TSA Today: The Thoughtless, Dataless Panopticon

The mysterious monied voices that shape my choices and career have ordered me to blog about the TSA today. Herewith, excerpts making some interesting points from a law enforcement perspective from a very long report from a former assistant chief of police from Montgomery County, Maryland on her TSA encounters. Some of her points are pro-citizen privacy and dignity; some are not, but point to the essential fecklessness of TSA's annoying procedures:

Within the last few months, I have been singled out for "additional screening" roughly half the time I step into an airport security line.  On Friday, October 9, as I stepped out of the full-body scanning device at BWI, I decided I needed more information to identify why it is that I have become such an appealing candidate for secondary screening…..

We have asked TSA to find the tools terrorists use and prevent both from boarding a passenger plane.  We have unintentionally created an agency that now seeks efficiency and compliance more than any weapon or explosive.

While returning my computer and shoes to their proper places, I watched the screening line at BWI.  I thought about the haphazard events surrounding the security screening process.  As I watched the screening officers, I wondered what information drives their decisions.  Left only to my observations, I concluded that their decisions were entirely random, and likely based upon three criteria:  passenger load, staffing, and whim.

I was left to conclude that I am not screened because I look like a terrorist. I am routinely screened because I look like someone who will readily comply.  I decided then that my next invitation to enjoy additional screening would be met with more inquiry.

I did not have wait very long.  On my return through Albany to BWI — Surprise! –  I got "randomly selected" for additional screening.

This time, I was "invited" to step into one of the explosive detection machines, commonly referred to as a "puffer machine."  The traveller is exposed to short, intense bursts of air, which are then, supposedly, analyzed for trace residue.

I read an article awhile ago that suggested these machines are entirely ineffective.   I have subsequently observed that they now sit idle at many airports where they were originally installed (Tampa International, for example).  In recently renovated airports (San Jose) they have not been installed.  At some other airports (like BWI), they have been replaced by the body-scanning technology.

When notified by the cheerful screener that I had been selected for additional screening (the screener's tone reminded my of the announcer who tells the contestant that she has just won a TV on the Price is Right), I stepped reluctantly toward the machine and asked her quietly whether I had the right to refuse the search.  I did not want to become a spectacle, or have to rent a car and drive back to Maryland….

What followed is what I can only describe as a process that left me with more questions and a hunger for something we need and something that has apparently been missing from TSA procedures since September 12, 2001: Data…..

After realizing I was serious about refusing to step into the puffer machine, I was told that I would be subjected to a "full-body pat-down" and that all of my "stuff would be fully searched."….

By this time, my belongings had already passed through the x-ray and sat oddly unattended on the belt.  They had aroused no suspicion, either as they passed through the x-ray or as they sat completely unattended.  I thought it odd that my initial refusal to be subjected to the 'puffer' now rendered the x-ray examination effectively flawed.  I was being cajoled and was then offered the opportunity to change my mind, which, again, I thought rather odd.  If I posed such a risk by refusing the secondary screening, why would that risk be now mitigated, if only I were to change my mind?

I did not change my mind.  So, I stepped between two glass walls and was subjected to what my police training would allow me to conclude was a procedural vacuum.

I had been told repeatedly I would be subjected to a "pat-down."  I correctly suspected otherwise.  During the course of my police career, I have conducted many pat-downs on the street.  The Supreme Court has described pat downs as a cursory check of the outer clothing of a person by a police officer, upon articulable suspicion that the officer's safety is at risk of being compromised.  My department's procedure indicated that this pat-down was to be conducted with an open hand, gently patting the outer clothing of an individual, for purposes of officer safety only, with the goal of detecting weapons.  In other words, it is not a search.

What happened to me in Albany was not the promised "pat-down."  It was a full search conducted in full public view.  It was also one of the most flawed searches I have ever witnessed.

From the outset, it was very clear that the screener would have preferred to be anywhere else.  She acted as if she was afraid of me, though given that I had set myself apart as apparently crazy, perhaps I cannot blame her.  With rubber-gloved hands she checked my head, my arms, my legs, my buttocks (and discovered a pen that had fallen into one of my pockets) and even the bottom of my feet.  Perhaps in a nod to decorum, she did not check my crotch, my armpits or either breast area.

Here was a big problem:  an effective search cannot nod to decorum.

These three areas on a woman, and the crotch area of men, offer the greatest opportunity to seclude weapons and contraband.   Bad guys and girls rely on the type of reluctance displayed by this screener to get weapons and drugs past the authorities.  We train cops to realize that their life depends upon the ability to compartmentalize any apprehension about the need to lift and separate.  Fatal consequences can and do result when officers fail to detect a secreted weapon which is later used against them.

At the Albany airport,  I was left to wonder what kind of training the screener received. I was forced to conclude the answer might be "none."  At a minimum, she needs re-training, assuming there is any policy or training that governs searches.  Further, after being repeatedly informed that I would be "wanded" by the metal detector in addition to the 'pat-down,' I was not.

Had I actually intended to move contraband past the screening point, my best strategy would have been to refuse secondary screening.

I am also forced to conclude that the purpose of the "pat-down" was not to actually interdict contraband.    In my case, I believe I was subjected to a haphazard response in order to effectively punish me for refusing secondary screening and to encourage a different decision in the future.

All of this is admittedly subjective, based on my perceptions at the time.  What is also entirely subjective is identifying which travelers are selected for secondary screening….

Over the last fifteen years or so, many police agencies started capturing data on police interactions.  The primary purpose was to document what had historically been undocumented: informal street contacts.  By capturing specific data, we were able to ask ourselves tough questions about potentially biased-policing.  Many agencies are still struggling with the answers to those questions.

Regardless, the data permitted us to detect problematic patterns, commonly referred to as passive discrimination.  This is a type of discrimination that occurs when we are not aware of how our own biases affect our decisions.  This kind of bias must be called to our attention, and there must be accountability to correct it.

One of the most troubling observations I made, at both Albany and BWI, was that — aside from the likely notation in a log (that no one will ever look at) — there was no information captured and I was asked no questions, aside from whether or not I wanted to change my mind.

Given that TSA interacts with tens if not hundreds of millions of travelers each year, it is incredible to me that we, the stewards of homeland security,  have failed to insist that data capturing and analysis should occur in a manner similar to what local police agencies have been doing for many years.