on 03 January 2010
The TSA issued new security directives, effective Jan. 4, for all U.S. and international carriers with inbound flights to the U.S.
Here are the publicly available highlights from a statement the TSA sent to me:
- Every individual — i.e. 100% — flying into the U.S. and traveling from or through countries designated as state sponsors of terrorism “or other countries of interest” must go through “enhanced screening,” the TSA says in a statement.
- Travelers can expect the use of “enhanced screening technologies,” and the new directives also require “threat-based and random screening for passengers on U.S. bound international flights,” whether they be operated by U.S. or international carriers.
I had asked the TSA for a “copy of the new security rules,” and a spokeswoman provided a statement outlining the above rules, but also noted:
“Security directives are Sensitive Security Information and cannot be released publicly, we do have a statement I can offer you…”
Well, given the Christmas Day terrorism incident onboard Northwest flight 253 and the uproar about two bloggers publishing the resulting security directive and getting Department of Homeland Security subpoenas, now dropped, I kind of realized that the Jan. 4 security directive would not be disseminated publicly by the TSA.
Still, as happened after the Northwest incident, the TSA website today, lacked any useful information about the new rules.
Or even mention of the new rules.
In fact, despite today’s TSA statement about the new security directives, there was nothing as of 4:40 p.m. EST Jan. 3 about the new rules on the TSA website.
On its website Jan. 3, the lastest TSA security update, described as “New,” was this Dec. 27 statement.
The TSA needs to do a better job of communicating with travelers.
I know it was a holiday period, but in these extraordinary times, the TSA would be wise to exert some effort into being more open with the public and to be more informative.
Being more transparent would only help the TSA in gaining broader support from the public.
Incidentally, read the comment here from travel agent Stephanie Diehl on why it is essential for the TSA to be more communicative with travelers.
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The TSA still hasn’t learned that saying something is better than saying nothing. Why can’t they learn their lesson? Issuing a public and private release is not a bad thing, as long as they say something to the public.
And so the profiling based on nationality begins. Will be interesting to see their interpretation of “travelling through”… Particularly with regard to when the travelling through was done.
Stuart: Traveling through refers to current itineraries only, fyi.
ok, so then a terrorist need only fly say Karachi to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia on a one-way ticket, hang out there for a week, then hop on the direct to LAX.
Targetting by itinerary, even using a long “through-travel” definition, seems pretty pointless to me. Sure it makes all the right sounds and all the added inconvenience will have the pax thinking something must be being done, but really what is it going to achieve? Aside from more hideous delays.
In all likelihood this new rule is only going to make it even less likely that they’ll catch a smart terrorist — and that is the person they should be concentrating on finding.
Sidenote, I’m baffled why these attempts are not flying out of Asian ports rather than EU ones — Asia airport and flight security, on both domestic and international, is farsical at best.
Stuart: Yes, there are lots of holes in this thing. I also did an update here http://bit.ly/5evmo4 with a bit more detail.
Another, little missing piece of the puzzle is domestic U.S. or U.S. outbound flights.
I mean, there will be a helluva lot of opportunities for terrorists on these flights, as well.