision made to avoid the PIA led to the scenario where the bids solicited were uninformed and biased in favor of incumbent parties who had previously had access to the information. Bad policy begat bad decisions which begat a terrible blunder.
The TSA made the decision at this point – mid 2008 – to produce a redacted version of the Screening Management SOP document so that they could distribute it to vendors. This was, in theory, the best of both worlds. The TSA would have the information available and would not have the issues associated with collecting personal information and the need for a PIA. Unfortunately, however, the TSA failed to properly produce this document, resulting in the events of last December.
The instructions for producing such documents are pretty straightforward. Indeed, the report includes a pretty picture that describes the process. The key step comes in the box that is redacted in this image but that is described pretty clearly in the report itself, “
In <<Adobe Acrobat>>
the key step to ensure that document contents cannot be either manipulated or retrievable is to check <<Apply Redaction>>. (N.B. – the bits inside the << >> marks are actually properly redacted in the original report. I have inserted the text here based on a reasonably solid supposition as to what the contents likely are. As someone who has worked with the tools in question and from reading the other content of the document it seems pretty likely that the above is correct.)
So, essentially, the error came because someone forgot to click on a checkbox. It was furthered when that user chose to skip the second to last step in the flowchart, searching for known redacted content in the finished document. Moreover, the document was returned to the Office of SSI for clarification of the header/footer that stated the document was still considered SSI. At that time a new electronic document was produced following the same procedures as the first one, skipping the appropriate steps to correctly apply the redaction.
Particularly damning in the report is the Inspector General’s review of the TSA’s training for its employees in the handling of SSI documents.
After our review of [the (SSI) Awareness] training course, we determined that this training does not contain instruction on handling redacted SSI material, the process of consulting with SSI coordinators, or discussion of any other quality control steps prior to the release of redacted information outside of DHS.
It is not clear what the training does cover but the fact that it doesn’t include anything about how to properly handle redacted material or to manage the release of the information to the public. Not comforting at all for the traveling public that the TSA’s training doesn’t actually cover things that seem critical to the topic in question.
Another of the findings in the Inspector General report is interesting, especially in light of some of the comments made by Acting Secretary of the TSA, Gale Rossides. Ms. Rossides testified during hearings before the House Subcommittee on Transportation Security and Infrastructure Protection that the leaked version was old and that many updated versions had been released in the interim months. While this is almost certainly true it belies a readily apparent fact: the main substance of the document didn’t change all that much. Indeed, the report suggests that over a span of 9 months – from the production of the original redacted version until the version was posted online – the “changes were determined to be insignificant” by the Screening Partnership Program Office and the same document was forwarded on to be included in the posting online.
Ultimately the failures associated with this document being published were many. The TSA made a decision to avoid responsibility associated with a Privacy Impact Assessment. An office worker chose to not follow the established process in creating a redacted document and also failed to check the document after producing it. And the Agency missed at least one other opportunity to discover the error and resolve it. As stated rather succinctly in the report:
We are concerned that an improperly redacted version of the SSI Screening Management SOPs passed through a number of TSA offices from June 7, 2008, to posting the document on FedBizOps.gov on March 3, 2009, and again on March 16, 2009, without any internal procedures to determine whether the document was redacted properly. As a result, TSA and department internal controls for reviewing, redacting, and coordinating the protection of SSI are deficient.
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Posted by Seth on January 4, 2010 under News, Screening Management SOP, TSA |
Gotta love an Agency that can managed to violate their own rules when creating rules. I suppose if they never bothered to publically state either of the two contradicting policies they’d be fine. And up until the unredacted Screening Checkpoint SOP document turned up last month at least one of the policies was not particularly well known. This week, however, the TSA has issued a new directive (anyone taking bets on how long until a full copy is leaked or subpoenas served to the reporters??) as part of their follow-up to the failed bombing attempt on Christmas day. And the new policies are in violation of their own policies.
The new policy, according to several sources, requires that passengers originating from one of 14 countries are subject to a full search of their carry-on luggage and a pat-down when boarding flights bound for the United States. This policy is eerily similar to Section 2A-2 (C) (1) (b) (iv) of the Screening Checkpoint SOP. That section dictates that passengers presenting a passport from one of twelve countries be subjected to a full secondary screening (essentially the same bag check and pat-down). The main difference is the addition of two countries to the list, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. And the rule now definitely applies at foreign ports rather than at TSA checkpoints.
The problem with this policy is that it violates the TSA’s stated Civil Rights Policy. That policy suggests that
[T]he public we serve are to be treated in a fair, lawful, and nondiscriminatory manner, without regard to … national origin.
So you’re not going to be subject to discriminatory screening based on national origin, unless you happen to be from one of 14 specific countries and then you will. Glad that they’ve cleared up that confusion.
On the plus side, the pat-downs conducted at most foreign checkpoints are much more thorough thatn the TSA-administered ones. Just this morning in Barcelona I watched a woman receive a rather thorough search at the WTMD that identified metal around her breasts and forced her to actually pull the necklace out from under her shirt to show the screening officer. I’m not so sure that such a thorough check would ever happen in the lawsuit-happy USA.
Still, the policy doesn’t really address the main issue at hand. The TSA is constantly fighting the last war rather than looking to the next one. Their “intelligence” appears to be a rather unfortunate joke of a system. And there are insufficient resources – time, cash, human and space – to reasonably provide 100% manual screening. Besides, it isn’t necessary. The key is in having the appropriate information and acting on it in advance, not after the fact. IATA Director General Giovanni Bisignani, a man who knows a thing or two about air travel, sums the situation up quite clearly:
Instead of looking for bad things—nail clippers and rogue bottles of shampoo—security systems need to focus on finding bad people. …
Adding new hardware to an old system will not deliver the results we need. It is time for governments to invest in a process built around a check point of the future that combines the best of screening technology with the best of intelligence gathering. Such a system would give screeners access to important passenger data to make effective risk assessments
But that hasn’t stopped the TSA, Canada’s CATSA or the UK’s DfT from trotting out plans to increase the use of Whole Body Imaging – aka Strip Search – machines around the globe. Fighting the wrong fight in an expensive and inappropriate manner. Thanks, government. You’re real great there.
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Update (1/5/2010 12:07am EST): Couple small typos in the original post that changed the meaning of a few key phrases. Whoopsie.
Posted by Seth on January 1, 2010 under TSA |
I really wish that these stories would stop cropping up. Don’t get me wrong – they give me something to write about – but they are truly depressing when I realize that these are the folks I entrust my live with a hundred times every year. I know that the numbers are still very much in my favor, but it is really quite sad that they are able to continue to operate like this.
The failure today comes in the form of another PDF document containing SSI that has been published online without the appropriate redaction applied. Last time this happened there were hearings and a decent amount of general outrage. Here’s hoping that something similar happens again. Actually, here’s hoping that something more happens this time. It would be nice to see the Acting Director of the TSA actually required to answer questions rather than to simply say that she’ll get back to the folks driving the inquest. It would be nice to hear that the organization will actually be held responsible rather than simply allowing the talking head to say that she is taking full responsibility, government speak for nothing will happen.
The document in question this time is a ruling from the US Merit Systems Protection Board. These are the folks responsible for handling whistleblower claims from government employees and ruling on whether the claimant actually has a case against the government. In this particular case the case is about a TSA employee responsible for testing the checked baggage screening procedures at airports around the country. He made a claim that a change to the screening procedure would negatively affect the safety of the traveling public and was reprimanded. The TSA claims that the reprimand was for other failures in his job, not for the claims made about the changes to the screening process.
The meat of the case is actually rather boring and reading the document is somewhat sleep inducing. Still, there are a number of bits that are listed as SSI and that are “redacted” in the same manner as the last document was. A black box was drawn over the affected text but the underlying text was not removed from the document. Reading the original text is a trivial matter; it does not require any special computer ‘hacker” skills.
What is important in this document is that it clearly outlines some of the policies that the TSA uses to define the screening of checked bags. It describes the process and frequency with with bags will be swabbed for traces of explosive residues (ETD check) and what the follow-on actions are should the test come back positive. Most notably, it describes situations where a positive ETD might not require further inspection. Properly redacted this information wouldn’t be there.
Ironically, the initial action came about because the TSA agent thought that the changes to the search policies were decreasing the safety of the traveling public. Through their failed PDF skills the government has ensured such an outcome.
The document is dated May 4, 2009. It is not clear if the procedures described are from that time-frame or from around 2007. If the latter we will almost certainly hear the TSA claim that there is no risk because the policies have changed several times since this information was in play. But they always build on previous versions of their SOP so it isn’t possible for us to really know just how much of the “redacted” policies are still in play.
You’ve failed again, TSA. How many more times can we expect this to happen before true, positive change comes to the organization? Why are you gambling with my life?
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