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TSA Prohibits Taking Discharged Electronic Devices Onto Planes
Trachman writes The US Transport Security Administration revealed on Sunday that enhanced security procedures on flights coming to the US now include not allowing uncharged cell phones and other devices onto planes. “During the security examination, officers may also ask that owners power up some devices, including cell phones. Powerless devices will not be permitted on board the aircraft. The traveler may also undergo additional screening,” TSA said in a statement.
All those free phones, tablets, laptops, etc. - it is great to be working for TSA!
This was specifically for international flights into the US originating from certain countries, not a TSA-wide procedure.
If you can't power the things up there is no way to tell what they actually are.
I can see this sucking for people who kill their battery browsing Slashdot while waiting for their flight.
When will they return the devices???? I dont want to loose my iPhone or iPad .....
Short of 'eh, just buy a display model on ebay and pack it full of semtex, the TSA won't notice...' slacker-terrorist stuff, how useful is the 'turn it on' test?
With the relentless demand for miniaturization and battery life, most consumer electronics should be able to get enough power to boot-and-display-innocence out of a battery pack markedly smaller than their real one, even without further clever surgery. In the case of products that have substantial spec variations available in the same chassis (like most 'workstation' laptops) or very similar ones(most cellphone flavors that have a high-end and a cheap-seats variant that share a design language, and often a number of parts), the slightly more adept attacker has even more room, literally, to build a low-drain device and its teeny battery into the chassis designed to run a fairly firebreathing set of components for a couple of hours.
Does the TSA expect that most of their enemies are as dumb as they are, or is this a 'well, it isn't worth much; but it's easy to impose so it's probably worth what you pay...' measure?
Yep, traveling with Granny might hinder your ability to make connecting flights.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Somehow I don't think the TSA will allow people to power up their device with the charging cable if the battery is dead.
Is this a new rule?
I've been asked before to power up my SLR when going through the security check.
It never happened with any other device, so I always thought it was some particular feature of the SLR which made it seem like evil stuff to the scanners.
I believe this already happened in Europe and Asia, so I can't say if they weren't doing this in the US before.
In the paranoid minds of the Airport security personel it actually makes sense. From a scan it's impossible to distinguish legitimate circuitry from bomb or plane-hacking components.
Not that I agree with the general airport security apparatus. I wish it were more like taking a train, or a bus, but I digress.
The TSA has been violating the constitution and people's fundamental liberties in broad daylight for more than a decade. 'Land of the free'? Not until we take care of serious problems like this.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
http://xkcd.com/651/
If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
Yeah. That flag pretty much no longer flies over the land of the free and the home of the brave.
Last time I went into a court house, I was required to remove my belt. Somehow, the US made it through a foreign invasion, a Civil War, WWI, WWII, the Cold War, and absolutely massive social upheaval without requiring people to remove clothing to enter into courts of law. But a few jackasses drive airplanes into some buildings and it's goodbye liberty, hello 'safety'. This 100% safe nonsense is destroying the Republic. We are less safe than ever and we have done it to ourselves. Government is the problem with our security, not to the solution to it
Hoist Number One and Number Six.
As another poster stated, this is only on certain international flights originating from certain countries--and in addition to that, I'm sure you can power your phone off once you've powered it on for them.
While this could be for another form of 'tracking' with cell phone tracking technologies (which exist), I feel it would be impossible to know just from cell phone identification what a person intends to do.
So I suspect it's nothing more than "Ensure that the phone is not a bomb in disguise".
The assumption that folks of Arabian descent who harbor ill will for the West would use a commercial jet is at best security theatre, and at worst, unimaginable incompetence.
Small aircraft leave and land at airports thousands of times a day with little or no TSA interaction, or imagine three drones leaving residential garages simultaneously on Superbowl Sunday...why would they concentrate their rather scattered efforts at a stronghold in their enemy's defenses?
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
In theory if you can't get through the security check you are allowed to leave with your property. In practice people have been prevented from doing so.
If someone does arrive at the security checkpoint with a $600 dollar tablet that happens to have a dead battery, for their $130 flight is the TSA going to let them just leave?
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
My first ever trip to the US (back in 2010), I was asked to power on my laptop going through security. In fact, while researching the trip IIRC the airline website even called this out as a specific to precaution to make sure your devices were charged in case you were asked to prove they worked. I wasn't asked on my second and third trips, so it must have only been sporadic ("additional screening" type thing). I would definitely be a bit time consuming to check all devices for all passengers, if that is the intent.
Just because you can power a device up does not mean it has not been modified.
Anyone with even moderate skills could EASILY take an off the shelf business class laptop, remove 3/4 of the guts of it, replace it with a tiny SOC, fill the case with explosive, and the laptop would boot and display and work just fine. The only way to know it was modified would be to look in detail* at the system specs and compare to an online DB - do you honestly think that TSA is going to do this? Replace all of above with phone / tablet, it is the same story.
* Oh, other than XRay the damn thing, which is what the TSA does anyway do they not? I honestly do not get what this "powering on of electronics" is supposed to achieve. Only the most idiotic of plots would be foiled by this.
I do wonder how this is going to stop someone from smuggling an explosive on board. It is vastly easier to conceal some nasty payload inside of a bulky laptop than inside of a battery. And it could still even work as a laptop - a brick of a plastic explosive the size of a disk drive or a secondary battery would be enough to cause a huge problem on board, without preventing the laptop from booting up and working.
And that is still assuming someone would actually want to bother with this - the guy with explosive underpants certainly didn't need a working battery ...
Mind boggling stupidity.
they are killing the airline industry, soon nobody will want to fly, years ago before 9/11/2001, once a year i used to fly to miami to spend a week at southbeach or to galveston and rent a motorcycle to ride around on padre island for a week , now i wont go near an airport anymore because i dont want those nazis putting their filthy hands on my body and i dont want to be xrayed with their death machines, so now i just spend my vacation week at home where it is nice and boring, - thanks US Govt you fucking nazis
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
If you have a vibrator in your luggage you'll have a better-than-average chance of being asked to turn that on, too. If you pack the biggest one you can find in your carry-on right next to your cell phone, they might not even notice your cell phone.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
"Oh, battery's dead? OK, here's a power outlet."
How fucking hard is that?
I'm starting to think that the TSA's real motivation is to slowly put all of the airlines out of business.
If so, they're going to be one of the most successful covert operations in history.
Devices that can't be turned on won't be permitted on flights, TSA said.
Don't bring chargers with you!
Clearly you won't be able to power on these devices if you're not allowed to plug them in. So under these new rules the TSA would clearly have to confiscate them. Furthermore you'd likely oppose their common sense move which would delay you going through security; increasing the risk that your phone's battery runs out, leading to it being confiscated too...
1991, leaving Franfurt towards Paris (just a short jaunt in a puddlejumper) I was asked by the security person working the line to demonstrate my camera was a real camera. So I uncap the lens, aimed at her, who quickly voiced her opposition to that idea, so I shot the ceiling instead. Wasted one frame of film to show her my tattered minolta x-700 wasn't some terrorists's bomb.
I suppose this was fallout from the bomb that took Pan Am 103 down over Lockerbie.
The "Civilized World" jumped the shark ca. 1973.
Can you think of any political development, short of global thermonuclear war, that would make 'the appropriate response to a sizable number of potential threats' go away quickly enough to qualify as a 'short inconvenience'?
Be happy you are *still* allowed to keep your trousers on.
... bring all the thermite, magnesium tape, and calcium carbide you want to on in carry-on luggage.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
on top of all the other "short inconveniences" already? no thanks. all those add up to one giant pain in the ass. The only reason I can think of this being used *puts on tin foil hat*
they want to mirror everything on your electronic device. they cant do that if its powered off, powered on they can either have you plug it in for "testing" or simply sniff the wifi and attack that vector. With everything we learned to date from snowden i would not be shocked., hell this could simply be to keep another snowden from exiting the country! *removes tin foil hat*
now what was I saying? oh right, theres nothing to see here, the TSA is our friends
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Which, considering the underpants bomber, is strange.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Metal detectors at the entrance of many state and federal buildings predates 9/11. In any event, if you look at how much violence there was against judges in the 19th century, one would have to assume that if people had metal detector technology at the time, they would have used them.
Can we please jump to the safety finish line?
No materials other than your ID, boarding pass, and a single credit card may be carried past security. Period.
No luggage may be checked.
All passengers must discard all clothing at security and travel in TSA approved hospital gowns. New clothing may be purchased outside the secure area at your destination.
I don't care if they want me to power on my notebook or phone. However if they want to search my notebook they better know how to use terminal based Linux, which honestly I think would pose more of an issue then anything else. It is a pretty valid question to ask why you're travelling with dead electronics.
Why dance around the issues with the security facade? If the U.S. would just flat out block all incoming traffic it would be a win-win for everyone involved, as the rest of us can plan accordingly and get on with our lives.
I know a couple of people who work for the TSA too, and sadly, they view all of this stuff as amusing ways to irritate the general public, who they regard as generally stupid and annoying in the first place.
If you corner them on any of the security policies, they'll readily admit they don't necessarily enhance security or serve a useful purpose. They just feel like all of that is unimportant, vs. the expectation that travelers just "follow the orders and instructions". If you don't cooperate, you're one of those "stupid and annoying people who can't follow directions" - so they ridicule you and enjoy your suffering as they put you through extra screening, detain you, or what-not.
It's funny how you can take practically anyone, dress them up in a uniform and a badge, and give them some sort of arbitrary control or power over others, and they suddenly feel superior.
Employees: We demand a raise, we have to face rude passengers and put our hands at weird places.
TSA Manager: Well, there is no budget for a raise, here is what we are going to do instead.....
At the lineup going into the area where the gates are, you have to demonstrate that you can turn on any electronic devices so that they know it's not just a case containing something else. This has been in place for at least the past 10 years.
What I'm wondering, however, is if they charge people whose non-working electronics that they might confiscate any fees for proper disposal/recycling? If not, then a positive spin on this could be that someone could exploit this to utilize as a free electronics recycling facility.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I guess they have never heard of smaller batteries or (for multi-cell cases) step-up converters. It is quite simple to, say, take a 6 cell battery pack and convert one cell to a step-up regulator and retain one cell. Gives you 4 cells (i.e. stainless-steel containers) to fill with whatever you like. The same effect can be had by using smaller batteries than originally in the pack.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
And what if I don't have a battery in my computer?
I never installed the battery in my previous laptop, so I would need an outlet at all times. It didn't matter to me since it was so heavy that I couldn't use it except as a portable desktop anyway.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
Then, you plug it in. They do have jacks at airports...
It has been a number of years since I was asked to turn on a device, even when I go through enhanced security. So, unless this is accompanied by a "we are now pushing to turn on all electronics" it is not exactly a prohibition.
We are less safe than ever and we have done it to ourselves.
Actually, we're MORE safe than ever, despite what we've done to ourselves with ridiculous measures. Education and social programs do a much better job than metal detectors.
And hope that it's the right voltage!
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
So everyone should start carrying external spare batteries.
I've seen a 22400 mAh portable Li-ion battery for less than $50. Imagine a whole plane full of those. And no, consumer grade Li-ion batteries never explode.
Up to two spare Li-ion batteries up to 300 Wh ("large batteries") are allowed in the carry-on baggage. So external USB chargers/accumulators up to 60 mAh should be OK.
My Asus Transformer is carried in a Pelican case, my fone in a OtterBox. Opening the Pelican case takes only a few seconds but wrestling my fone from the three piece Otter case takes more time. Each device takes one minute to boot. There should be a Margarita Bar at the TSA Choke Point.
I second that on the courts. I had to drop off a document for a child case. I stopped at the metal detector and told security I was here to drop of a document, not visit offices, so I had not emptied my pockets. Please call the office of ... to come pick up the document. They objected. I said they can scan the manilla envelope. They complied. I made it clear I had no intention of wasting time for a drop off. It would be much faster for them to step out of the office and accept the delivery.
The truth shall set you free!
But a few jackasses drive airplanes into some buildings and it's goodbye liberty, hello 'safety'.
All that after the CIA was repeatedly told to go to hell by Bush and his Cabinet when they tried to raise all hell about the intel they had from multiple sources that an attack using airplanes within the US targeting the WTC was imminent.
It's almost like our own Government wanted it to happen so they could use an excuse to trot out the "PATRIOT" Act and step up their War on Civil Liberties when Bush Sr's plan to suspend the Constitution for the War on Drugs didn't gain much support. But that would **never** happen and anyone that thinks so is an Alex Jones loving crackpot looney.
And rightly so. It's well documented that Linux users are all a bunch of dangerous extremists
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
for anyone with hulu plus, here's a southpark clip from about a decade ago that's sums up my feelings toward airports in general.
http://www.hulu.com/watch/265294/it's better than flying
everyone else will have to find a crappy handshot video of a tv on youtube.
To just notice this a dumb history to only streamline the data inspection of gadgets?
Of course I want to have a fully charged battery in my laptop, that way, when they ask me to power it on and show the BIOS, I have plenty of room to put the explosive where the HD was, and need the power to fire the detonator.
I'm a satanic clam.
Wouldn't a fully charged lithium battery be more of a security risk than a dead one?
Keep in mind, that TSA has yet to have stopped a single bombing. The only reasons we've not had a plane go down is due to lack of effort, not any increase in security. The few attempts that have been made, made it through the TSA with ease and it was the efforts of passengers or the stupidity of the attacker that saved the plane.
The famous "few attempts that have been made" originated in foreign countries, not in the USA. You admit that there is a "lack of effort". Huh. You'd like us to believe that this is because "teh TSA am stoopid" or something that amounts to that, but in fact it very well could be that the bad guys have decided that the likelihood of getting a bomb on a plane is not "100%" or close to it like you seem to believe but quite a bit below that. I'd say maybe a 5-10% chance of getting through security successfully. Suicide bombers are a limited quantity and the chance of failure could be a disaster because if the would be bomber gets caught by the TSA, the US government now has access to the type of bomb being used and may be able to get the failed terrorist to talk. This is exactly what happened with Richard Reid.
People have car alarms not because they believe that it makes their car impossible to break into but because it raises the bar so that it may be more trouble than it's worth. Actually I think the TSA is working because if it was truly as bad as you and other complainers claim, there would have been a successful attempt already. I think the bad guys have decided that the risk is too high that they won't get away with it and the success would not be worth the risk of getting caught.
I wish I could find out when the last time is that you even flew to/from/within the USA. I had a friend a few years ago who would go into a full blown hissy fit and rant about the TSA, making pretty much the same arguments as you. He last flew around 1998 and he is very likely to never in his life get on a plane again. It has nothing at all to do with the TSA - he has no reason or desire to ever travel by plane. Yet from all his complaining you'd think that he was some kind of hard core road warrior who was at a different US airport every week. I have found that in general the people who complain the most about the TSA are the people who fly the least.
I've wondered why they haven't done that before. Forget about taking a plane down, or flying into a building.
Have 20 individuals at 20 airports all approach the processing line, timed to arrive at the metal detector/x-ray chute at noon. Scream the usual "aloha cracker" (or whatever those crazy fucks say), pull out the bomb from their carry on, and detonate it before anyone can stop them.
Instantly, every airport is notified about this threat, and now everyone gets screened before they even get to the airport.
If they want to fuck with the west, that is how they could do it.
The fact that this has not happened (nor have we heard of a such a plot being defused) makes it pretty clear that the real threat is the TSA itself, and "terrists" are simply an Emmanuel Goldstein type boogeyman used to keep everyone in line and their mouths shut.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
What about the fact that if it's all the way dead and you try to charge it on the plane, the battery can be a fire hazard.
Here's a Slashdot story from 2001 wherein I recount my experience with having to power on each of my devices before boarding a flight:
http://news.slashdot.org/story...
Technically, that wasn't even the TSA since that agency didn't exist until a few weeks later.
Years ago I flew on Tower Air. Tower Air contracted their security through El-Air, as such they were ahead of where we are today. But one thing I always griped about was this policy being useless.
You see I had borrowed an old laptop (and I mean super old, where only the front half flipped up with a screen). The PC still worked, but the battery was long dead. So when they required me to turn on this ancient behemoth, we spent the next 20 minutes trying to find a plug so I could boot it. As soon as they saw it begin it's boot sequence, they gave me the okay. A lot of PITA for little benefit IMHO.
Why do I say this?
If anyone intended to build a bee oh em bee inside a laptop or cell phone. Why wouldn't you just take advantage of all the existing software and circuitry? It is a lot easier to just set a timer, use a program like Automate It, or even write your own basic Android app to control any such set up. A simple Bluetooth trigger and you can remotely detonate either an internal or external explosive trigger.
So in no way do I see requiring proof that a device turns on as adding anything to our security. Rather, it merely means all those people laid over for 4 extra hours and now with a dead battery on their iPhones will have to hand over their phones to TSA. (Who will make a LOT of money selling used iPhones until they get sued for having sold devices with personal data - after which they will just destroy them.)
Luckily, many Android users will simply keep a spare TSA battery on hand. And smart vendors will set up stands that sell "pre-charged" USB battery packs for $150/each right outside the security lines.
A few days ago I was thinking of buying an HTC One M8 because the camera takes very clear close-ups. When I discovered that the battery cannot be removed, I decided I probably won't ever buy anything from HTC.
If a company engages in sneaky, tricky behavior, I try to avoid buy its products. The sneakiness and trickery I know about may be only part of the attempts to trick the customers.
(The word "buy" should have been "buying".)
A small percentage of batteries are defective and have a short life.
See the 3D printer I'm bringing aboard works just fine.
Nullius in verba
Most chargers are universal, meaning they run between 100-230v. I'd be more worried about fitting the plug in
I've got better things to do tonight than die.
TSA Check.
Have gnu, will travel.
Kids and their entitlement issues.
In the good old days we had to power up our laptops at the security checkpoint before bringing them on the plane as carry on and this was before 2001.
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
I live in the Southern Hemisphere. Im not a terrorist, im a tourist looking for a holiday this year. Id love to come to the USA for a holiday, to go and see the sights and generally enjoy a holiday in a country full of history and things to see and do. ( love to see NY, the Grand Canyon, the science museums etc)
But this TSA absurdity is so fucked up, so scary and frightening, you couldnt pay me to holiday there.
There is no way in hell im going to subject myself to the indignity, radiation exposure, nude body scanning, device seizure and random harassment of Security Theatre in the US.
Fuck that shit.
Ill go be a tourist and spend my money in another country.
Because you totally couldn't hide explosives in a device that powers on.
Near as I can tell from reading the news (from rural Thailand), the point is that the device must be turned on and functioning so you can prove it's not a bomb. Fully discharged is not allowed. But fully charged is not required. IMHO this is reasonable. Call your mother.
Some day when I have enough time and money I plan on taking an airplane trip with no luggage. I'd show up at the check in counter with nothing but the clothes on my back. Why? Just so I could see what they'd do.
Think about how odd that would look. No cell phone, no key ring, not even a tooth brush. I wouldn't wear anything out of the ordinary, no "Potential Terrorist" t-shirt. I'd just wear what I normally do, running shoes, slacks, polo shirt. I normally keep a knife on my belt but I'd leave that at home, maybe even leave the belt too.
As much as people will claim otherwise you are not required to have identifying documents to board a plane when traveling domestically. International travel you do but not within the USA. I'm thinking I might leave my ID at home too.
What would this prove? I'm not sure but it would be an interesting experiment. I am just curious how the TSA would respond to someone that acts so far out of the ordinary but also fits no norm of a threatening person.
If anyone should ask me about my plans I'd probably just say I'm going shopping. I need some new clothes so I didn't see the need to pack any. I'm thinking that to make it additionally frustrating for them I'd leave not only my ID at home but any credit cards or anything else that might have my name on it besides my boarding pass. I would not lie about who I am and would not refuse to give my name or any other detail. I'm just a guy that wants to go on a shopping trip and I like to pay in cash.
I think that they would not let me on the plane.
One problem with my experiment is that I'd like to document the experiment but I'd have nothing to record with. I'd have to go by memory, or write everything down. No doubt that if I did do this that someone would say, "Photos or it didn't happen!"
The thing is that if the TSA keeps up with their security theater, and the airlines charge for every piece of luggage a person brings, then what I propose as an experiment may become the preferred way to vacation. It would remove a lot of hassle that way.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
http://www.theinquirer.net/inq...
I'm not repeating myself
I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user
TSA tends to react to threads rather than speculate on new ones. This doesn't mean the other side is posting speculative plans too that they may not build.
I'll start flying again when they start treating people like humans.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Land of the free, home of the brave. Fuck, yeah.
Religous speak to God. Insane are spoken to by God. When all shut up, one can finally hear Shostakovich in peace
I wanted to guess when anal and vaginal searches will become new normal, standard procedure. Sorry for direct and not necessarily tasteful reference here. I am sure that bearded men, sitting in the caves, will spread the new gossip about devices in bod cavities and will watch in disbelief what people in US allow for TSA personnel to do on themselves.
TSA prohibits combing your hair,
TSA prohibits scratching your butt,
TSA prohibits arranging your junk,
TSA prohibits picking your nose,
TSA prohibits rolling your eyes,
Resistance is futile, you will be assimilated,,,
NOW! Stand in line and be a good little prole or we will show your throat the soles of our boots.
I only fly now when I have no other possible choice!!!
Dear Microlimp: I give you 2 valid product keys for win7 and you reject both of them. Piss off you wankers!!!