I'm just going to say this out loud since no-else has: A BILLLLLION DOLLARS! A billion! One. BILLION. Dollars.
Aghhhh!
I'd have done it for half that.
$1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
41–50 of 51 posts
Re: $1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
#42So this is codified racial-profiling and intuition-profiling (that singles out people with dreadlocks, arabs, sick people, stressed people etc.) unlike all other un-codified profiling employed by virtually all agents of all border security things all over the planet. If you don't believe me, try flying visually sick and you'll be questioned over and over again (not about being sick or having ebola, mind you).
Yes, exactly. It makes the criteria for singling out someone subjective and impossible to verify, so it empowers TSA to target whoever they please without any real fear of being held accountable for it.
You missed my point. All officers around the world already employ criteria that are subjective and impossible to verify, TSA went one step ahead and actually admitted it. Did you cross any international borders recently? While holding e.g. Iranian passport?
Re: $1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
#43I've observed the horrible nature of this program in person while traveling. During the practice, the TSA staff talked loudly to threaten passengers and then also made "jokes" to passengers about finding chemicals on them. Essentially they try to escalate the fear among all the passengers and then single out someone who responds the most poorly. Not to mention the fact that anyone who has protested or complained abou…
I was singled out once for carrying two laptops. I answered the same two or three questions over and over.
They had trouble understanding my work allows no personal use of laptops so if I wanted one for development or gaming I had to carry two.
I guess they thought asking the same questions repeatedly would be stressful. They haven't met my wife. :eyewaggle:
Re: $1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
#44So this is codified racial-profiling and intuition-profiling (that singles out people with dreadlocks, arabs, sick people, stressed people etc.) unlike all other un-codified profiling employed by virtually all agents of all border security things all over the planet. If you don't believe me, try flying visually sick and you'll be questioned over and over again (not about being sick or having ebola, mind you).
SPOT is based on the Facial Action Coding System (FACS), a method developed by Paul Ekman to read faces (familiar to fans of the show Lie to Me): http://www.denverpost.com/editorials/ci_24533526/face-it-tsa... While the data behind using FACS to spot emotions (EMFACS) is solid ( https://books.google.com/books?id=W_npWdrHGFcC&pg=PA47&lpg=P... ), the record on using it to spot lies, terrorists, or otherwise discovering…
What if I'm scared I'm going to miss my flight? Or I have to go to the restroom urgently and I'm afraid all these questions will have unintended consequences? LOL. As you say no way to read intent.
Re: $1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
#45This should be a very easy test. In the years since these 3,000 behavioral observation officers have been hired, how many people have they identified as dangerous?
If this number is greater than 0, the number of actual terrorists which existed to be stopped, then we know that it is an ineffective program. If they did identify 0 people, then we know it probably works!
It's like school counselors looking for 'warning signs' of school shooters. If this is a reliable tactic, the counselors would identify 2 or 3 people every several years across the entire US. As it is, they identify dozens of students at every single school every single year - proving that they are monumentally incompetent.
Re: $1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
#46I've observed the horrible nature of this program in person while traveling. During the practice, the TSA staff talked loudly to threaten passengers and then also made "jokes" to passengers about finding chemicals on them. Essentially they try to escalate the fear among all the passengers and then single out someone who responds the most poorly. Not to mention the fact that anyone who has protested or complained abou…
Consider this counterpoint experience posted on Slashdot... "I recall going through security at the Charlotte, NC airport once, a few years ago, and noticed TSA agents out in the queue making smalltalk with all of the passengers. "Hey, how are y'all doin' today?", "Goin' someplace warm?", "Be sure to take off that belt buckle sir.", "Were are y'all headed?", "Y'all fly much?", and so forth. At first I thought that th…
>it seems to me that chatting up passengers in order to spot potential trouble-makers is probably the single most effective part of the whole TSA process
I don't understand this. I assume that its meant from an intuitive 'I feel like this would be effective' standpoint. Because as far as actual effectiveness is concerned, we know that it has stopped 0 attacks. The only way we could know it to be effective is if there were people actually trying to carry out attacks and being caught. Neither of those things are happening, though, so we really can't tell. Thus far, it's just a massive waste of resources.
Really, 9/11 guaranteed that there will never be another airline hijacking for a very, very long time. No passenger will fight with anything less than every fiber of their being to stop any hijacker now. It doesn't matter what kind of weapon you've got, the instant you stand up and say 'I'm taking over this place', you immediately have the entire crew and passengers willing to die to stop you. Before the idea of planes as weapons was tried, everyone presumed a hijacked plane would just fly to Cuba and everyone would be OK. But now that they know the possibility everyone is going to die in an intentional crash, hijackers have no chance.
Re: $1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
#47Sadly there isn't one good site running with this story so I am not sure how we get the facts in the case. It seems the one problem standing in the way of getting the facts is the TSA itself; an agency whose screeners may soon be armed
How many facts do we really need?
Number of terrorist attacks attempted: 0
Number of terrorist attacks prevented: 0
Number of 'suspected terrorists' screened by TSA: More than 0, with great probability they pick out more than 0 every single day at every single airport.
Trying to stop terrorist attacks (at least in the US) is akin to trying to prevent a lottery winning. The statistics just don't work.
Re: $1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
#48I have flown to Israel many times from different countries and I can tell you that the Israelis, who are probably the world's authorities on airport security, do have conversations with passengers where they ask questions and look for the passenger's affect when responding. The questions and brief discussions are not direct, eg, "How are you feeling?" but indirect such as conversations about NYC where I live or Israeli tourist spots, etc.
Re: $1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
From the ACLU⁰: "Both Congress’ Government Accountability Office¹ and an independent scientific advisory group² found that there is no evidence that people can identify deception by observing the behavior of others." Claiming the opposite without showing any proof, like the TSA is doing, looks disturbingly like "junk science" to me. 0: https://www.aclu.org/national-security/aclu-sues-tsa-records... 1: http://www.gao.…
Maybe the TSA screening is junk due to lack of training or proper implementation, but behavioural observation is hardly junk science, Israel does exactly this and has one of the safest airports in the world due to their security screening processes. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel-wagner/what-israeli-air...
There is not a single word in the article about any scientific research supporting these methods.
Of course you can say "look, the airport is safe, it must be working", but this is no proof.
Moreover, these "security screening processes" you mention look very much like racial profiling to me. The article states that the duration of security interviews is "based on such factors as age, race, religion and destination".
Re: $1B TSA Behavioral Screening Program Slammed as Ineffective Junk Science
#50I'm just going to say this out loud since no-else has: A BILLLLLION DOLLARS! A billion! One. BILLION. Dollars. Aghhhh! I'd have done it for half that.
That is cheap compared to the cost if the scrapped rapidscan systems