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TSA Subpoenas Bloggers Over New Security Directive
Hugh Pickens writes "The NY Times reports that TSA special agents have served subpoenas to travel bloggers Steve Frischling and Chris Elliott demanding that they reveal who leaked a TSA directive outlining new screening measures that went into effect the same day as the Detroit airliner incident. Frischling said he met with two TSA special agents for about three hours and was forced to hand over his laptop computer after the agents threatened to interfere with his contract to write a blog for KLM Royal Dutch Airlines if he didn't cooperate and provide the name of the person who leaked the memo outlining new security measures that would be apparent to the traveling public. 'It literally showed up in my box,' Frischling told The Associated Press. 'I do not know who it came from.' Frischling says he provided the agents a signed statement to that effect. The leaked directive included measures such as screening at boarding gates, patting down the upper legs and torso, physically inspecting all travelers' belongings, looking carefully at syringes with powders and liquids, requiring that passengers remain in their seats one hour before landing, and disabling all onboard communications systems, including what is provided by the airline. In a December 29 posting on his blog, Elliott said he had told the TSA agents at his house that he would call his lawyer and get back to them."
The two bloggers are the press, and our Constitution, in fact the very fabric of our American society tells us that they should tell the TSA to take a long walk off a short pier.
If we wanted to live in Soviet Russia, we wouldn't be Americans!
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
You do not know it wasn't sensitive at the time. In fact, if there were planned multiple attacks, the very information could have allowed an attacker to make adjustments to their plans without being detected.
Suppose for one instance that instead of being one foiled attack, there was plans for 20 bombings in this same fashion within hours or days of each other. In the hours or days right after the attacks, knowing of these security changes could be all that is needed to implement the same attack an hour and 5 minutes before the plane reaches it's destination. But without the information, the attack would proceed as planed and then the restrictions would have either forced the plan to be aborted or force the attacker to disobey one of the rules in which case appropriate actions could have been taken to prevent the completion of the bombing.
One of the problems I think you are missing is that you seem to be looking at what did happen, not what could have happened. After the fact, it's easy to miss the benefits of the restrictions that were present at the time of the restrictions. Had there been multiple attacks, the restrictions would have presented problems to the attackers that could have been detected and foiled because of the restrictions which were not known at the time. There wasn't multiple attacks so this point eludes a lot of people and they do not see the seriousness of making something secret known before it should have been. Sure, ten days later, it's pointless to keep it a secret, but when the fear is similar attacks that day or the next, secrecy could be key to defeating them.
Whistle Blower protections only apply when the actor it revealing something the government did illegally or immorally. I fail to see how that would apply to someone callously revealing secrets.
There are air marshals on almost all international flights. But stopping him may not have been the only answer. If someone was detected, then diverting the flight to less populated areas is a potential point of action.
I think you are exaggerating things a little bit. A lot of the potential issues your thinking of could have been addressed by simply announcing that they are expecting to enter a turbulent air space in 15-20 minutes and the fasten seat belt light would be on so use the facilities while you can. Most people who are not sick, can hold from using the restroom for an hour or two without much issue.
Are you serious? The secret new restrictions were in response to failed bombing attempt and was implemented directly because of them. Logic would tell us that a competent agency would block an avenue of attack as soon as it knows about that avenue. So if you were attempting to do something you know you shouldn't be doing, are you going to do the same method after someone already got caught doing it? No, you would be doing it before they knew the attack vector existed otherwise you would be shut down at the gates. That is why this policy was sensitive at the time, the logic for multiple attacks through this avenue would be a narrow window of time between when the first one happened and the time the flights were already in the air. Otherwise, changes at the terminal would most likely detect the bomb before you boarded the flight.
It's not how long they can keep it a secret that matter. Their intent was not to keep it a secret forever. Now could they have kept it a secret from terrorist already on a plane or boarding a plane before the news of the failed attack was public around the world? Well, they only needed a day or two in order to make sure the threats were not there. But in a hypothetical world, the policy is leaked, an attacker on another flight is tipped off by an operative who read the blog, and instead of attempting to blow up the plane on landing, he does it an hour and 5 minutes earlier.
Do you see the potential problem there? While we didn't know if further attack would be attempted, the policy would alert us to those attacks and give us a potential to either foil them or divert the plane to less populated area. As soon as the policy became public, that potential became significantly less because anyone could have tipped the attacker off and they could have detonated and 5 minutes before the restrictions would be applied on the flight.
No, I do not think it's silly at all. First, it wasn't meant to be secret forever, second, the time frame where it would have the greatest potential impact wasn't all that long and even the dummies the TSA hired should have been able to keep most of it a secret with only divulging bits and pieces of information here and there. In contrast, some idiot totally ignored that and emailed the policy changes to someone who would have posted it on the internet as if that inside person wanted all the potential attacking friends to know about