Full-Body Scanner Backlash

[tahnan]

I'm consistently entertained by reading about the increasing backlash against the new TSA procedures. And once you get past the anger, the TSA's official blog is relatively entertaining, especially considering that the comments they get are almost universally dismissive and skeptical. Some truly high points from the blog:

There is nothing punitive about [the patdown] - it just makes good security sense.

"It just makes good security sense." That's hardly a sentence, and frankly it just sounds like a talking point.

Then, in relation to the John Tyner case—that's the "If you touch my junk I'll have you arrested" guy, who's now facing the possibility of a $10,000 fine for deciding not to fly and leaving the airport when faced with the full-body scanner or "enhanced" pat-down:

It is important that all screening procedures are completed. This ensures that terrorists do not have an opportunity to probe TSA’s procedures by electing not to fly just as TSA’s screening procedures are on the verge of detecting that the passenger is a terrorist. [...] Will you receive a $10,000.00 fine if you opt out of screening all together and leave the checkpoint? While TSA has the legal authority to levy a civil penalty of up to $11,000.00 for cases such as this, each case is determined on the individual circumstances of the situation.

That's really just the worst justification I've ever heard. For one thing, these procedures are publicized in places like, say, the TSA blog, so there's not a whole lot of probing that needs to be done (except of course the probing in the enhanced patdown, ba dum bum ching). For another, if they want to probe the procedures, they'll go through the security without any sort of weapons or explosives. I've tried four or five ways to elaborate the point, but I just can't, because, if you'll pardon the less-than-in-depth argument, duh. You don't test the waters by diving in headfirst; you don't check out what security is like by going in with anything that would identify you as a terrorist. (Or see the Futurama episode "Insane in the Mainframe"—Roberto: "I got busted robbing that bank again." Fry: "Why would you hold up the same bank twice?" Roberto: "Ah, that first time was just to case the joint and rob it a little.") And third, if someone is interested in blowing up an airplane, presumably with themselves on it, how the hell is a $10,000 fine going to be a deterrent?

Then there's the bit where they discuss the recent CBS poll showing that four out of five Americans support the scanner, but rather than even cite the TSA on this, I'm just going to point to Nate Silver's discussion of why the poll is deeply flawed. (The question they asked is: Some airports are now using "full-body" digital x-ray machines to electronically screen passengers in airport security lines. Do you think these new x-ray machines should or should not be used at airports? Which is basically saying "Do you support security?" without any context at all for what "these new x-ray machines" do, what health risks there might be, what the alternatives are...)

It's really just astonishing how utterly, utterly stupid the TSA is. In contrast, I offer you Rafi Sela, Israeli security expert, explaining why the machines are "expensive and useless", and what actually works.

[EDIT: In Parentheses brings up a very valid question about false positives in the comments. It's also the case that Bruce Schneier, whom I tend to respect on this subject, observes that the problem with the US adopting the Israeli model is scale—Ben Gurion, Israel's primary international airport, is about as busy as the Sacramento airport. "Stop and chat with every passenger" is a lot more feasible there than it is in O'Hare. Though at least some of it, e.g. blast shields around security checkpoints that would mean clearing a very small area instead of an entire terminal, ought to be feasible.]

Comments

[in_parentheses]

What the Israelification article doesn't get into is how many people are turned away because the crack team of psychologists decides they're looking shifty. (It also doesn't discuss how many of them are Palestinian.) I have no idea what these numbers are; they might be totally reasonable. And of course our "system" is completely ridiculous. But I worry about such a subjective system of determining threat.

[tahnan]

Yeah, I actually did mention that fact to Michelle when I was discussing the Israelification article with her—that for all we know, they're detaining six innocent Palestinians a week. (I just did a quick attempt at a Google search, but reading the Web about Israeli security, or probably Israeli anything, is a good way to wade deep into the mists of unjustified anti-Semitism that cloud any chance to learn where there's any justified mistrust of the Israeli system.)

But god, it looks like it has to be closer to reasonable than what we've got now. Or at least it's something that can be tweaked to reasonability, whereas the current system isn't going to get better by a series of little changes here and there.