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TSA's Precheck Registration Program Causing Longer Security Lines (usatoday.com)
McGruber writes: The Associated Press is reporting that TSA's PreCheck program is causing maddening long security lines at U.S. airports. TSA's PreCheck security lanes can screen 300 passengers an hour, twice that of its standard security lanes. Based on that and other increased efficiencies, the TSA's front-line screeners were cut from 47,147 three years ago to 42,525 currently. At the same time, the number of annual fliers passing through checkpoints has grown from 643 million to more than 700 million. The TSA told Congress its goal was to have 25 million fliers enrolled in the PreCheck registration program, but as of March 1, only 9.3 million people had registered for PreCheck. TSA first tried to make up for that shortfall by randomly placing passengers into the express Precheck lanes, but scaled back that effort for fear dangerous passengers were being let through. That's when the regular security lines started growing -- up to 90 minutes in some cases. The TSA is now shifting some resources to tackle lines at the nation's biggest airports, but it claims there is no easy solution to the problem with a record number of fliers expected this summer. To enroll in TSA's Precheck registration program, travelers must pay $85 to $100 every five years, then submit to a background check, in-person interview at an airport, and to being fingerprinted. Unsurprisingly, getting once-a-year fliers to spend the time or the money to register has been a challenge. While 250,000 to 300,000 people are registering for Precheck every month, it will take more than four years at that pace to reach the TSA's target enrollment.
That was a "revenge" attack paid for by Iran with the contract carried out by a person from Libya (with what appeared to be full approval of the Libyan leader) so most definitely state sponsored.
This is very wrong on so many levels. I met a former TSA and she explained how working there is hell made by those at the helm. They are all former Military with military training and mentality, enforcing military discipline onto the TSA workers and onto us, the citizen. She also mentioned that TSA workers send a lot of feedback to their superior but are met with either disciplinary measure or contempt.
but no one went to jail for imposing the "bad" radiation on so many people
If memory serves, that's because it was Michael Chertoff's company (you know, the Director of Homeland Security at the time) who sold the machines to the TSA.
Attractive women are quite dangerous, it turns out.
Prosthetic devices and the people who wear them are also quite dangerous.
Has there been a single case where it has been proven that the reinforced cockpit doors have thwarted anything? There is one case where it was proven that those reinforced doors led to the loss of an airliner along with all the passengers: Germanwings flight 9525.
I fly a lot. Not as much as the tech sales guys I work with, but enough to get Alaska's MVP75K top-level status in just the last half of last year. A few years back I had top-tier status on United and Alaska in the same year. So I have one of those nice little cards that lets me go thru the "premier/first class" lines at every airport. AND STILL the process sucks, and remains a constant source of despair for the state of business, security, and the country.
To wit:
1. Orwellian PRE bureaucracy: I cannot get a PRE approval, because my state ID (DL) doesn't list my middle initial, while my passport does. I would have to produce a certified copy of my birth certificate to correct the state ID, and my original birth certificate has a one-letter misspelling of one of my parents' names. It is a clusterfuck. And why the hell should I have to pay a private company for what amounts to a national ID card anyway?
2. The nakey microwave: The goddamn "millimeter wave" (high frequency microwave) xray machines are STILL NOT TESTED OR CERTIFIED as medically safe for xray exposure, only that they're safe from a heat damage perspective. It would be a federal crime to use one in a hospital, because there have been "no human tests or studies to prove scanner safety." And yet the TSA video playing at top volume above the line makes baseless claims that it's perfectly safe...
3. False positives: Even when I resign myself to go through the untested scanner, for me it gives a false positive about 75% of the time. Apparently I have oddly shaped legs. So I have to wait or step to the aide and get a patdown, which often takes as long as the opt-out groping (without the RF exposure).
4. The intentional delays: When I opt-out, the procedure is to let me stand there for at at least 5 minutes before calling a screener to come grope me. Not joking about this -- I had about 60 TSA pat-downs last year all across the US, and often the gate agent would just call "MALE ASSIST" off into the void to no one (literally calling out to an empty area). A few minutes later, they would say it again to the agent on the other side of the microwave box, and then someone would come up and walk me back. It was consistent enough to wonder if there's a policy to make sure that opt-out takes long enough to discourage others.
5. Nonexistent training for TSA: The opt-out manual screening procedure is passed on through oral tradition. I'm supposed to be read a statement about the procedure, asked if I want a screening in private, asked if I have medical devices (I do, so it matters), or if I have any sensitive or painful areas. Only 1 in 4 TSA agents remember to ask all of these, and I've frequently had to remind agents of what they're supposed to ask me. On 4 different occasions in the last quarter, I've had a newly hired TSA agaent being instructed on how to do the procedure by a slightly less inexperienced agent -- with no written instructions, no consistency to the procedure, and the instructor omitted one of the key points EVERY TIME. It's clown school.
6. Total failure to detect: They have no idea what to look for -- through some unintentional testing. I found an unsubtle pocketknife (a kershaw switchblade my teenager had bought) stuck between the frame and outer covering of one of the rolly bags I use -- after I'd used it half a dozen times as a carry-on, and TSA had missed it EVERY time. I can carry on a bag full of a dozen lithium-ion battery packs, and they don't even blink. A ziplock baggie full of random powder? No problem, as long as it's not a liquid or gel... But god forbid my girlfriend use a Lush product with too much glycerine in the lotion, and they're calling the explosives expert.
I could go on. A lot. But there's no point; there's already way way too much money invested into this security theater, enough that it has become its own ecosystem. Stopping now would mean publicly acknowledging the total lack of success or value. Not gonna happen... And
I think not...(*poof*)
The only country that's ever taken my prints at the border is the USA. Even in communist Viet Nam you get the standard glance at the passport photo and stamp the visa. Flying into the USA it's all questions and fingerprint scans and overcomplicated three-layered visa approval months in advance. It's not exactly an attractive environment for doing business.
That's an interesting data point. My interview(s!) were actually much more detailed and involved. I think I spent about 20 minutes with the agent in Canada, not to mention around 40 minutes combined with both US and Canadian border personnel doing a more cursory interview and an explanation about how the system worked from a functional standpoint (IE - How to use Nexus when I cross in a boat, with multiple travelers, etc). The main interview in Canada was largely focused on making sure I wasn't violating business visa limitations but I'm sure a 10+ minute interview is probably enough to also identify the presence of someone being disingenuous about the purpose of the program enrollment.
Might be the difference between strictly Global Entry and NEXUS (which includes Global Entry by default).
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