Oct 18 2007
The illusion of security - part 2
It gets worse and worse, the TSA confirmed today that MOST fake bombs made it through screeners at LAX and Chicago’s O’Hare airports over the past couple of years. According to a CNN.com article:
Screeners failed to find most of the fake bombs smuggled by plainclothes investigators through checkpoints at two major airports from late 2005 until last fall, the Transportation Security Administration said Thursday.
Investigators successfully smuggled 75 percent of the fake bombs through checkpoints at Los Angeles International Airport in California, and 60 percent through Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport in Illinois, according to a report obtained by USA Today. In tests at California’s San Francisco International Airport, where a private company conducts inspections, 20 percent of the contraband made it through security.
I work in an industry where anything below a 99% success rate is a major problem, and I just can’t wrap my head around how ineffective the TSA really is. To put this in perspective, LAX screener were effective 25% of the time while screeners at O’Hare were effective 40% of the time. It is interesting that a private company had a much greater success rate at 20% failure/80% success. It is clear that the federal government is over-matched, and privatisation is something that should be seriously looked at. I’m not sure if everybody remembers but prior to 9/11 the screeners were private and the TSA was brought in with the wonderful Patriot Act and the Dept of Total Incompetence Homeland Security because they could “do a better job”. Great job dipshits.
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This is pretty surprising. Most things that the government takes over are run much more smoothly, efficiently, and cheaper than they ever could on the open market.
For example, take…uh, well there’s…uh, well what would we do without…