TSA To Allow Laptops In Approved Bags 571
mnovotny writes "TIME is reporting that TSA will be allowing laptops in approved bags through security checkpoints. 'The new rules, announced Tuesday and set to take effect Aug. 16, are intended to help streamline the X-ray inspection lines. To qualify as "checkpoint friendly," a bag must have a designated laptop-only section that unfolds to lie flat on the X-ray machine belt and contains no metal snaps, zippers or buckles and no pockets.'" Don't you feel safer? I wish an independent 3rd-party group could get together and see what they could get through security without being arrested for the experiment. So little of what the TSA is doing is any more than illusion.
Oh yay (Score:2, Interesting)
I haven't flown since 1999.
This isn't enough to make me even consider flying ever again.
How can I get myself put on the no-fly list? I want to make it official.
The Inevitable Relaxation (Score:5, Interesting)
And so one of the many restrictions of post-9/11 flight security goes the way of the dodo in the name of convenience. I predict that we'll see more and more of this in the coming years. Soon, we'll not be required to X-ray our shoes when people forget why we started in the first place.
This is an illustration of how a knee-jerk reaction to tightening security instead of innovating causes us to be less secure than we were before. If we had rethought airplane security from the ground up as opposed to ramping current practices up, we might have actually learned something from 9/11 in terms of air security. As it stands, I don't think we learned very much at all.
Re:Hey, the TSA does screw all with private planes (Score:3, Interesting)
Ahh but you see, if they did anything to private aviation, it'd affect their own flights. So no more bush just walking up to the private jet with no security checks.
Re:Worthless security lightened (Score:2, Interesting)
Or possibly the larger airports have newer and better machines, smarter than to "light up like a Christmas tree" when they detect small quantities of distributed metal. Metal detectors, like almost everything else, have benefited from better technology.
But it's easier to simply jump up and down and make accusations than to think isn't it?
Re:Worthless security lightened (Score:5, Interesting)
i tried to but he just shook his head.
i looked at him and asked "when is this insanity going to end", he just shrugged.
I think a bit part of our problem is that life has become so convenient that very very few of us are willing to risk arrest by protesting.
One the things that upsets me most about this 'war on terror' is that car accidents kill many many many more people every year. Are totally random and tragic. If we spend a tiny fraction of the resources that is spend on 'security' on education and technology to prevent people falling asleep at the wheel and drunk driving we would save many many more lives.
Re:Worthless security lightened (Score:3, Interesting)
If you're so annoyed with the whole thing, why not stop flying?
I haven't been on a plane since 9/11. I decided right then that I'd never fly again, and have in fact taken several cross-country drives and Greyhound trips to support that stance. The only reason my kids have been on a plane since 9/11 is because my dad has paid the bill because he wanted to see his grandkids so bad. The only reason my wife has been on a plane since is because she needed to travel to see a dying relative, and taking a boat takes too damned long when cancer is in the equation.
I will *never* travel by plane again. Ever. If I had a job that required the occasional trip/conference/whatever, I'd tell them to book me a car rental or not book me at all. If it meant my job? So be it! I've taken a moral stand at jobs and lost them before. I will not be treated like some kind of animal to be herded and paraded around under the guise of security.
Just like with high gas prices, people just won't make the commitment to change *their* lifestyle unless it's convenient for them. They'll bitch and moan about their $80 SUV fill-ups, but refuse to trade it in for smaller car because they need to tow that boat or camper twice a year on Memorial and Labor Day. Everyone hates acting like we're terrified of shoes, fingernail clippers, and shampoo at the airport, but nobody will suck it up and (as a collective) tell the TSA and the airlines to fuck off.
Yeah, I know.... boycotts never accomplish much. But at least my actions go hand in hand with my convictions.
TSA is a joke (Score:2, Interesting)
Spent two hours and missed my flight because the idiots could not believe that i just happen to have a little horse sh%* on my boots and a little diesel fuel on them from getting fuel on the way to the airport.
They finally admitted that I was right, let me go, I had to pay $75 re-booking fee and get another flight.
Then just to show how stupid they are, they wanted to detain me again as I went through security a second time.
Laptops? How about camera equipment? (Score:3, Interesting)
I have a Canon brand backpack that I carry a DSLR and 8 lenses in.. one of which is a 300mm fixed length lens, it's metal and about 10-12" long.
I've flown with this bag as my carryon and taken it through security 40+ times. Once, on a month long trip, I accidentally left a large (4" blade) pocketknife IN THE BAG for 6 different legs of my trip. That's right. A lens that could conceal a small cannon (and looks like one on the x-ray), and a knife big enough to carve it, in my carryon.
Theatre. God help us if someone with ill intent actually does decide to purposely board a plane with a weapon.
Re:"See what they could get through security..." (Score:2, Interesting)
Last year I traveled over 50,000 air miles across the United States, making more than 30 trips through security before they found my Leatherman inside my briefcase. The thing is, in all that time I had forgotten it was there, next to my flashlight. It has a functional knife, cork screw and lots of other doodads that should have make someone wonder.
I was really pissed when they found it, since it was a gift from a co-worker and they confiscated it. Now I am much more careful to check - I usually clip a Swiss Army knife to my briefcase that my grandfather gave me and I would be heart-broken if I had that confiscated. Fortunately now they are more reliable about letting you go back out of the terminal to mail it to yourself (in a nice $10 package, of course, capitalism at its best).
Re:Targus lobbyist (Score:2, Interesting)
Yeah, now try driving from LA to New York (about 3 times the distance you drove) and tell me it's not that much longer than flying. Assuming it's only you, it'll take you at least two days to drive that distance, probably closer to three.
I'll agree that shorthaul trips, like LA to Phoenix or even LA to SF are about the equivalent to flying, but driving across the country is going to take a lot longer than flying.
Re:Hey, the TSA does screw all with private planes (Score:2, Interesting)
I can't speak for FedEx, but UPS security procedures are MUCH more stringent then mandated by the TSA.
FedEx is very strict with their guidelines for package contents. They pull out the rulebook for anything, especially International, and turn you away if they think it's hazardous or fails customs guidelines.
The U.S.P.S. on the other hand will take anything you give them, no questions about the contents (I guess they assume you aren't shipping chemicals or that the scanners will catch everything), and ship it off as long as it's not too large (I forget the sizing criteria).
I ran into this when trying to ship gifts for X-Mas over to my wife's family in Russia. Fedex-"Can't send because Russia isn't allowing toys from America because they are probably from China." USPS-"Fill out this form and give us ~$75."
Re:Targus lobbyist (Score:5, Interesting)
The Department of Homeland Security (which TSA is under) has very little actual authority.
Remember your rights, refuse to answer questions, the only answer you should EVER give a police officer, or federal agent is "I want a lawyer."
A lawyer tells us why we should never talk to cops in this video [youtube.com]
This guy has been making a series of videos of himself at DHS checkpoint basically blowing off the Fedtards in video 1 of 11. [youtube.com]
As Americans we have rights that we -allow- the federal and local governments to steal from us when we opt-in to their tactics. As you can see in the checkpoint video the guy did not opt-in and thereby became immune to their power and because they do not have any authority. (Hopefully you know the difference between power and authority [byu.edu].)
How to be a terrorist (Score:1, Interesting)
This airport security BS doesn't protect us from anything. There are so many other ways we are vulnerable.
-Want to take down a plane?
Just go to the airport parking lot or anywhere along the flight path and shoot with appropriate caliber weapon.
-Want to kidnap/hurt large group of people?
Go to a movie theatre, school, church, music, sport event, office building, rush hour freeway intersection.
There is no security from random acts of violence. The only security is counter intelligence where you know what your enemy will do do before they do it. And you don't get counterintelligence by spying on everybody and everything. You get it by hiring people who bear resemblance to your enemy.
Re:Qualifications (Score:2, Interesting)
Keep the Velcro closed or use it sparingly, and it doesn't collect lint. Use a big enough carryon (like a zippered messenger bag) to hold the laptop case and your stuff.
I've yet to test the dockable case for my laptop on the TSA; I'm willing to bet that they are so curmudgeonly that they'll only let sleeves and such through (mine has snaps and a pocket if you carefully examine it, and they don't really block the view of the computer).
Re:And this is why I take the train. (Score:3, Interesting)
Plane from LA :Leave Monday morning, get delayed by TSA goon. Get laptop confiscated, luggage stolen, shoes & toothpaste missing. Show up late for meeting barefoot with yellow teeth and no PowerPoint notes. Lose client, lose job.
Re:Targus lobbyist (Score:3, Interesting)
Just because a person is a police officer, that doesn't make them heartless.
I was in the car once with a friend. He was speeding , I think 46MpH in a 35MpH zone. The cop pulled him over and my friend was open and apologetic. It was to the tune of "Yeh, I'm sorry about that. I don't really have an excuse, I just wasn't paying enough attention."
The cop wrote him a ticket for "failure to wear a seat belt" instead of a 10MpH speed limit violation. It was a small fee, but most importantly "NO POINTS" on the insurance. And this was not in my friend's home town, nor did he know the guy.
Officers are just people, and like people you have the Jerks and the ordinary Joes. The only problem is that between power corrupting and attracting the corrupt, the ratio of jerk police officers might seem higher than a crowded room of people. But it's usually not by much.
Accidental knife... (Score:4, Interesting)