TSA 'Warning' Media About Reporting On Body Scanner Failures? 465
OverTheGeicoE writes "When anti-TSA activist Jonathan Corbett exposed a severe weakness in TSA's body scanners, one would expect the story to attract a lot of media attention. Apparently TSA is attempting to stop reporters from covering the story. According to Corbett, at least one reporter has been 'strongly cautioned' by TSA spokeswoman Sari Koshetz not to cover the story. If TSA is worried that this is new information they need to suppress to keep it away from terrorists, that horse may have left the barn years ago. Corbett's demonstration may just be confirmation of a 2010 paper in the Journal of Transportation Security that concluded that 'an object such as a wire or a boxcutter blade, taped to the side of the body, or even a small gun in the same location, will be invisible' to X-ray scanners."
Re:Easy fix? (Score:5, Informative)
That's what metal detectors do. I fly a lot. these go thusly:
wait, get in, put your feet on the prints (rotated 90 degrees from normal walking direction), hold up your arms
wait for the scanner to swipe through it's arc.
get out
wait on another set of footprints
total time 20-45 seconds per scan.
Re:They're hardly perfect (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Warned about what? (Score:5, Informative)
They can send you to jail for not cooperating [nydailynews.com] (or even citing the constitution at them) [ajc.com], prevent you from traveling freely [cbsnews.com] and deny you the right to exit the country. They can put you on watch lists that make the "more traditional" TLA's pay attention to you. And their influence [forbes.com] is [publicintelligence.net] spreading [tsa.gov].
So, yes, they are.
FoxNews is covering the story (Score:5, Informative)
FoxNews is covering the story:
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/03/08/blogger-shows-world-how-to-sneak-anything-past-tsas-nude-body-scanners/ [foxnews.com]
I'm impressed.
Re:Easy fix? (Score:5, Informative)
Someone who has actually used one of these could probably confirm or deny this...
As someone who has actually used one of these (many times), my answer is a solid "deny". You don't just walk through these scanners the way you do with the metal detectors. You walk in, turn to the side, spread your legs, put your hands in the air, and hold that position for about five seconds. They slow down the lines immensely. If you then had to turn another 90 degrees and hold for another five seconds, it would make things even worse.
Considering that the scanners don't even detect the sort of threat they were rolled out in response to (the underwear bomber), they should just be scrapped entirely, and the government should do everything in its power to find a loophole in the contract to get some of our money back.
Re:They're hardly perfect (Score:5, Informative)
They aren't iron detectors, they are metal detectors.
In fact, they'd detect bronze better than steel.
Re:Easy fix? (Score:5, Informative)
But I work on millimeter waves in my day job, so don't believe a word I say.
Re:Warned about what? (Score:5, Informative)
Innumeracy runs rampant. You're off by a factor of 1000. 10,000,000 (that's 10 million, since you apparently can't parse digits) is a very significant fraction of the (frequently) flying public.
Re:Warned about what? (Score:5, Informative)
The flaw was exposed in February 2011 by an undercover TSA agent. He tested a known, unpatched, exploit.
Here's more links to stories. [freeinternetpress.com]
Re:Warned about what? (Score:2, Informative)
And when that happens, you are no longer in a 'free Democracy', if the USA was ever one to begin with.
Why would you ever think it was? The United States of America has always been a Republic.
Re:can't you also make plastic shivs? (Score:4, Informative)
The hell with improvising. High quality polymer weapons are cheap.
http://www.coldsteel.com/nightshadeseries.html [coldsteel.com]
Re:Warned about what? (Score:4, Informative)
How is an adult's decision to consume ANY substance a reasonable basis for detention?
Just because prohibition is law does NOT make it reasonable.
Re:I have an easier fix (Score:5, Informative)
Sigh. Have you ever held a glock? What material do you suppose the slide (you know, that thingy on the top that goes back and forth each time it goes bang) is made of? That's right... Steel. Which is a metal. How about the barrel? Oh yeah, that's steel too. Recoil spring? I'll give you a hint... steel. Should I go on?
But you're half right... the frame is made of... polymer. A fancy name for plastic. So if you separated the slide from the frame, and took all the little movable metal parts out of the frame, then the frame probably wouldn't set off the metal detector (the little metal inserts molded into the frame are probably too small to set off the walk-thru metal detector).
Summary: Glocks (and all other mainstream guns) have major parts made of metal. More metal than a belt buckle. If a beltbuckle sets of the metal detector, so will a gun. Even a glock.
http://xkcd.com/386/ [xkcd.com]
Re:I have an easier fix (Score:5, Informative)
"The Glock 23 has no metal parts"
Umm.. "The Glock's frame, magazine body and several other components are made from a high-strength nylon-based polymer invented by Gaston Glock and called Polymer 2.[34] .. The injection molded frame contains 4 hardened steel guide rails for the slide: two at the rear of the frame, and the remaining pair above and in front of the trigger guard. .. The frame houses the locking block, which is an investment casting that engages a 45 camming surface on the barrel's lower camming lug. It is retained in the frame by a steel axis pin that holds the trigger and slide catch. .. A spring-loaded sheet metal pressing serves as the slide catch, which is secured from unintentional manipulation by a raised guard molded into the frame."
Re:I have an easier fix (Score:4, Informative)
The Glock 23 has no metal parts in it (as the most famous - You can actually get at least half-a-dozen polymer frames today, in a variety of poly chambers and actions). Poly casings hit the mainstream within the last few years (though they still cost a bit more); Hand-load with a properly sized ceramic bullet, and you have fully live firearm without a scrap of metal in it.
Say what? The Glock 23 [glock.com] certainly is made of metal, as are all Glock pistols. The barrel, slide, and much of the internal mechanisms are steel and comprise about 80% of the gun's mass. It is certainly detectable by airport metal detectors.
The plastic parts show up clearly on airport x-ray baggage scanners [wordpress.com]. The plastic parts and magazines have a fair bit of metal in them as well for strengthening (and the metal rails on the frame for the slide to move on) and would set off metal detectors.
There's nothing special about the Glock 23: it's simply the mid-sized model chambered in .40 S&W. I have owned it's 9mm counterpart, the Glock 19, and the subcompact 9mm Glock 26 and can confirm that both the 9mm and .40 S&W models have considerable amounts of metal.