This morning the blogosphere is buzzing about a Chicago Tribune article that claims that CIA operatives can be identified using simple Google searches. Reactions seem to range from ex-spook Larry Johnson’s scorn to bemused amazement that the apparently universal incompetence of our regime, demonstrated in Iraq and New Orleans, extends to its “covert” operations.
Would you be even more worried if you learned that the government’s famous “no fly list” could be easily circumvented by any moderately computer savvy terrorist?
According to CSO – the magazine for security executives, getting past the TSA and onto a plane would take nothing more than a laser printer and a stolen credit card. The author walks you through what you would need to do — it certainly reads as if it would be within the skills of most of us. Click that link if you want to know.
The anonymous author comments:
As a frequent flyer, I hesitate to write this article, but as an auditor of security and information systems, it’s the right thing to do. If you’ve ever wondered whether airport security has improved since 9/11, let me set you straight: It has not. There is a gaping hole in airport security, and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has done nothing despite being alerted to this vulnerability more than 11 months ago.
As a person who had her own brush with the no fly list, I’ve long contended that most of the airport security rigmarole we go through is just a Theater of Fear, designed to accustom us to scared compliance with authority. Certainly if so-called “security” is this easily evaded, they can’t mean it to keep us safe.
Cross posted at Happening-Here.
Form trumps content again? Show over substance? Theater of Fear indeed!
thanks for posting this
These guys are all show!
Now playing at every airport: “security theater”
Thanks Janis, for posting this! As someone who has been more than regularly “flagged” at airports, starting in Oct. 2001, I’ve often suspected that this so-called “system” is rife with error, and prone to hacking. Further, I wholly suspect that anyone vocally opposing der Shrub ends up on some kind of “watch list” and added to the no-fly zone. I’m none of us forget that Ted Kennedy, among others, ended up on this list, hardly by mistake or coincidence, I’m sure!
I’ve probably undergone over a 100 “Selectee” searches since 2001, and at the beginning I often asked airline employees why I kept getting such special status. More than a few cynical responses I got could be summed up as “Once a selectee, always a selectee,” (which one Delta agent once told me). You’re right, it’s a joke, and most certainly conditioning to the surveillance state.
These days I do my utmost NOT to fly, unless absolutely necessary for my work, and I hope to keep it that way. At least that particular area of my life can be kept semi-private, although others are probably under surveillance too… though anyone ever listening to my phone calls would probably find them better than Ambien for their soporific qualities.
Anyway, thanks for posting, and I’ll cease my rant now. I’m going to go read your source material now.