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Pornoscanners trivially defeated by pancake-shaped explosives

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Re: Pornoscanners trivially defeated by pancake-shaped explosives

#31

Post by SpikeGronim »

jdp23 wrote: post #27
SpikeGronim wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm really curious about this. People on HN are saying "oh it's just security theater" as if the TSA purchasing officials are knowingly disingenuous. I suspect the testing procedures are badly flawed and the TSA has no clue whether the devices that they buy work. Right now I don't haven enough data to say either way - lying or stupid. Both hypotheses fit the facts.

Suppose as you hypothesize the TSA really doesn't know whether or not they work and whether or not they pose radiation risks to travelers and TSA employees. But they've told the President and Congress that this is the only way to keep us safe and we absolutely must spend $2.4B. Would you consider that 'lying' or 'stupid'?

I was proposing two hypotheses. First, TSA knows exactly what is going on and they are lying about it. Second, TSA's testing procedure is flawed so they don't know what is going on, but they may think that they do. So if they are using a flawed test without being aware of the flaws, 'stupid'. If they are using a flawed test and they know it, 'lying'.

Re: Pornoscanners trivially defeated by pancake-shaped explosives

#32

Post by InclinedPlane »

stcredzero wrote: post #11

It would be very hard to conceal such conformally-packed explosives from sniffers and dogs.

If we had systems that sniffed for chemical residue of explosive compounds we wouldn't be having an argument about ineffective and silly porno-scanners, because they wouldn't be used.

Re: Pornoscanners trivially defeated by pancake-shaped explosives

#33

Post by ShabbyDoo »

Let's say a terrorist had a plastic container with a wirelessly detonatable bomb inside surgically implanted in his abdomen. After a few weeks to allow the incision to heal, the guy went through airport security. Given the number of implantable devices on the market, I bet the TSA folks are quite used to feeling the odd lumps of pacemakers, etc. on people's torsos. While the backscatter xrays might show a bunch of wires and such, would the image look much different than someone who had a pacemaker implanted with various leads into the heart? What if that guy was rubbed down with the bomb detection cloth pad (name?) which is then placed in the explosives detector? After a few weeks of being sewn up, would he trigger an alarm?

What's interesting about this scheme is that the bomb would be ready-to-go, and the terrorist could throw himself right before hitting his remote control button toward the area of the plane deemed to maximize the likelihood of death.

Is this scenario at all possible? How could the TSA possibly deal with it without harassing a bunch of people with pacemakers installed? If a single terrorist tries such a scheme, I predict that everyone with any sort of implanted object will have be added to some sort of pre-screening registry so the TSA can sort-of verify the legitimacy of the thing which shows-up on xray/pat-downs/etc.

As is obvious to most HN readers, the TSA's security measures can only make it more difficult for terrorists to operate. However, the scenarios thought to still be possible do not seem terribly sophisticated compared to the incentive to commit these acts.

Re: Pornoscanners trivially defeated by pancake-shaped explosives

#34

Post by kujhytrtyu »

ceejayoz wrote: post #29
kujhytrtyu wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They aren't meant to detect explosives. They are meant to detect weapons that the metal detector might not pickup The explosive you would just put through the x-ray machine anyway where it wouldn't be detected.

> They aren't meant to detect explosives. Yes, they are. http://www.tsa.gov/approach/tech/ait/faqs.shtm > Advanced imaging technology safely screens passengers for both metallic and non-metallic threats, including weapons and explosives, which may be concealed under a passengers’ clothing without physical contact to keep the traveling public secure.

That's a TSA website - it also claims that they are professionals working for our security.

Re: Pornoscanners trivially defeated by pancake-shaped explosives

#35

Post by kujhytrtyu »

SpikeGronim wrote: post #30
foobarbazoo wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Security experts are saying it's security theater. And they're right.

I completely agree. I'm questioning whether TSA knows that or not.

Well they could add up how many terrorists they have caught

Re: Pornoscanners trivially defeated by pancake-shaped explosives

#36

Post by jey »

cscheid wrote: post #19
jey wrote: post #14

I'm against security theater, but this sounds like an information visualization problem: if the image contains enough signal that a theoretically optimally trained eye can detect the contraband, they should be able to use machine learning algorithms to detect suspicious items and make them show up with higher contrast. In other words, the software should magnify anything out of the ordinary, like contraband. It's not…

Sorry, but what you're suggesting is the equivalent of "every airplane should fly flapping its wings" "if the image contains enough signal that a theoretically optimally trained eye can detect the contraband, they should be able to use machine learning algorithms to detect suspicious items and make them show up with higher contrast." The type of processing which you'd run on an image to make it easy on the human eye…

I'm not talking about making it "easy on the human eye". I'm suggesting that they use the output from a classifier to make parts of the image stand out more.

Re: Pornoscanners trivially defeated by pancake-shaped explosives

#37

Post by ceejayoz »

kujhytrtyu wrote: post #34
ceejayoz wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They aren't meant to detect explosives. Yes, they are. http://www.tsa.gov/approach/tech/ait/faqs.shtm > Advanced imaging technology safely screens passengers for both metallic and non-metallic threats, including weapons and explosives, which may be concealed under a passengers’ clothing without physical contact to keep the traveling public secure.

That's a TSA website - it also claims that they are professionals working for our security.

The scanners may not do a good job of it, but it's pretty clear that one of the things they were sold as doing is detecting explosives.
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