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What Examples of Security Theater Have You Encountered?
swillden writes "Everyone who pays any attention at all to security, both computer security and 'meatspace' security, has heard the phrase Security Theater. For years I've paid close attention to security setups that I come in contact with, and tried to evaluate their real effectiveness vs their theatrical aspects. In the process I've found many examples of pure theater, but even more cases where the security was really a cover for another motive." swillden would like to know what you've encountered along these lines; read on for the rest of his question below.
swillden continues: "Recently, a neighbor uncovered a good example. He and his wife attended a local semi-pro baseball game where security guards were checking all bags for weapons. Since his wife carries a small pistol in her purse, they were concerned that there would be a problem. They decided to try anyway, and see if her concealed weapon permit satisfied the policy. The guard looked at her gun, said nothing and passed them in, then stopped the man behind them because he had beer and snacks in his bag. Park rules prohibit outside food. It's clear what the 'security' check was really about: improving park food vending revenues.
So, what examples of pure security theater have you noticed? Even more interesting, what examples of security-as-excuse have you seen?"
So, what examples of pure security theater have you noticed? Even more interesting, what examples of security-as-excuse have you seen?"
Airports... Need I say more?
No trolling intended, but the war in Iraq now is the biggest piece of security theater on the planet. It does not make the US safer ( indeed it probably does the reverse ) but it does give certain people benefits. Chaney and friends make millions on no-bid contracts, and neocons get to implement policies that in more normal conditions would not be tolerated by the public.
In 2001 I was living in an apartment complex in a North Dallas suburb. If you got a package that wouldn't fit in those teeny-tiny mailboxes then the mail man would drop off the package at the apartment complex office and you could pick it up in normal office hours.
After September 11th, the apartment management sent out a memo to all residents that because of the heightened state of terrorism awareness the office would no longer allow packages to be held there for the residents.
Of course my first thought was they were just tired of dealing with the packages and saw this as a convenient excuse to stop holding packages for people.
No todo lo que es oro brilla
The article fails to talk about security as a deterrent.
The RFID bracelets on an infant can give comfort to the parents but its more of a deterrent then anything. Sure the hospital can tell the parents that their child is protected. But the hospital is not protecting the child as much as its protecting itself. For example:
A guard that is in the bank is not there to stop a bank from being robbed. He deters people from committing the crime itself. In a robbery situation the guard himself is useless because the individual or individuals robbing a bank would take him out first. But in most bank robberies, the criminals are going to go after a bank without a guard anyway.
A mall guard doesn't stop people from stealing, he creates the presence of being watched, therefor deterring people from stealing.
Same goes with cameras in stores. Most of the time no one is monitoring the cameras and if anything their used to watch employees over customers. But their deterring employees from doing anything unethical or illegal and they deter people from stealing.
In my opinion the idea of security theater and feeling safe is crap. You might as well spend the time and effort to know your safe then make it seem like you feel like your safe.
What's left to say? It's pretty clear that drugs are more dangerous when they're only available in the unregulated black market than in a regulated legal market. Criminalizing the use of drugs only hurts drug users more, yet it's done in the name of safety.
What's worst is that we've been fighting this war for decades, no end is in sight, we've spent more money and lost more freedoms fighting it than we have in Iraq. And still, no one in power has the balls to speak out against this.
We live in a sick, sad world. People who would meet the non-violent act of drug use with the violent acts of arrest and imprisonment are themselves violent criminals. Yet in this society they are deemed good citizens.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
rj
We created a delete function, and kept getting reports that the customer accidentally deleted records. (And we had no undelete function.) So we added a "Are you sure?" dialog.
The incidents of accidental deletion did not go down.
So we added text "This cannot be undone. Continue?" and still the incidents did not go down (People just randomly click OK.)
Finally we changed it to "Please key in 'irreversible' to continue with the deletion." This solved the problem.
It also helps politicians pander to ignorant members of the right.
"Not an actor, but he plays one on TV."
Why the hell would you have a button that actually says "OK" on it? That's poor design, because you should know that people always click OK. A better design would be to have buttons that say "Delete" and "Cancel", with the Cancel button selected by default. Typing the phrase was a good alternate solution to eventually arrive at, though.