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Interview With TSA Screener Reveals 'Fatal Flaws'

Posted by Soulskill on from the my-toothpaste-is-not-a-deadly-weapon-you-jerks dept.

OverTheGeicoE writes "Jonathan Corbett, creator of the video showing that TSA's body scanners can't see metal objects on our sides, has a new video out. This time he's interviewing an experienced TSA screener identified only as 'Jennifer,' and her allegations point to 'fatal flaws' in TSA and its procedures. Worse, TSA's screeners are well aware of these flaws. According to Jennifer, body scanners frequently fail to detect objects on passengers, and this flaw is well known to the screeners on the job. People with visible items in their pockets can pass through scanners without detection, even when the items are simulated weapons or explosives. Jennifer also alleges that training for screeners is severely lacking. Screeners are directed to operate body scanners, even the X-ray scanners, without any training whatsoever. The manual of standard operating procedures often can't be found at the checkpoints, let alone read. Jennifer was so alarmed by what she experienced that she wrote her congressional representative to complain. She was ultimately fired as a result, effective yesterday."

33 of 582 comments (clear)

  1. Firing in US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    How come people in the US can get fired for reasons other than incompetence or stealing? Why can a person get fired simply by raising an issue? I never hear about this here in Europe. It's in fact very difficult to fire a person here if he is a good worker.

    1. Re:Firing in US by BVis · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Because the USA is run by Big Business, who can give unlimited money to candidates for office. You can be fired here for no stated reason at all.

      --
      Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.
    2. Re:Firing in US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      I prefer the government treat me as an adult.

      Here you go: "You're fired".

    3. Re:Firing in US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I prefer the government treat me as an adult.

      It's not a matter of children vs. adults; it's a matter of individuals vs. employers, which sometimes are large corporations. Do you really think there can be a fair discussion between an employee and their employer? Do you really think the employer won't exploit the employee, particularly in times of high unemployment?

      If your system is so great, how come it leads to so much social inequality?

      Adults or not, there are still bullies in the world, and letting them go unchecked will only lead to trouble.

    4. Re:Firing in US by ledow · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Tell me that next time you're arrested for crossing a perfectly ordinary road (even with zero traffic on it), or "failing to come to a complete stop at a stop sign", or any of a thousand and one ridiculous notions of what adults shouldn't be allowed to do.

      The US is really no better or worse than Europe. The biggest problem with the US is that they DON'T REALISE THIS.

    5. Re:Firing in US by StoneyMahoney · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Oh, I'd say the US has a pretty massive deficiency compared to the Europe - we have socialized healthcare, they have inhumanity.

    6. Re:Firing in US by ruhri · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Nope. Because the US is (mostly, there are obvious and absurd exceptions) governed in a way that assumes consenting adults can engage in mutually beneficial relationships without a nanny telling them what to do as if they were five year old children. In Europe most laws are written to the point where they assume the ordinary citizenry are mentally handicapped five year olds that needs to be monitored, watched and told what to do at all times by responsible adults.

      I prefer the government treat me as an adult.

      Are nanny analogies now the new car analogies on Slashdot?

      Anyways, here's what's wrong with that picture:

      Let's ignore the massive differential in power between a corporation/employer and an employee for a second and accept for the sake of argument that your assumption of both parties being consenting adults is valid. Of both parties in this case, only one acted responsibly, and that is the employee. The TSA chose to throw a tantrum worthy of a five year old and go "Lalala, I can't hear you!". At that point, I'd like to have a mechanism in place to make both parties behave responsibly. And that, pretty much, is the definition of a law (to lay down what "responsible behavior" is) and this subsequently implies it must be enforced by an impartial entity (judge, jury, whatever is customary in your local law system).

      Isn't that the way it's supposed to work even in the USA? Why is everybody so afraid of laws and regulations when time and time again experience shows that especially those with a lot of power act like 5-year-olds any time they can get away with it?

    7. Re:Firing in US by lambent · · Score: 5, Insightful

      no, that's not what life is about. i pity you for not understanding that.

    8. Re:Firing in US by ciderbrew · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I glad it's not like that in Europe. I don't think I've ever read so much utter nonsense. Apart from the social aspect of hiring a person, which I don't think you'll get. You seem to thing that being able to fire someone easily leads to lower unemployment?

      Lets back this up - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_unemployment_rate
      It's very hard to fire a person in German and they've got one of the lowest unemployment rates (5.7%) in Europe. In Japan (4.7%) they tend not to fire people even if they are awful, they just get moved to another office. The USA and UK are both ranked at 8.3%. That's a whole country worth of people in the US without a job and no social system to fall back on - erghh. Does that mean the poorest country is inside the richest country? How do they pay rent?
      Greece(21%) and Spain(23.6%) no longer have any jobs to be fired from, so it doesn't matter what the hiring laws are, you can't hire or fire a person for no job. I've lost the point to this. back to work...

    9. Re:Firing in US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Explain to me where "Jennifer" was obviously fired because she wasn't pulling her weight. She raised important flaws within the organisation which could consiquently be resolved. That sounds pretty fucking valuable to me.

    10. Re:Firing in US by ruhri · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Ah, nice. Latching on to the one thing I've neglected for the sake of argument, and for that sake only. Thanks for biting.

      This is where the power differential kicks in. Your relationship with your employer is not symmetric. The potential impact on the employer is much lower than on the employee. That's why you need an impartial arbiter or a union (yeah, I know, good luck with that...)

      And since you mention the word "friend" here, let me say that you'd be a pretty crappy friend who dumps someone you care about without trying to help him first, which is exactly what the agent tried to do in this case. Also, in this case, this is not only a matter between the employer and employee, because the safety of a third party is affected. As such, it becomes a matter of public safety and an ethical issue. Responsibility also means not just walking away from a bad situation.

    11. Re:Firing in US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You could hire 1,000 programmers at 60k a year, or spend 10M lobbying for a bill to increase the H1B visa quota, hire 1,000 foreign programmers, pay them 40k a year, threaten not to renew visas if anyone asks for a raise, and pocket the 10M left over. Are we still in the realm of "fair business"?

    12. Re:Firing in US by crazyjj · · Score: 5, Funny

      Yeah, it's easy to fire people in Europe--if you're in Greece and Germany *makes* you.

      --
      What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
    13. Re:Firing in US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      That's not what *LIFE* is about... but it is what *BUSINESS* is about.

    14. Re:Firing in US by dkleinsc · · Score: 5, Insightful

      An alternate interpretation here: Europeans understand that the relationship between an employer and employee are inherently unequal. An employer without a particular worker can usually get along just fine for a while until a replacement is found. A worker without a particular job can often last only a few weeks without a paycheck. While a worker is working for an employer, they have to follow orders from the employer or expect to be fired.

      Some of the effects of that relationship in the US:
        * In any area with "at-will" employment (like most of the US) people regularly go in for work and discover they no longer have a job, while there's still an expectation that employees give at least 2 weeks notice before leaving a position.
        * Employees are willing to put up with pay cuts, wage theft, unpaid overtime, workplace violence, sexual harassment, and other illegal activities by employers.
        * Unions are a non-factor in most sectors of the economy, in large part because those trying to form unions tend to get fired. The employer will come up with alleged unrelated reasons for the firing to get around the labor laws that specifically say you can't do that.
        * If you are fired, you're eligible for public assistance in the form of unemployment insurance, but if you quit, you are not.

      If you're somebody who (like me) has a high-paying white-collar job and a couple years' expenses in the bank, it's much easier to stand up to your employer and treat it as a relationship between equals, because you can in fact leave when you want to with reasonable certainty that you'll be OK until you find another job. If you're like a majority of Americans and living on 0 or negative savings, then it's basically impossible to do so.

      --
      I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
    15. Re:Firing in US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You are entirely out to lunch. Private medical insurance agencies have the JOB of protecting their bottom line OVER TOP of any motivation to protect your health. You are often disqualified for insane reasons and still end up paying out of pocket to be reimbursed later.

      How's your car insurance agency treat you when you have a claim? The Health Insurers in the US run by the same playbook. Don't try to paint roses over a cemetery.

    16. Re:Firing in US by Linuxmonger · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you are self employed, you get to keep whatever you can make - but if you work for someone else, then that someone else is making a profit from your effort. If you think you can sell your talent, or you could do better elsewhere, then move, it really is that simple. I treat my employees with respect and honesty, they have access to the company files and know exactly what I charge for their services - but they don't have to spend half their time trying to find themselves the next paying gig, that's my job. Most folks that are self employed fail at it because they have a skill that's salable but don't know how to market themselves.

    17. Re:Firing in US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      > The US has, by a very significant margin, the best health care system in the world

      News for you: Nope.
      http://www.oecd.org/document/11/0,3746,en_2649_37407_16502667_1_1_1_37407,00.html
      http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/12/58/49084319.pdf
      http://www.rwjf.org/qualityequality/product.jsp?id=47508 (I like the part where they state "And while evidence base is incomplete and suffers from other limitations, it does not provide support for the oft-repeated claim that the “U.S. health care is the best in the world.” In fact, there is no hard evidence that identifies particular areas in which U.S. health care quality is truly exceptional."
      Have a look at http://apps.who.int/ghodata/?theme=country and show me the "very significant margin".

      >> "Europe is hardly in the forefront of pharmaceutical development"
      Novartis etc. ?

    18. Re:Firing in US by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      Everything you said was false. US is ranked 38th in the world in healthcare. The ER is not socialized medicine. You get a bill. Our expensive healthcare goes to the pockets of rich people, its not an efficient or an ethical system. The drug companies exploit the American consumer on drug prices, we don't subsidize anything. The for profit system makes sure we pay the most the market will bear. The socialized system negotiates prices with drug companies. Stop making shit up.

    19. Re:Firing in US by coldfarnorth · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Horse$#!t.

      Go spend some time in Europe. My experience in Germany and Austria has been that that the government produces regulations that assume you can make your own decisions and be responsible for your own actions. If you screw up, you pay the price. Slip on a puddle and hit your head at the water park? Your fault - everyone knows water parks have slippery spots. Be more careful next time. A lawsuit is out of the question.

      My experience was that day-to-day rules and regulations are mostly self-enforced: Occasionally an inspector will come around and if you are caught in violation, you will be fined. And you know what? It works. The government doesn't want to pay someone to poke into your life all the time, so they don't.

      In comparison, the US (and England, in my experience) is practically a surveillance state. Every level of government assumes that you won't possibly comply unless someone is actually watching you. The government assumes you are an idiot and can't be trusted to walk onto a subway car without someone watching you. If you could make the US police and security industries as efficient as the ones I say in Europe, you'd make a good start on cutting the cost of government. Let's not even get started about the US policies about air travel.

      The reason people in the US hate regulation is because the federal, state, and local governments have proved so bad at implementing them.

      --
      Lets start refering to The War Against Terror by it's initials. . .
    20. Re:Firing in US by Avoiderman · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Explain to me where "Jennifer" was obviously fired because she wasn't pulling her weight. She raised important flaws within the organisation which could consiquently be resolved. That sounds pretty fucking valuable to me.

      ... and this is where the argument for the free market breaks down. That is massively valuable, but a stupid boss won't see that. Pure free market business can work efficiently only with the assumption that people are well informed and make intelligent decisions. Many to most aren't and don't. This is why many business do many inefficient and unprofitable things. Sometimes they support this by legislating out competition, or bullying (patent trolling e.g.), or sometimes there just isn't an efficient competitor (finite people and resources). It is amazing that the myth of free market caught the religious fervour of anyone ...

    21. Re:Firing in US by skozsert · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Notice he said H1B visa and not visa? The H1B system is not a free market, it is tailored to allow businesses to import labor at below market prices, leveraging the value U.S. citizenship/residency is seen as providing e.g. social entitlement programs, public infrastructure, and public education. The workers brought over do not have a visa themselves and will be deported if they are fired/quit their job unless they find another business with an open H1B visa and secure employment there within a short period of time. That being said, if the H1B system were to be scrapped entirely as an flagrant form of corporate welfare, and replaced with higher quotas for full visas, you're original point about fair business/market practices vs protectionism would be valid.

    22. Re:Firing in US by gambino21 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      But it's not an open market in this case, it's a monopoly where the vendors (various security contracting organizations) and the customers (elected officials) are basically a single group using the public's money. The objective of this group is to get as much money as they can while still giving a reasonable appearance of providing a service to the public. This particular employee tried to interfere with this relationship.

    23. Re:Firing in US by Avoiderman · · Score: 5, Insightful

      That's not what *LIFE* is about... but it is what *BUSINESS* is about.

      ... and going back to the story, you are now less safe flying in the US as a result. See why only thinking about profit gives you me, and everyone a bad outcome now?

    24. Re:Firing in US by fearofcarpet · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Ah, I love the ignorance of dumb Europeans. They (should be "we" since I live in Europe) think that our health care system is great and that the one in the US is really, really bad. Here is some interesting news for you: The US has, by a very significant margin, the best health care system in the world if you can afford it.

      Europeans thinks that because in the US one needs insurance, that people without will not get treatment. That is not true. A hospital that received a sick patent in an ER is required to treat that patient, insurance or not and then dump them in the street with no follow-up care. ERs in the US equals socialized health care except that an ambulance ride alone will set you back $1,500, it is just that nobody, Dem or Republican, will admit to that. Will they get the very best treatment, no, but they will get significantly less treatment than a European on a waiting list for an operation that may or may not come before he dies, but of course that rarely happens, just as American surgeons rarely amputate the wrong limb.

      In the US, if you have insurance, which the vast majority of the employed US population actually does have, the treatment you will get is significantly better than in any country in the world, unless you're poor. This--and the enormous profits of private health insurance companies--is a major reason that the US spends significantly more per person in health care than any other country. Well, that and the absurd amount of malpractice insurance American docs need to defend against frivolous lawsuits and ambulance chasers.

      Also, and very importantly, US citizens, through taxes and insurance, sponsors to a great degree health care in Europe. They do this by paying for medications developed by US companies in full, not at cut-rate prices, because European pharmaceutical companies are too busy working on cancer therapies to cure restless leg syndrome. In this way, the people in the US pays for development and testing, and advertising of often over-prescribed drugs that Europeans get access to. Europe is hardly in the forefront of perfunctory pharmaceutical development and outright abuse of patent laws to keep generics off the market.

      FTFY

      --
      Actually, I wrote my thesis on life experience.
    25. Re:Firing in US by Rob+the+Bold · · Score: 5, Insightful

      He didn't say pulling their weight, he said profitable. It's not profitable to have the procedures manual at every TSA station. It's also not profitable to actually train the employees. "Jennifer" was being unprofitable by going to her congressman to ensure the TSA did these things.

      As a side note, I do not agree with this outlook, just can understand it from a business perspective.

      *CAPTCHA: untested

      Ya. The TSA's "profit" is their funding from Congress. The employee was questioning the effectiveness of the organization, and thus jeopardizing its profits.

      Congress wants the TSA to make Americans feel safe-ish without spending too much, that's their motivation, to look like they're doing a good enough job to get re-elected.

      The US people might profit the most from the TSA if the organization protected life and property at a reasonable cost, but most people wouldn't understand this concept, so they settle for the illusion of "safety".

      So that brings us right back to the problem of someone who breaks the illusion. The solution, as seen by the parties involved, is to get rid of the person pulling away the curtain.

      --
      I am not a crackpot.
  2. She's missing the point by GeneralTurgidson · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They arent there to stop weapons or explosives.

    1. Re:She's missing the point by DarkOx · · Score: 5, Informative

      TSA's real reasons for existence:

      1) Get citizen accustomed to life without the fourth amendment.
      2) Provide government union jobs to re-elect incumbents.
      3) Preserve the culture of fear, again to re-elect incumbents.
      4) Discourage would be rabble raisers form assembly; can't have more than just local Occupy protesters showing up wherever the G8 is being held.

      --
      Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
  3. Re:Standard security by SJHillman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You'll find that's true of pretty much any job that combines low pay with repetitive or tedious work. If there's no incentive to do a good job, then most people won't bother. This was one of the big issues with communism.

  4. A bad interview from a bad source by Sarten-X · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Look, I dislike the TSA as much as anybody, and I've complained about it to my representatives, and I hope it dies as quickly as possible, but everything about this story annoys me.

    A guy with an obvious bias against an entity interviews a recently-fired employee, and uncovers terrible details about that entity! Oh no! Who could have guessed?

    The ex-employee's letter to Congress was the reason she got fired - in a time span of one week. Right. I'm sure the Congressman has their interns sorting mail, looking for disgruntled employees, notifying the appropriate chain of supervisors, and working hard to get people fired - and they can get that done in under a week.

    No SOP manual? Hey, at least you know one's been written somewhere. You could ask your supervisor, or move up the chain to their supervisor, and so on, until you find out where you can get one. There's no sign that that was attempted, just an "I don't know where it was" statement.

    As much as I want to see the TSA dismantled, this interview isn't going to help. It sounds like a muckraker interviewing someone incapable of navigating office politics, who's skirting the system because she got fired, looking to become a martyr for self-justification. This isn't journalism.

    --
    You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
  5. "Jennifer" by Isaac+Remuant · · Score: 5, Insightful

    inb4 "Jennifer" is identified and prosecuted under the espionage act for blowing the whistle on national security matters that are to dangerous for us to know.

    And depending on how we feel, throw Corbett in there too. At least ruin his life for daring to criticize authority.

    Disclaimer: There would be a time where this joke would be obvious.

    --
    "Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world. " - Asimov.
  6. Fired for writing to her congressman? by 91degrees · · Score: 5, Insightful

    How does that happen? The congressman would not only have to violate the trust of his constuituent, but actually care enough to let the TSA know. If this violation of trust got out, it could seriously harm his career.

    Could this actually be unrelated? I'd be more readily convinced that the sick leave was related. This would be a problem in itself perhaps but not a security problem.

  7. Theatre and Focus by RichMan · · Score: 5, Informative

    It is all theatre.

    The threat theatre cast by the politicos creates the market for the TSA theatre.

    You are not likely to die by terrorist act. You are more likely to die by automobile accident, heart attack, stroke ......

    http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/lcod.htm
            * Heart disease: 599,413
            * Cancer: 567,628
            * Chronic lower respiratory diseases: 137,353
            * Stroke (cerebrovascular diseases): 128,842
            * Accidents (unintentional injuries): 118,021
            * Alzheimer's disease: 79,003
            * Diabetes: 68,705
            * Influenza and Pneumonia: 53,692
            * Nephritis, nephrotic syndrome, and nephrosis: 48,935
            * Intentional self-harm (suicide): 36,909

    Official 911 death toll : 2,996 - and that does not happen every year.

    http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr60/nvsr60_04.pdf
    The 15 leading causes of death in 2010 (Table B) were as follows:
    1 Diseases of heart
    2 Malignant neoplasms
    3 Chronic lower respiratory diseases
    4 Cerebrovascular diseases
    5 Accidents (unintentional injuries)
    6 Alzheimer’s disease
    7 Diabetes mellitus
    8 Nephritis, nephrotic syndrome and nephrosis
    9 Influenza and pneumonia
    10 Intentional self-harm (suicide)
    11 Septicemia
    12 Chronic liver disease and cirrhosis
    13 Essential hypertension and hypertensive renal disease
    14 Parkinson’s disease