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Lie Detectors to be Used for Airline Security
swimgeek writes "A new walk-through airport lie detector being made in Israel may prove to be the toughest challenge yet for potential hijackers or drugs smugglers. The product has been tested in Russia and should be commercialized soon. The software in the detector picks up uncontrollable tremors in the voice that give away liars or those with something to hide, say its designers. Passengers that fail the test are then required to undergo further questioning or even search."
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Tell the truth and then blow up themselves near the lie detector?
Scott McNealy to Michael: "Suck my Sun!" Michael Dell to Scott : "Lick my Dell!"
they just shoot your ass.
I can't wait until I have to take a lie detector test before boarding a plane. I'm really getting sick of all these invasive security measures. I'm damn glad I won't have to hop on planes for my job.
If only taking a ship was a valid alternative for travelling overseas.
for innocent passengers as well, who, when faced with M-16 toting guys can't avoid an "uncontrollable tremor" in their voice.
No mention of the false positive rate on this. If just 1 in a million passenger is a terrorist, and given the number of passenger flights per year without bombings on US planes it has got to be way up there, the false positive rate it going to need to be way WAY down there.
If you're honest, you get cleared, right?
"Are you a terrorist?"
"Yes."
"Go on through."
Game Company Database
Wish I had mod points, you'd go way up.
Maybe they could sell a home version of this that would help rate aspiring actor on their ability to convincingly speak a part from a screenplay.
I found out how the lie detector works. Bend suspect over, shove device in rectum. I only hope that everyone (including officials) has to go through it, equally.
A "Lie Detector" is a fantasy. Machines can detect physiological clues to nervousness, and that's it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldrich_Ames> Aldrich Ames passed his polygraph exams for years, while he was getting every US agent in Russia killed.
Depending on fantasies like "lie detectors" distracts law enforcement from practicing solid investigation.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
The software in the detector picks up uncontrollable tremors in the voice that give away liars or those with something to hide, say its designers. Passengers that fail the test are then required to undergo further questioning or even search.
Sounds like sufferers of spasmodic dysphonia, such as NPR's Diane Rehm are going to have a hell of a time at airports in the near future...
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
Thank god there's no other way to hurt people besides with airplanes!
rooooar
I won't have any problem with this, because I'm not a pathological liar. Really.
If there's a hot female security guard on duty, I'm gonna SO lie so I'll get searched by her.
The eternal struggle of good vs. evil begins within one's self.
This is really unfair to psychics, who have just as much scientific basis for their powers as lie detectors. Why replace a paying job with a machine? Obviously it's greed.
English is easier said than done.
Having been to Israel many times, I know their airport inquisitions quite well. They ask tough questions and usually single out anyone that looks like the stereotypical Muslim or Arab. Once in a while, they'll grab any old "white" person to keep the race hounds away. The unfortunate truth is that their system closes one potential door but leaves many others open. These days most "terrorists" (depending on who's side you take) are not going through the airports to enter the country. So what is this device really for? It seems like another gimmick to me. Are they telling me that they are going to be able to get a positive baseline on an individual in an environment like an airport and then screen them? I call bullocks on this one. In reality it takes years of skill for operators of lie detectors to get exact results. Furthermore, post-9/11 how many people do we see getting on airports here in the U.S. freaking out in some way? I've seen at least a few every flight that gasp on take offs and landings but its normal. Also what happens if a person takes an anxiolytic (i.e. a benzo drug), does the machine still work? Does the machine still work on someone who is a pathological liar? I just have a lot of doubts.
... Your airport is a fucking disaster area and I think your airline is unsafe. *beep* truth.
etc
What about the poor schmuck just excited about going off to visit his mistress? Or his girlfriend, knowing he's about to get his first action in 9 months? Or any member of Congress?
I am pretty sick and tired of these jerkwads coming out with all of this technology that is supposed to protect us from somebody who has nothing better to do all day long than figure out ways to hurt us. And stick me with billions of dollars in expenses for a technology that may or may not catch somebody other than the occasional innocent git or two-bit martyr wanna be. Does it work? "Sorry, for national security reasons we can't tell you how many bad guys we caught or how many innocent guys to whom we gave a cavity probe".
Money isn't the root of all evil anybody who votes for any incumbent is.
If the g'vt kept the data on you that google does you'd better believe you'd be calling it "doing evil"
Here's the problem: many Islamists - particularly the type they're trying to detect - do not consider lying to an infidel to actually be lying.*
Lie detectors generally depend on the person being scanned to be more or less honest with themself. If they aren't, then no dice.
This won't work.
* - Info from a poli sci professor I have this semester who worked on the Senate Intelligence Committee for 10 years... sorry, too lazy to find a link
There is a variant on this which uses polygraph-like testing with a hand sensor, also an Israeli company, but different from the one featured in the article here. This could be done at check-in time where the operator would normally be checking for ID and can ask the passenger to verbally verify their identification. This seems a bit less of an obnoxious approach to flagging follow-up for people who fail than challenging them with questions like, "do you intend to carry out a terrorist action!?"
Further, this could go a long way to identify false identities where certain known entities on a no-fly list wouldn't be able to board, yadda yadda.
Either way, I too am all for this if it means that we can move the lines through a little quicker at the airport.
Now they will catch everyone who flies less than once a year, or is otherwise just a bit nervous with the idea of flying as false positives.
Off course if one does fly on a weekly basis nothing happens. But that is not the case for one getting on board to a city one had never been before, possibly to be met by people unknown to the moment.
Speaking for myself: I would fail this tests everytime - I am never too calm on a flight.
-><- no
Voice analyzers and polygraphs (the so-called "lie detector") are frauds. They have both been scientifically proven again and again to be unreliable, with lots of false positives and false negatives, which is why they aren't admissible in court.
The only value to either technology is to scare and threaten. If the person being questioned believes that they work, they are less likely to lie or more likely to admit a lie.
Aldrich Ames, a mole in the CIA, passed a polygraph many, many times, as did lots of others.
Since voice analyzers and polygraph examiners make a shitload of money, and they compete with each other, they are great for pointing out the flaws in each other's devices since the other technology threatens their gravy train.
It's fraud, plain and simple. Flip a coin instead. It's more likely to be accurate than a voice analyzer or polygraph.
Then whomever gets the "glory" of murdering innocent civilians has one additional step in the training camp: learning how to calmly lie into the microphone. We don't pack the explosives in his bag until he can pass 10 times out of 10.
I'd much prefer returning to pre-1972 rules where the airlines could decide if you could bring a loaded firearm onto the plane. Those airlines that allowed it would get my business, and the free market would take care of the problem.
-paul
Pistol caliber is like religion: everyone has their favourite, and theirs is the only right choice.
...dead body.
You know I saw this device in a 1970's issue of Popular Electronics.
It didn't work then either...
Being an introverted techie, I can't wait for my social and flying nerves being evident in my voice and interpreted as 'this idiot is going to bomb the plane'.
This is actually a really good idea in one specific context.
If they use it to determine who gets the greater scrutiny in searches (thereby avoiding dangerous profiling) and make it unobtrusive (a microphone in the attendants uniform when he asks if you have packed your bags..etc.) this could be a boon to airport security.
Post apocalyptic gaming goodness
I'm so glad that this new airline security will protect my rights as I surf the 'Net.
Lie detectors are naturally attractive to a culture that casually accepts a redefinition of the word "science," that promotes creationism as science, that sprinkles holy water on orange groves in an attempt to retard freezing.
Corry
Currently playing: Drs. 4 "Bob," You Cain't Hide From God
-- It Came from C. L. Smith's Unclaimed Mysteries.
I think we can expect an increase in delayed flights because a bunch of innocent people with quiverring voices have been hauled off for extra questioning while the rest of the passengers wait patiently on the plane. What a crock!
And ask them if they're really doing their job instead of just standing around looking helpless.
TSA = Thousands Standing Around
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
Here's the problem: many Islamists - particularly the type they're trying to detect - do not consider lying to an infidel to actually be lying.
/. I would suggest citing sources out of the Qur'an. By the way, you do know that Pope Urban II called Muslims "infidels" when he declared that God had ordained the crusades? I didn't think so.
I don't think the Irish thought they were lying either when they denied bombing targets in London so drop the stereotype. Furthermore, before you post meaningless garbage on
"In our trial, 500 passengers went through the test, and then each was subjected to full traditional searches," said chief executive officer Amir Liberman. "The one person found to be planning something illegal was the one who failed our test."
I can see that they settle for nothing than the most stringent double-blind testing.
It's not a lie if you believe it.
-If you're honest, you get cleared, right?
-"Are you a geek?"
"It would be false to say that I AM NOT."
-"Go on through."
Good lawyers/politicians use this trick to confuse people
Hello my name is Werner Brandes. My voice is my passport. Verify me
Best "hacking" movie ever!
K Man
All the crap that gets posted here and this gets tagged as flamebait. Cute.
-- It Came from C. L. Smith's Unclaimed Mysteries.
They searched the place high and low, never finding the door. Someone suggested the fraternity President ask each member, on their honor as a member of the fraternity, if they had stolen the door. So he worked his way down the line, and came to Feynman.
"Richard Feynman, on your honor as a member of the fraternity, did you steal the door?"
"Yes."
He replied, "Quit screwing around, Feynman!", and moved on to the next guy. Everyone else denied having taken the door.
Eventually Feynman took pity on the guys and returned the door and (I believe) confessed. When he did, there was an uproar, as people claimed he had lied.
Please help metamoderate.
Eddie: Checks out. OK, sir, you're free to go.
Moe: Good, 'cause I got a hot date tonight.
*BZZT!*
A date.
*BZZT!*
Dinner with friends.
*BZZT!*
Dinner alone.
*BZZT!*
Watching TV alone.
*BZZT!*
All right! I'm going to sit at home and ogle the ladies in the Victoria's Secret catalog.
*BZZT!*
Sears catalog.
*DING!*
Now would you unhook this already, please? I don't deserve this kind of shabby treatment!
*BZZT!*
Heh heh... he does deserve that kind of shabby treatment.
With a false positive rate of 12% is hardly seems like an effective screening mechanism especially when you consider the number of people on an airplane and that each test takes ~1 minute.
Nice idea. Next!
That's great. Now some nervous person is gonna have to go into a room for further questioning, while the real terrorist that's trained to pass a lie detector is all-aboard. Nice.
Infidel (noun) - a person who does not believe in religion or who adheres to a religion other than one's own.
It's a frequently used word which comes from French. The usage is correct.
As far as the Irish, why on earth would I mention them in a post about ISRAEL. Perhaps you're not up to date on world events, but the IRA has not been attacking Israeli settlements, Islamists have.
Before you post meaningless, off-topic nonsense on slashdot, you may want to give it some thought.
I recently was in the US on a vacation. ..So this thing measures voice tremors? Well my body was shaking and my palms sweatty, and I'm sure my voice was nervous, so I guess that means next time I'm in for a strip-search. wooo-fecking-hoo. :(
I had nothing to hide, have a good job at home, no criminal record, nor was I ever in trouble. Just wanted to see a bit of the US! Despite all this, I was shitting it becuase of the bombardment of questions I got about why I was entering the US.
I'm sure this techonology will have wayyyy to many false positives, and end up causing more confusion as a result. It May even mask "bad people" who may have been trained to be cool under pressure.
and wasnt it mathematically proven such measures make it easier for terrorists to get thru?
I wish I could find the original slashdot comment I saved this from. I googled for it briefly and found the slashdot story but couldn't find the comment. If you do, please reply with it.
--The following was written by someone else--.
"Yeah! Hunters don't kill the *innocent* animals - they look for the shifty-eyed ones that are probably the criminal element of their species!"
"If the're not guilty, why are they running?"
I wrote about this a while ago. Here's the text:
"If you haven't done anything wrong, what do you have to hide?"
Ever heard that one? I work in information security, so I have heard it more than my fair share. I've always hated that reasoning, because I am a little bit paranoid by nature, something which serves me very well in my profession. So my standard response to people who have asked that question near me has been "because I'm paranoid." But that doesn't usually help, since most people who would ask that question see paranoia as a bad thing to begin with. So for a long time I've been trying to come up with a valid, reasoned, and intelligent answer which shoots the holes in the flawed logic that need to be there.
And someone unknowingly provided me with just that answer today. In a conversation about hunting, somebody posted this about prey animals and hunters:
"Yeah! Hunters don't kill the *innocent* animals - they look for the shifty-eyed ones that are probably the criminal element of their species!"
but in a brilliant (and very funny) retort, someone else said:
"If the're not guilty, why are they running?"
Suddenly it made sense, that nagging thing in the back of my head. The logical reason why a reasonable dose of paranoia is healthy. Because it's one thing to be afraid of the TRUTH. People who commit murder or otherwise deprive others of their Natural Rights are afraid of the TRUTH, because it is the light of TRUTH that will help bring them to justice.
But it's another thing entirely to be afraid of hunters. And all too often, the hunters are the ones proclaiming to be looking for TRUTH. But they are more concerned with removing any obstactles to finding the TRUTH, even when that means bulldozing over people's rights (the right to privacy, the right to anonymity) in their quest for it. And sadly, these people often cannot tell the difference between the appearance of TRUTH and TRUTH itself. And these, the ones who are so convinced they have found the TRUTH that they stop looking for it, are some of the worst oppressors of Natural Rights the world has ever known.
They are the hunters, and it is right and good for the prey to be afraid of the hunters, and to run away from them. Do not be fooled when a hunter says "why are you running from me if you have nothing to hide?" Because having something to hide is not the only reason to be hiding something.
Please help metamoderate.
Anyone crazy enough to be a threat would also be crazy enough to have their larynx removed.
So how many people will get searched as terrorists because their voice is shaky because they're cheating on their wife, didn't tell their parents they were going to costa rica with their friends, or told their employer they were going to a family reunion? Not everyone with "something to hide" is a lawbreaker.
See if their lips are moving.
Never shake hands with a man you meet in a fertility clinic.
...that goes double for voice stress analyzers (VSA's), which is actually what the article is describing.
It's a bunch of damned snake oil, and it won't do a bit of good to fight terrorism. All it will do is inconvenience (or worse) innocent people.
Kythe
From the article:
"The one person [of 500] found to be planning something illegal was the one who failed our test.
around 12 percent of passengers tend to show stress even when they have nothing to hide."
I'm not sure how to reconcile these two statements, especially since the 12% figure was used in a "those who fail" context. I would guess that the former statement is marketing spin, especially since it makes claims about the plans of the people tested, and the false positive rate is going to be much closer to the 12% rate from the second quote.
Also a consideration, what is the false negative rate? It's pretty common for law-abiding people to get nervous when confronted by law enforcement---they're not used to it. By the same token, actual criminals often are used to dealing with law enforcement, and hence are often calmer than many normal folk!
When combined with active spoofing of the test (examples), I would be surprised if this procedure was particularly more accurate than a standard polygraph, which is to say, not very.
Given that, I strongly suspect this will turn out to be a security procedure with no benefit beyond allowing people to point at it and say "see, we're doing something to improve security!!" without having to go to the trouble of finding a way to actually improve security.
The problem with that (beyond the waste and hypocrisy) is that the more useless steps there are in a security procedure, the more the useful steps are diluted and rendered ineffective. If Joe Smith looked kinda funny but passed the lie detector, well, I gotta let him go so I have time to interrogate and search Gertrude McGrandma who flunked it.
A measure which gives no information is worse than useless. Hopefully either this won't be one, or we won't use it.
what is your name?
what is you quest?
what is your favorite color?
(I'm pretty sure I got question 2 wrong, but you get the idea...)
-- it's ridiculous how many people misspell ridiculous... (damn, damn, damn...)
I travelled to and from Israel prior to 9/11 and, being the security geek that I am, I found their approach to airport security very interesting. Not only is it utterly different from what we do in the US, but it is obviously devastatingly effective. Israel has been under open attack from terrorists for *decades* and yet they've never, ever had an incident.
What do they do that's different? The whole focus is different. In the US, we focus on the (arguably futile) task of assuring that there are no weapons on the aircraft. In Israel, they focus on assuring that there are no terrorists on the aircraft. Their approach is about screening people more than bags, on the theory that weapons aren't dangerous, people are dangerous.
The screening is intensive, detailed and time-consuming. They do search the bags while they're at it, but the main purpose of searching bags isn't to look for weapons, it's to look for clues and to provoke reactions. I'll describe my experience of going through security in Tel Aviv on the way out of Israel by way of example.
I was travelling with my boss, on business. The first thing they did was to separate us, sending each of us to a different table. At each table were three agents. One of them searched my bag -- *very* thoroughly, picking through it piece by piece. Another asked me questions at a rapid-fire pace, jumping around between who I was, what I was doing, where I had gone, who I had spoken with, who I knew in Israel and what was the purpose and origin of various pieces from my luggage. The questioner was detailed, but not necessarily thorough. He asked about seemingly random things, but inquired in great detail, testing to see how my story would hold together under scrutiny. After asking the names and phone numbers of some people I had met with, he pulled out a phone and actually called one of them and grilled him for a minute! Then he and the agent who had been speaking with my boss stepped away and conferred with one another, obviously cross-checking our stories to see if they matched up.
The third agent at each table just watched. The guy at my table had his eyes glued to me the whole time, watching for any hint of abnormal reaction... it's unbelievable how nervous that made me! But I suppose my reaction was normal.
I can see *exactly* how a lie detector would fit into this model. Even if it didn't actually work, it would make the subject that much more worried and frightened, making it harder for a terrorist to stay calm enough to have all the right reactions. It wouldn't even matter if it gave bad readings from time to time, because in a situation like that, with trained, experienced agents, the lie detector would be just another tool to help both trigger and analyze reactions; it would be the agents themselves that made the decisions about who to investigate further and who to pass on.
Although I would really hate to see what would happen if the US tried to institute a *real* airport security system like the Israelis have, rather than the "security theatre" that we have, I found it very impressive. It sucked royally to be the subject of that scrutiny, even as an honest guy just trying to fly home... it's easy to see why they have such an amazing track record.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Lie detectors are also used in Kansas. I am surprized they don't use the good old medieval torture techniques to find witches.
from your wiki link: Ames showed deception on three polygraph tests while spying for the Soviet Union. He failed when asked if any foreign intelligence service has tried to recruit him as a spy. Ames found excuses for the failures, which had been accepted by the examiners.
Umm, no, it has big freaking magnets in it that make having anything metal on you while inside it potentially dangerous.
And when I say "big freaking magnets," I mean BIG. The magnetic field created by those things is insane. A few Tesla or something, if I remember my units correctly.
Hijackers plan years in advance and make lots of practice runs to see what they can get away with. Prior to 9/11 they had been smuggling all kinds of things onto aircraft in trial runs to see just what they could and couldn't get away with. If they want to do another 9/11, they could do the same thing with these lie detector machines. A certain percentage of people are good at fooling lie detectors. Potential hijacker candidates would be screened by their organization to see if the can fool a lie detector. They would then be further tested by sending them on on many trial runs through the airport with some minor contraband just to see how good they are at fooling the airport lie detector. The ones that can fool the machine consistently will be the ones trained to carry out the next 9/11.
I suspect that the problem with airport security is dealing with the sheer number of people who move through the airports. Israel is probably so effective because they only really have one major international airport to screen, so they can afford to watch people from the time they park their car to the time they get off the plane at their destination. In the US we can't watch nearly that many people so we need a preliminary filter that will let TSA determine who to watch. If you consider this device as a filter that you would use in combination with other things than its a good idea. If you RTF you'll see that it only takes seconds to carry out this test. Lets say you run everyone through the metal detector first. Then you run everyone through this machine. People who fail this test are met by a TSA officer who is trained to ask questions very casually and to determine whether the reason you failed this test is due to the fact that, for example, you don't fly very often and you're a little afraid of it. If you RTFA it implies that the machine has a 12% rate of false positives. If chatting for five minutes with a TSA officer eliminates two-thirds of them than you only have to pay attention to 3% of passengers. If you combine that with the metal detector, and searching every checked bag and pulling aside people whose behavior is suspicious (e.g. buying a one way ticket the day before) then you may have a much more efficient system than what we have now.
Then terrorists will drive truckbombs into buildings, like they did the first time they bombed the World Trade Center in 1993. And drug smugglers will ship their drugs in container ships, like they do every day. It will cost a little more to smuggle, and the lowest rung of losers with stupid girlfriends will have a harder time. But it's pretty shabby cost:benefit tradeoff.
Remember, the 9/11/2001 planebombers were all legit flyers, working within the security measures at the time. New attacks will just attack the weakest link in the entire open society. The real safety is in our intelligence finding these multinational organizations, the rich people who fund them, and heed the warnings like "Bin Laden Determined to Attack in the United States". The rest of these measures are mostly handwaving, leaky fences that attack regular Americans more than our enemies.
--
make install -not war
These likely detect the state of thinking you're lying, which can go both ways: you train yourself to lie without even knowing it and thus go undetected, or in the tense situation of being thought a liar, you think you are and get falsely flagged. Regarding the latter, who hasn't experienced enough pressure to temporarily lose confidence in one's own sense of a situation?
the software program Truster? I thought it worked quite well for entertainment purposes.
If the salesman answers yes without the machine triggering an alarm, you know it's bogus.
What about those perverts that like anal searches? They might just trigger the voice software on purpose, get their probe, and be on their way. Oh, and what about all those used car salesmen that might be terrorists? I bet it can't pick up on their lies. Some people just sound untrustworthy. Especially if they talk with hesitation, which may be caused by some disability. I hope it doesn't always screen out people with Down's Syndrome...that could piss of disabled people getting singled out like that. I know if they ask me anything, I'm just gonna yell as loud as I can into the mic, hopefully the attendant is wearing headphones!
that is all
Click here to watch it. :)
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Scully: Homer, we're going to ask you a few simple yes or no questions. Do you understand?
Homer: Yes. (lie dectector blows up)
they're in our backyards! in our communities! in our schools! they're eating our babies! aaghghghhaagh!! quick! let's invade another country before it's too late!
This is scary because there are people who become nervous wreck at airports out of fear of flying. They'll probably sound terroristic and would have to go through a lot of crap if this technology was put into service.
Ooo man the floppy drive is broken. No wait. The computer is just upside down.
Can't help it, have no bad intention. Do not smuggle drugs or want to "commit a terrorist act".
...
.... and I am not a nervous person at all, but those checkpoints freek the crap out of me !!! really!
I did not take part in mass murder or ethnical cleansing. And I do not want to be an illegar worker in anyone's country.
However, when on a US airport (and few other places):
there are 10 cameras scanning the whole place
they take my photograph
they take my fingerprint
they look into my luggage (even open unopened factory sealed boxes)
it just makes me plain unconfortable, and however I control myself I feel myself like I was a wanted criminal trying to smuggle drugs, bombs and uranium into the country
The last time i went to the US, I was phisycally shaking and felt totally discomfort when arriving to the "purpose of your visit, and no we need your pointer finger print" officer...
I mean I understand it, I live with it, no offence, but I am going to fail any detector if it detects nervous people with trembling voice, even if I do not smuggle anything and I am willing to be on the flight back home
So if it takes between 30-75 seconds to scan someone, it will take more then 5 hours to scan everyone on a Boeing 747. So they can't scan everybody on a flight.
Customs Officer: Please answer yes or no. Do you plan to blow up this airplane?
Passanger: Yes...NO!!! AHH DAMN IT!!!
Cue rights violations for the transgendered in 5, 4, 3, 2......
[sample situation follows]
"I'm sorry, Sir, you can't fly here dressed like that."
"But I have a note from my therapi...."
"Sir, you cannot fly here dressed like that."
"But you didn't even know until you search...."
"Sir, you are not allowed on the plane unless you change."
"I don't have any male clothes!"
"Maybe you should have thought of that before you tried to fly, Sir?"
"But I'm required to live as a woman before surgery!"
"I'm sorry, Sir, you have two choices; dress as a man or leave."
"But..."
"Sir, am I going to have to call security? You may not fly on this plane. Please leave or I'll call security."
With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
The software in the detector picks up uncontrollable tremors in the voice that give away liars or those with something to hide, say its designers.
So if my wife and I are coming home from a vacation, and someone asks me if I have anything to declare, I get flagged as suspicious if I don't want to give away that I bought my wife's anniversary present on the trip? What about the fact that I think the female airline attendant off to the side looks great in a miniskirt?
"Something to hide" isn't always sinister, or a criminal offense.
Jay (=
Hey, what if the control towers could take remote control of a hijacked plane? This technology already exists in cars today.
This way, whenever a hijack occurs, the plane's controls could be disabled and the plane could be flown (using a flight sim?) to a safe, remote location.
Now, the next question would be: What if terrorists took over such control towers? They could take control of ALL the flights that are in the air... Well, there could be a central OVERRIDE button somewhere (like the nuclear missiles have now...)
More nincompoopery from the TSA. Pretend muteness.
"Are you a terrorist?"
*scribbles on paper*
"Oh! Oh. Ok, pass on through. It's ok guys, he's a mute!"
Hitler wasn't wrong on trying to get rid off the jews, all they do is transfer their misery to the rest of the world, Jews should focus on their enemies and not bringing their problems to the rest of the world, period.
Thanks for making traveling by plane even more traumatic.
So, how many terrorists have they caught with all of these precautions, while putting the rest of us into a police state? What happened to the constitutional right to freedom of movement?
Yeah, the airlines can require anything they like. That's not the same as the federal government forcing you through their checkpoints and doing things like confiscating your car keys.
... that sprinkles holy water on orange groves in an attempt to retard freezing.
Hey, at least the orange groves will be safe from Bunnicula!
How can a post be modded "overrated" or "underrated" when it hasn't been rated yet?
I've been searched before. I had nothing to hide, but my voice was trembling and I was fidgty and sweaty.
This happens to me whenever I see law enforcement officers, whether be security guards or police, "examine" me, whether it be a search or a simple stare.
I'm sure I'm not the only one. I think with this technology only the innocent and the timid will be caught, while those with nothing to lose (such as those suicidal hijackers) will get the green light.
Now you know why I hate searches and authority figures in general...
The software in the detector picks up uncontrollable tremors in the voice
In plainspeak what this means is the software detects someone who is terrified (terror-fied), as opposed to detecting terrorists.
Sounds like the bastard child of a dyslexic inventor and a paranoid politician to me.
Visit CryptoGnome in his home.
Scully: Now we're going to run a few tests. This is a simple liedetector. I'll ask you a few yes or no questions, and you just answer truthfully. Do you understand?
Homer: Yes! [The machine blows up]
The Rapture is NOT an exit strategy.
Lie detector tests are premised on the probability that people will experience anxiety when lying. Of course, some people are more susceptible to anxiety than others. Generally nervous people might experience the anxiety that causes these voice microtremors without actually lying.
On the other hand, people can fairly easily be trained to pass lie detector tests while still lying. Psychopaths in particular, many of whom are constitutionally underreactive to certain stressors (search Google for "deficient affective experience"), tend to be able to lie without the slightest trace of anxiety. This is mainly because psychopaths have an entirely self-centered attitude and thus no moral qualms about lying, stealing, or doing anything to people to get what they want or to serve their own twisted brand of justice. Note that one type of psychopath (the so-called secondary psychopath) is hypersensitive to stress; these are the common-criminal/reckless type.
My guess is that psychopathic individuals would be attracted to international terrorism. Osama bin Laden, for example, is almost certainly a psychopath. Therefore, these lie detector tests will be less effective against the people most likely to do harm!
On vit, on code et puis on meurt.
Even for friggin' nervous.
... MAKE THEM WET THEIR PANTS.
So - lets pick on the people that find flying stressful and
Is this an adaptation of the let's only give loans to the wealthy, or health insurance to the rich ideas ?
As me types in 'whimper' as the security word for this post - I wonder.
EMail: 0110001101100010010000000110001101110010 0110000101111010011011100110000101110010 0010111001100011011011110110
Now the terrorists will all get vocal-cord-removal surgery before boarding airplanes.
You've probably heard people who talk using voice-assist devices - they sound like computers.
Even better, the voice-assist device itself is battery-operated and can conceal a bomb.
The bottom line:
It's very hard to stop a determined, knowledgable terrorist.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
It's not ever going to happen again in any of our lifetimes. The terrorists burned that plan from ever working again because the pilots and people on the plane know that they're dead either way, so there's no reason not to resist. If they have a bomb, no difference. Dead when the bomb goes off or when the airliner hits whatever they're aiming at. No one on the plane has anything to lose. You can't control people with nothing to lose.
The 10-15 minutes multiplied by the millions of people who fly each day, the money for all the extra security...it's all meaningless. We're wasting millions of man-hours and millions of dollars to try and stop something that's not ever going to happen until a new generation comes along with "don't resist" drilled into their heads so a hundred of them just sit there like sheep and let five guys drive them into a wall.
But you can bet the terrorists know the things we're missing. That's where the next one will come from. Somewhere we're not expecting. And Condi Rice will be on TV going, "Who could have guessed they would use..." whatever it was. A little success for them goes a long way. We'll tie ourselves in knots and exhaust our treasury fighting phantoms. We'll over-react, like usual, and end up making more enemies than we started with while expending billions to little or no effect in the process.
All because of people like you.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
movie? what movie? i always think of it as refering to a game (Uplink, by introversion software)
Sneakers
I started a new courier job, and was amazed by how much paperwork is required to ship a package on a flight and pick one up from the cargo terminal these days! They even have a federal security agent who randomly walks around the terminal lot trying to open the doors of your vehicle while you're inside trying to drop off an outgoing package or pick up an incoming one. If he/she is able to - then you're immediately stopped from making the delivery or receiving it.
(The theory being "You're responsible for the security of your delivery from the moment you accept it until you drop it off for shipment.")
IMHO, this is just more assinine posturing -- because let's face it. The courier himself might be the one sabotaging the delivery, right? He'd have the most access to the package of anyone. And furthermore, an unlocked vehicle door on the airport lot is no guarantee the person kept the doors locked during the rest of the package's transit.
All they did was shift the focus away from airports and toward everything else. They have had bombs in cafes, malls, discos, schools, buses, car bombs in cars that pull up next to buses (so complete and thorough searching of the bus is ineffective), etc., etc.
They didn't stop terrorism in the least, they just shifted it by hardening one of the targets. And logically, that wouldn't stand up to a suicide bomber either -- he might not get on the plane, but he could take out everyone stuck in those long lines. "Sir, we believe you are a terrorist." "Ya got me." *BOOM*
Ultimately this situation will only be improved by persuasion, not force. If you are doing something that makes people willing to die just to get you too, you are going to have problems. A real peace process, combined with education and reduction in poverty, is the only way out.
The software will almost always pick up uncontrollable tremors in the voice that give away liars
I'm elderly, you insensitive clods.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
I have worked in situations where taking polygraph tests are mandatory. After having taken several so called "lie detector" tests, I have concluded that "lie detectors" are bad pseudoscience at best. All lie detectors, whether they be polygraph or voice stress analysis or whatever, depend on the leap of faith that the subject is nervous because they're afraid they'll get caught in a lie. The problem is: is the subject nervous because they're lying or are they nervous for some other reason, say being subjected to a test, or in this case preparing to fly on an airplane (Oddly, some people get nervous about flying)? Most polygraph tests I have taken amounted to good cop/bad cop kinds of interrogations, using the equipment to make the subject uncomfortable (one time, my arm actually turned blue due to a blood pressure cuff being tightened too much for almost an hour with no release of pressure). Also take note that the spies Ames and Hansen passed their lie detector tests regularly. They were both nabbed through examinations of their financial records IIRC, not through anything the lie detector had to say.
I doubt very seriously that this will have any positive effect on airport security. But it will increase the annoyance factor for law-abiding passengers.
NT
-- My Weblog.
Parking garages. Think more carefully, or try living here in NYC where such measures are obvious farces, including actual bombings to show the force of reality.
--
make install -not war
"Islamist" as discussed above was the definition I was using. The term "Islamist" does not refer to Muslims as a whole and, to be honest, it's hard to fit a small but diverse group into a one-word term.
You sound a bit like you think the world is like a Hollywood movie - where the people flying in the cabin know everything that's going on just like the person sitting in the cinema and seeing both the control tower, the cockpit and the hero hiding on the landing gear.
Terrorist attacks do not play out so dramatically like in the movies, man.
Only one addition - the Shin Bet screens passengers lists already when they buy a ticket, long before they left home to the airport. When they park the car in the airport they already passed two circles of security - the screening of passengers lists and the entrance to the airport (the parking lot is already behind gates with armed guards who ask you where are you going).
i've flown on El Al a few times. invariably they find something they don't like about me after 30-45 minutes of questions. the last time i flew them i asked the questioner to call their supervisor, and then just asked that they search me. they asked me to calm down, etc. and i explained that i had no desire to go through the interrogation and that it would be easier for both of us if they just searched me. so yeah, let them search me.
...vividly encapsulates that post-Watergate/pre-punk/coked-up moment when you could trust no one, least of all yourself.
The ultimate lie detector dodge.
Normal passengers won't use it, so they'll get extra scrutiny. This allows the terrorists a better chance than they otherwise would have to pass through successfully.
This is not a dream, not a dream...we are transmitting from the year 1-9-9-9.
I wonder where is this system today.
with the pre 9/11 system, and if airliner terrorism increases 10 fold, I'm still safer than I am driving on the Arizona highways with uninsured chuckleheads and illegal aliens driving drunk with stolen license plates on their car. Dead from terrorism, dead from drunk driver, dead from stroke due to high cholesterol, I'm still dead.
Then there's the cellular phone "Love Detector" service. You call someone via their system, and after the call, you get an SMS message with their analysis. (TV commercial here. In Hebrew, for the Israeli version.)
Moving up the product line a bit, they offer Ex-Sense, their low-end lie detector product. Only $149, including phone connector cable. Screenshots here.
Then there's Ex-Sense Pro, at $499. Unclear what you get with the "Pro" version.
All these, NemesysCo says, use the same technology as Gatekeeper.
this thing has been out for a while, a voice based lie detector developed by IMI i believe... its been on sale to hte public for at least the last 5 years...
http://www.snapshotspy.com/special/faq.htm
ebay has a bunch of them, along with other places. Its called the "Handy Truster." Supposedly you have to calibrate the device before each conversation to get a baseline of someones voice, so if the voice is trembling all the way through it wont catch anyhting.
the byproduct of years of oppression by the white man
There wasn't a damn thing I could float past her my entire childhood.
The Luddites were ahead of their time.
His point was that never again will hijackers be able to say, "sit down, shut up and fly the plane--and you'll live", and be believed. 'Cause that's what the 9/11 hijackers did, and everyone figured they'd be making an unscheduled trip to Cuba or something, because that's how hijackings went until then.
I doubt any gaggle of passengers is going to believe a hijacker who tries that line on them again, and I think that's what the OP was saying.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
I've heard way too much of this attitude. The USA founders defended personal liberty, but the average USA sheeple just assumes that if someone tells them "it's for a good cause: security," they feel all warm inside and let everyone get herded. Stand up for your rights, tell your congressfolk that the government doesn't need more powers, or just fuck off, please.
IANAL...
For better or worse, the Right to Privacy in American legal tradition has seemed to be an area of balancing rights and interest, and so is a very murkey area of the law (it is based on the right to be secure from "unreasonable" search and siezure and the right not to have one's liberty curtailed without due process of law).
Certainly this is far less of a concern than that of scatter Xray machines that see through clothing, or CAPS-II (which has the effect of curtailing the liberty to travel without any due process in addition to any privacy concerns). So while this is questionable, I reserve my right to decide later whether plans to impliment it are unreasonable or not.
For me to be comfortable with this system, it would need to be implimented in a neutral and limited way. For example further searches would need to be limited to items that are banned from airlines for reasons related to the safety of that flight. Compulsatory searches at airports really should be subject to this limitation anyway (for example, if a search turns up marijuana, this should not be valid in court or even valid to get additional warrants).
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
One more step closer to Big Brother...
> different than, say, 20 years from now.
True; however:
(a) The door to the cabin is kept locked for the entire flight now, so hijackers would be unable to take control of the plane anyway.
(b) With 100+ people on a plane, the odds are very good that a small group of people will have heard of the dangerous of letting hijackers have control of the plane, and will feel hero/frightened enough to act to prevent it. Once they start, other passengers are likely to pile on, quickly overcoming lightly-armed hijackers.
When the dangers of submitting to hijackers are illustrated so clearly by something as shocking to the US as 9/11, they're unlikely to be forgotten by every single one of 100+ random people for a long, long time.
Considering lie detectors are about as inaccurate as weatherman (often considered to be a little over 50% accurate in practical use outside of a testing lab).... it doesn't suprise me that airlines would be up for this idea.
Remember: if the security doesn't clear you to fly, the airline doesn't have to book you on a later flight. That's considered *your* problem in most cases. Hence they tell you arrive at the airport 3-6 days before you leave.
Just like metal detectors that only beep when the guard pushes the "beep" button. The Israeli will undoubtedly continue to racial profile passengers. It is really time that the US stops the biased support in the conflict. If the US could help to somehow create jobs in Palestein, maybe the refugees would calm down. 40% unemployment in Gaza. A young man might think twice about strapping a bomb on his chest if he had a future. With no opportunities, there is no reason to live. Worrying about security is the wrong approach. Giving up civil liberties is not the answer.
It takes around 60-90 seconds to place your bag on an x-ray belt, step through the detector, and collect your bag afterward, depending on how crowded the scanners are, and how efficient the screeners are.
Somehow those airports manage to do that to every passenger.
The US free market: two halves of a government-granted duopoly are free to set the market price.
Your experience in cruise ship security mirrors that of the Carnival cruise we did a couple of years ago. They let me through with my Leatherman, but they did want to inspect it ("hey, that's pretty cool, I'm gonna have to get one") when I came through.
Vista:XPSP2::ME:98SE
you know, those autistic savants that stare at x-ray screenshots of people's luggage and look for bad shit.
Temple Grandin, "an autistic woman who was recommended for institutionalization as a child, [...] went on to become an influential expert on animal behavior and inventor of humane systems for handling livestock. [...] Grandin, in her book, notes that autistics have ably performed quality-control jobs that draw upon their detail orientation, and score exceptionally well on tests that involve finding a hidden shape inside a picture. She suggests that autistics be tried as airport screeners, to spot guns, bombs and the like amid the cluttered images of x-rayed luggage. Is anyone in the Department of Homeland Security working on this idea?"
Source: http://www.techcentralstation.com/091305C.html
The only worse thing I can imagine than the farse that is American airport security, is the possibility that some day they might actually successfully implement true security. I thought society was taking a step forward since you no longer need papers to travel inside Russia, or passports to go between France and Germany. I dread travelling now, because it offends me to have to take off my shoes and belt at the airport to maintain the illusion of security. But how much worse would it be when they confiscate my laptop because I could make an explosive from the battery in about three seconds? Or when I'm detained indefinitely because I'm a 20-something travelling alone, and I happen to be carrying a Quoran for some leisure reading.
In my life, terror doesn't come from desperate fundamentalists. Terror is the government trying to control every aspect of the way I live and the way I think. I can only hope that it's not too late to undo the damage. Vote while you still can! And pray, if you're into that sort of thing.
Well then, that nervous person, and any others that missed said flight will be thanking their lucky stars that they missed an opportunity to be a victim of a terrorist, I suppose, even if they did become a victim of some beurocrat's stupidity.....
I for one welcome our new false-posetive, false-negative, lie-detecting, airline security overloards!
Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. - Dr. Seuss
Ever wonder why we don't see any of these?
- Glasses frames with sharpened ends
- Suitcase handles with sharpened ends (pull them all the way out of the suitcase and you have a gigantic shank)
- A sharp plastic credit-card size object
- Some kind of chemical disguised as a useful medication (e.g. Tylenol) that ignites when it reacts with beer or soda or laptop batteries or something
- A car bomb in the pickup/dropoff area
And the list goes on.I make websites and stuff. Buy one.
Don't you mean, "I'm aware of the risks of terrorism, and I don't give a fuck if 20 guys with box cutters hijack this flight and smash it into a building, killing thousands of people, just so long as I'm not inconvenienced" instead?
Given that more Americans die *every month* from automobile accidents than did on Sept. 11th, I think you like everyone else is overstating the risks. Indeed in Israel terrorism-related deaths have only outstripped auto accidents during one month since the current uprising began. Interesting, in Sept, 2001, fewer people died in auto accidents (3303) than either August (3526) or October(3490). Maybe people were afraid to travel? (source: US DOT)
I think people need to calm down and stop being terrorized.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
As long as they use the detectors just as a way to pick out people for further investigation, I don't see much wrong with this. It may cost them extra money and cause extra inconvenience, of course, but I don't know the figures on that.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
The net tightens ...
I hope people keep in mind that terrorism kills fewer people than traffic accidents, lifestyle diseases, or regular crime (one of these alone suffices).
The way I see it, many of the prevention measures that have been taken only increase the effect that terrorism has on American society.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Cool. Does that mean if I'm profoundly deaf and don't speak with my voice at all, I should expect to show up at the airport 4 hours early to have enough time to deal with the searches? :)
You do realize that more than 1 million people fly in the US every day right?
Having a 1 in 1 million rate on this thing would not be acceptable IMO.
Libertas in infinitum
to see me?
The really sad thing is some con artists are making money out of these things at the expense of the public. Electronic voodoo like lie detectors doesn't have to work, money is shelled out for this sort of thing because it shows that the people spending the money care about the children in The War Against Terror.
The guard recoiled and asked what the noise was and I quickly said "a massager".
If anything, it's a lie by omission - you didn't say *what* it was for massaging.
...be very confident about accomplishing his objective?
To fool one, you just have to train a bit with the right equipement (ie the detector model that you want to fool). So basically, a well-trained terrorist would raise his chances of not being throughfully searched by passing this test. Great way to improve security!
Anyway, all these airport regulation begin to get on my nerves. Now that you have to register one hour before the flight, put off shoes, belt, nickels, face people who treat you like suspects in a police station, that freak out when you have a laptop with you, etc... Every time I have to go somewhere, I check if train is not an option. Even if it takes two more hours.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0105435/
Watch out for that cootys rat semen!
And studies argue
<rant>
Apart from the loss of civil liberties and the loss of billions of dollars, this is just another pointer to the fact that the so-called war on terror is costing many, many more lives than its ostensible targets. Up next, after two thousand dead American troops and literally countless dead Iraqi civilians:
</rant>
What a stupid concept, for a number of reasons.
Firstly, this kind of thing is based on the assumption that even a 'bad guy' will somehow feel bad about what their are about to do, and there will feel under emotional stress. Two of the most dangerous kinds of persons, psychopaths and suicide terrorists, are not likely to to fall into this category. Psychopaths don't care, simply, they will lie or contemplate atrocities like normal people would think about buying a bottle of milk. And a person who has decided to die has overcome the fear; it is a wellknown phenomenon that a person who wants to commit suicide often enters a phase of perfect calm and contentment when the decision has been made.
Secondly, as others point out, a lot of people feel very bad about small transgressions. I remember one lady who felt very nervous because she had bought 1 small bottle of alcohol over the limit and was afraid to get caught. So are we now going to catch all those who are under a bit of strain, but let through the really dangerous ones?
Thridly, wouldn't it perfectly possible to subvert the equipment - perhaps simply by eating Valium or similar?
Maybe give them an incentive to do it right, such as paying them a decent wage?
And how does this system deal with people who have taken alcohol or a narcotic before hand? I have yet to find a decent sized airport that didn't have a bar or 5 in it.
"Bartender, give me a double scotch on the rocks, I need to get through security."
Bad idea. I'm in favour of the millimeter wave solution, even though it might embarrass some people. It sees through your clothes - you know so that you can detect bits and pieces which shouldn't be there. I look forward to the wearable visor edition.
But, FYI, if you avoid those 2 things, you will never be hassled. Even (or perhaps especially) if you are wearing a turban and muttering, "Muhammad, Jihad." repeatedly under your breath.
A subtle, yet important clarification: followers of the Sikh faith wear turbans, not Arabs or Muslims.
"The problem with our economy is that our budget is balanced by people who aren't" - A.E.N.
This is bullshit because leidetectors don't really work ...
It's both, it was the movie Sneakers originally, and later paid homage to in the (rather excellent) game Uplink.
I know that I will fail this test. :P
How many people aren't a lot self confident and will fail the test because of the stress of a mistake?
Go stupid security test.
Well maybe it's different than what I think, didn't read the article
So those of us who have a slight tremor in our voices will be marked as terrorist ? It's bad enough I shake slightly, . And what about parkinson's folks ? Would Katherine Hepburn be grounded now ?
nervous people ? you better think about the disabled people that have some kind of defect in their throat ... they will be searched each time they're gonna fly ...
I'd tell you the chances of this story being a dupe, but you wouldn't like it.
This is not to be seen as a troll but a suggestion...
How about making sure you don't elect fuckwads^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hincompetents as country leaders (I am not talking solely about US here) so as to make sure that the possibility that your country could be a target for terrorism ridiculous ?
It might be tougher, but in the end, everyone would benefit from it, and no one would then need some stupid pseudo-efficient privacy-invading machines so as to pretend protecting submissive people...
is another reason why I will never fly again. I can drive, take the train or bus, or take a boat if I'm going overseas. Air travel (ast least from a US airport) is no longer an option.
Life sucks, but death doesn't put out at all. -- Thomas J. Kopp
what if i pretend to be deaf and dumb. can i respond with ASL? :)
Of course not. Because she might be trying to knit an Afghan.
On behalf of someone who used to be an exceedingly nervour flyer (who was afraid of air travel), I can guarantee that a lot of innocent people are already scared shitless getting onto an aircraft and going through security. I know people who need to be medicated before they fly.
Having these people put on headphones and go through an invasive interrogation designed to see if they are nervous is going to create an absurd amount of false-positives.
It amazes me with all these lock downs etc etc, what is to stop a terrorist going through flight school, getting his license and then when he gets his first job, fly it straight into a building? Fact is, there are a million and one ways to cause a terrorist attack, what's to say that 5 terrorists dont just drive van bombs into somewhere? Since when has piloting a plane into a building been the 'be all and end all' of attacks?
I know I don't want to go there after reading that.
Machine: "Are you carrying anything dangerous?"
Passenger: "Yes."
Machine: "Did anyone known or unknown to you ask you to carry anything for them in your bags?"
Passenger: "Yes."
Machine: "Have your bags been under your control the entire time?"
Passenger: "No."
Machine: "No vocie quaver. You may pass."
GIGOwiz
Why don't we ask ourselves, why did these terrorists actually attack us? And no "They hate how free we are" is not the reason.
The 9/11 bombers hate us because we interfered with their attempts to overthrow an oppressive regime in Saudi Arabia. That is why nearly all the bombers were Saudi Arabians.
We as a country fund and assist brutal oppressive regemes world wide. We do it to help our massive corporations make billions of dollars. Our intelligence agencies work to defeat democracy movements in those brutal regimes, because their leaders are our "friends."
Why do we hate deomocracy so much that we work to prevent it in so many places? Because countries with real democracies institute rules to protect their people from predatory corporations who would use up their workers and pay them far under what the true value of those workers in an international labor market. Not to mention the ecology and other standards of living rules that democracies institute that corporations see only as unwelcome additional costs.
If we would stop supporting brutal regemes and stop repressing democracy world wide, then we would not get attacked all the time.
And people that can't talk, what will they do ?
There are some people that don't hear, and some that don't talk because of a disease or alike.
It is as stupid as declaring a one year old child a potential terrorist because he has no fingerprints or passport as the US customs do. New born child cant have passwords because they wont have fingerprint until a few years old.
You dont want planes to explode ? Dont have planes fly.
In the end, this will be their solution I guess.
Stupid people have no limits to their stupidity and they try anything : that's how you recognize them in fact.
Such a trip really seems feasibly - even it is a "once in a lifetime" thing to do. Transatlantic roundtrips seemed to average about $3000.00 per person, taking around a month to complete (most of the time spent on the open sea - average about 5 days at various ports). Get used to walking up and down stairs on the ship (no elevators usually!) - but the food accomadations sound good and interesting. There seem to be a lot of options, and prices weren't outlandish (around $100.00 per person per day - I have stayed in hotels which were more expensive, though not on my dime). Of course, it takes longer, but you are guaranteed to have interesting stories to tell when you get back home. Also, since it is a freighter it is possible to bring along (or more likely, send via another ship) your automobile or other transportation (though getting licensed/insured/etc on the other side might be an issue!). Finally, you can't take much in the way of luggage with you (a suitcase or two, max), nor can you take pets - but the rooms on some freighters look pretty nice!
Wow! Thanks again for pointing this out - I had a great time looking up the information I found. I encourage everyone who has ever thought about this to look into it further - it might be the most interesting adventure you could take!
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
I'm somewhere between agnostic, pantheistic, and atheistic, myself - but I have to say... the term "Islamic people" defines a religious group, not a racial group. Not all Jewish people are Isralies, and not all Isralies are Jewish. Likewise, not all Islamic people are Palestinian/Arabic/Egyptian/Indian/&c. I would have thought that you would be more sensitive to this type of distinction, since you are "Israeli and secular", and based on your "pause here while I tell anti-Semites to fuck off..." comment.
If you don't want to do that, here's my own summary from what I read of the above materials: A) Evidence about its use for law enforcement/criminal investigation shows that it is better than chance but "far from perfect", B) There is nearly no scientific evidence about its efficacy for screening or pre-screening employees, and C) there are good reasons for thinking that it would be even less effective for (pre-)screening than it is for law enforcement.
For those unfamiliar with the NAS, there's a Wikipedia article.
I know plenty of people who are just plain nervous about flying, to the point that they feel the need to stop by the bar before a flight. Those people would likely give false positives on that kind of test. I feel for them.
Already nervous, then pulled aside on a random check, and on top of that failing the "lie detector test"? Sounds like a nightmare to me.
'Rora
80's Cartoons Central
Well it just goes to show you that we do have enough money to actually pay those in charge of airline security a high enough rate, to perhaps get more qualified intelligence. But you ever think an honest solution to a problem that is agenda based will ever pass? Uh No... Let's see... Continue to pay these people in charge of our safety a wage that most Taco Bell workers would morally jihad their wad in your burrito supreme. However the administration and apathetic politicians who are paid lobbyists (all) will not make the obvious decision to make a moral decision, but rather make more problems for those who are innocent, meek, and perhaps violently brilliant as a hypothesis to see how much personal information that the GOV can get on one individual with out questioning... I am a former Southwest Airline Employee (IT DEPARTMENT...DEPARTED BECAUSE THEY REFUSED TO DEPART FROM NOVElL TILL 2 MONTHS AGO). Being an airline employee who wants to make an impossible solution perhaps feasible, unlike a problem that wants to keep terror and security an issue in the media and make enough known flaws bait a true (no names because it could be another not al-queda at one point) terrorist in killing oh a few, few hundred, few thousand... Then they get down to the REAL leader of the network of EVIL ,., uh Bin Laden, No Hussein, NO Zarquai, and no Putin, wait KIM from that country that we get cheap shit from that all the new deli foggers(those who have enough intelligence to fog a mirror. To implement a system that is not even admissible in the court of law, is a front for keeping FEAR in the regime and allowing new laws that weaklings will not fight, thus giving away more and more of your freedoms.. With Massive APPLAUSE... (ROTS RIP YEAH YEAH) We need to wake the hell up, Terrorism spreads by giving it acknowledge meant that it will happen at ANY TIME, yet the fight on awareness is at an all time low.. Just like when Bill Clinton was in office and Usama Osama(see more confusion techniques to keep people in the drool) Bin Laden bombed the WTC in 1993 no one seemed to give a shit, yet our CIA losers were "watching" However if they would have looked in their HR department they would have noticed that BinLaden's trade was an architect. BinLaden was doing a test run to see how the buildings structure would demolish.. Yet when Syria had arrested him in 94 or 95(please don't hold me to accuracy on the time lines ... the point are what matters) Clinton ignored to "deal with another terrorist involved state... Kind of like how we used to do with known communists, yet we have a prison camp in Cuba who is run by the man that Kennedy feared... Castro... Yet the rules change due to agendas and what can and will be pulled over the peoples eyes... Terrorists will always strike because they seek clues and puzzles much like hackers do with seeking vulnerabilities in windows/Linux environments, once you see flaws over and over and nothing really being done about it... Then is the time they strike, http://www.infovlad.net/?p=38
did more to actually combat terrorism then the GOV did, they had videos of real terrorist propaganda that was being spread.. Including the technique of 9volt batteries with transistor discharges to sneak anywhere, yet now the TEAMZ-USA site is now down probably due to real intelligence fighting the GOV's agenda in lettings some thing truly screwed to go on so they can instate a Slave Republic. Everybody blames Bush, But Clinton , Bush Sr have all lead a clever chess game of feeling prophetic in starting Revelations.. Yet this makes Revelations come true in a strange way, Sometimes prophecy though self induced by belief still makes it prophecy...I hate this implement, next thing you will see if banning of RF and laptops containing batteries, because you can make a battery of thermite in the extra battery slot (thebroken.org)and then you have a bomb.. Sure you would think the ETD's could detect it, however people are so conditioned ---especially poor p
Embody Yourself In A Concept It Will Become Reality... Byron Smart
Those who sacrifice freedom for security deserve neither and lose both
How would this work for these guys?
How would it be possible for someone to prove that the guy isn't mute?
People are too narrow minded when it comes to "OMGZORZ TEH TERRORIZTZ R TAKING OVER TEH COUNTRY!!!"
Dying from a terrorist attack is highly unlikely. You are far more likely to die in a plane crash or a car crash, does that mean these vehicles should be banned? No.
Putting ridiculous amounts of security on aircraft won't deter terrorists. They'll just bomb the underground/crowded mall/any public transport.
The links in the GP have excerpts downloadable, if you just want to get an idea (warning: high wacko quotient on those sites, and dubious copyright). It really is creepy, once you see it... especially given Chris Carter's (x-files writer/producer) ongoing theme of using conspiracy theorists to spread disinformation. Not a huge x-files & spinoff fan myself, but it is just too weird... The reasoning given in the pilot is that this event [spoiler alert!] is a pearl harbor-style trigger coordinated by a faction of the US gub'mint dedicated to boosting military production and global influence, mirroring both PNAC and real world conspiracy theorists.
Damn those pesky terrorists
I've responded to this, but I was at another puter, so maybe you didn't see it, so I'll repeat:
;-), while in the latter you don't (not on itself, that is).
;-)
"That's wonderful for you, but unfortunately, we do actually have problems that arise from underage drinking here. Hell, we have problems with of age drinking here."
"Do I think it will solve the problem? Hell no. But until we can figure out how to solve the underlying issues, it's better than nothing."
Which was my point; it *doesn't* actually help (just as in the case of airports/planes, a lot of 'security measures' don't help). But in any case, you are confusing two things: driving under influence, and underage drinking. We most certainly have pretty stringent laws for the former, but not for the latter. The difference being (as laws should be) that in the former you directly endanger others (and driving under influence is not limited to the youth, and maybe even less so, because young teens aren't even allowed to drive in the first place
Ofcourse, drunken youth (or anyone else for that matter) *may* cause trouble, but that's just what I was saying: in countries where they have a more tolerant attitude towards it, 'binch drinking' and youth creating amok under influence happens a lot *less* then in those countries where they have a pretty repressive 'no-under-age-booze' attitude. (Take the example of the UK, for instance, which adapted it's laws in this regard). Some countries realise this mistake (like the UK recently), some don't. Which is why I thought your analogy was ill chosen, because it demonstrated just the point I was making, that some laws or rules (like the booze-thing or like giving a false sense of security) is actually making things worse then they are making things better - and yet, people are happy to do so, convinced it really is helping.
In fact, most of the time, the persons themselves are convinced it's for a good purpose ('safety' or 'avoiding deaths', etc.), and so don't even question the necessity of the law which hollows out their rights, or the rights of others. Is it really necessary to hassle people on the airport? Does it augment safety? Most people being sheep, they just echo what the governement tells them: yes. You might think this is a bit of an elitist attitude, and it is - but it also has truth in it. Take your own example of booze/drinking age: did you ever wonder if it wouldn't be better to lower the drinking age, or to get less restrictive in these matters? Did you ever looked at how other countries are doing in this respect, which have a different attitude (and laws)? Do they have more alcoholics, trouble with youth under influence, etc., or less?
I don't think you did, convinced as you are that your current laws, mentality and viepoint on this is the 'right' way to go. (You could prove me wrong, of course
I understand you're not thrilled with the lie-detector hing, but your emotional viewpoint of "if it's for (claimed) safety/saving from deaths/etc., it's ok" doesn't really fly with me. You may add "if I'm not much bothered by it", but that doesn't make it any better, it only makes it less consistent and more arbitrary. First one has to know if it *actually* helps - which, as the case for booze demonstrates, is often genuinly seen wrong - and even if it does, it's the question if the loss of any rights one normally possesses is worth the *possibility* of reducing deaths/etc. Because, let's face it, when you are talking about possibilities, one can argue whatever one wants.
Gitmo can seem over the top for me, and maybe even for you, but not everyone (including your leaders) are of that opinion, apparently. And they are following exactly the same reasoning: if there is a *possibility* of avoiding another attack with torturing people, then let's do it.
If you take that premise, they stay in exactly the same logic and reasoning as you have used. Only you think they are not reasonable (anymore), while they think they *are* (and that you're not, probably).
I would rather argue the premise itself is wrong.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---