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Schneier On the War On the Unexpected
jamie found this essay by Bruce Schneier, The War on the Unexpected. (It originally appeared in Wired but this version has all the links.) "We've opened up a new front on the war on terror. It's an attack on the unique, the unorthodox, the unexpected; it's a war on different. If you act different, you might find yourself investigated, questioned, and even arrested — even if you did nothing wrong, and had no intention of doing anything wrong. The problem is a combination of citizen informants and a CYA attitude among police that results in a knee-jerk escalation of reported threats... After someone reports a 'terrorist threat,' the whole system is biased towards escalation and CYA instead of a more realistic threat assessment... If you ask amateurs to act as front-line security personnel, you shouldn't be surprised when you get amateur security."
people using the excuse of a boogieman in the shadows to lash out against those they don't understand and/or fear?
unheard of in all of human history.
America is at war with terrorism. America has ALWAYS been at war with terrorism.
Is a war against an emotion... Anything which can cause fear is therefore subject to the war. In that way it's the perfect war for politicians.
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Our whole lives are spent dealing with people and their reactions to what is 'acceptable' and taking the risk that what you try and accomplish is 'unexpected'. Wear long hair in the executive world? Get fired. Dye your hair green in high school? Get teased. Run down a street naked? Get arrested.
Humans are exceptional at detecting differences, its part of our nature, intellectually - we integrate similar concepts and differentiate between different ones. Our brains pick out differences. Thats why profiling at airports actually works.
Its nice to see someone publish something about this, but its hardly insightful.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
This sounds like a throwback to the 50's and early 60's when "Communism" was the buzz word, and a conforming America was key to not being "outed" as a Commy.
Shameless plug alert: Game server control panel
...if their goal was to create fear in the U. S. population.
The fear is real. I hate to admit it, but it affect me.
Everyone knows that there will be further terrorist attacks on the U. S. On the one hand, we're not serious about beefing up homeland security, which is a disappointment to me--I was expecting at least a competent, good-faith effort. But we're doing all the "security theatre" stuff and none of the expensive, difficult, serious stuff. On the other hand, the Iraq war has inflamed passions in the Muslim world and created enemies where we didn't have them before. So the threat is getting worse and our defenses are not getting much better and all the "security theatre" just keeps reminding us of the issue.
On my last plane trip, the gate was near security, and my wife and I were watching as some woman got some kind of very, very extended attention from the TSA people. She was dressed in some kind of dark robe that covered her body, her head, and most of her face; it looked to me like a burkha, but I don't really know anything about such things. She also had a somewhat disfigured face, with a golf-ball-sized lump of some kind on one side of her forehead.
From our vantage point it was all pantomime. I don't know why they were searching her. But they would ask her questions, then wave those handheld metal-detector frisking things, have her sit down for a while, go away and come back with other officials who would ask her more questions and so forth. After about a half an hour she was still sitting there in the security area waiting. They announced that our flight was boarding and we got on and don't know anything more.
What I hated myself for was that I personally was creeped out by this person and her appearance. And what I particularly hated myself for was that the things creeped me out were a) her style of dress, and b) her disfigured face.
Part of me was indignant at what looked from a distance to be discriminatory treatment. And part of it was great relief that she was not on my flight.
I think it's time for new moderator points.
"+1 Terrorist" and "-1 Sheep".
Whether you want to swap the signs depends on your political preference.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
Choice 1: Over react and be labeled a fascist.
Choice 2: Do nothing and be blamed when people die.
No wonder we only get shit bags running for public office.
Virginia is for lovers. EVE is for griefers.
people are spoiled and every time something bad unexpected happens they can't accept it. result of living in one of the safest and affluent societies on earth.
so if something does happen the media jumps on it with all kinds of "investigative" reporting about how some insignificant clue had been dismissed or how some proposed law wasn't passed that could have prevented this. and they attack government agencies in the process along with congress getting involved with subpeonas and investigations. so the police to CYA just start to investigate idiotic things and bugging people
For those interested in hearing Bruce Schneier dispassionately and quite reasonably shred a lot of the "security" measures implemented since 9/11, I suggest reading his book Beyond Fear. The subtitle says it all: thinking sensibly about security in an uncertain world. The book was reviewed on Slashdot not long ago.
The book takes a very general approach to security, analyzing it with the most basic categorizations, while using very clear real-life examples to illustrate. The final chapters deal specifically with security against terrorism, particularly since 9/11. His conclusion is that, from a security standpoint, most of the measures put in place - additional airport scrutiny, massive centralized databases looking for suspicious patterns, the move towards national ID cards, etc. - are largely ineffective as security measures. The massive trade-off of decreased privacy and liberty coupled with enormous cost for these measures make them especially unreasonable. In short, the widespread perceived risk and culture of fear it has fostered has made our response to the new terroristic threat wildly out-of-proportion with the actual risk.
It's mostly preaching to the choir here at Slashdot, but I think this book should be as widely read as possible.
More likely the kind of reactions he's talking about has to deal with thrill killers. The 9/11 guys didn't do so much that was out of the norm to ring any real bells (yeah, yeah, I know, if you were there it would have set off the alarms in your head. yeah, I know that.) but the actions of thrill killers is often noticeable by those around them because of long time association and a change in behavior.
But my real wondering is: Since when has Slashdot become the outpost for the war on terror articles? Everything posted here anymore seems to be political. What was that Taco was saying the other day about loosing control of his website? Dude, it's already happened.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
If you think that the next administration - Republican or Democrat - is going to be substantially different, you haven't been paying attention for very long.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
full of win
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I hear NPR mention a "war on terror", and I want to call in a correction/complaint.
A war on terror or fear is quite different than a war on terrorism.
And a war on terrorism is quite different than a war against terrorists.
And of course a war on terrorists is quite different that a war against a specific group.
A war against an generic term, a tactic or unspecified groups of people cannot be won.
(It cannot be lost either).
How about:
Choice 3: React appropriately and install security measures that work, without unduly stressing people?
The problem isn't that there are two extremes the people in power must choose from, the problem is that the two choices you gave are actually being done at the same time.
You didn't call anyones attention to it, did you? You just confirmed to me that a way to plant a bomb where you work is to just make it look compex enough.
Anti-abortion groups don't design bombs by committee. Only the government does that. Anti-abortion groups (or whatever other kind of group you want to substitute) have a guy who knows about making bombs, and he makes them with no input other than size and yield. There may be a second guy who knows about hiding bombs. The point is, these two people are smart. Individually, everyone else in the group is likely reasonably intelligent. It's only as a group that they become dumb enough to place bombs at clinics frequented by pregnant women in an attempt to keep fetuses alive.
I see your informative link, and raise you a pithy comment.
If that counter terror expert offered cogent arguments, sure, why not? If the arguments are wrong, refute them, don't engage in the logical fallacies of ad hominem attacks and appeals to authority. Security isn't some magical concern that only a few high priests can speak on. Security is a day-to-day issue that everyone needs to consider. Security is a matter of government a politics, an area that every interested citizen can debate and try to influence our government.
Indeed, it is. And Schneier agrees (although he calls it acting "hinky," a word a custom's agent used to describe someone's behavior that led to their arrest). But you're suggesting a false dichotomy between ignoring everything and calling in the most minor of suspicions. Schneier's proposal is pretty clear: you need knowledge to be able to accurately identify hinky.
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I was a Canadian tourist in Boston in April. I walked through Boston Commons Park at 10am on a beautiful Sunday morning, seven steps from my hotel. I said good morning to a few people in the park. Ten minutes later, two police approached and interrogated me. Apparently, some crazy women to whom I said "good morning" promptly left the park and reported me as a sex offender / pedaphile.
The police were firm but polite in their in-park ten-minute interrogation. They said things like "maybe you shouldn't walk around in public parks." and "don't you think it's a bad idea to say 'good morning' to a complete stranger?". They believed me when I said I was Canadian -- after seeing my passport and driver's licence. (yeah, passport wasn't enough for them. I have no clue how they were able to authenticate an Ontario driver's licence, Massacheusets has something that looks like it's off a 1985 inkjet.)
It was really just one crazy woman -- I greeted many people during the week, and others, notably injured Kelly, and also fishing Steve, were exceptionally nice.
All the same, I was glad when they let me leave the country five days later.