“The Transportation Security Administration has suffered more than 25,000 security breaches in U.S. airports in the past ten years, a House subcommittee on National Security is expected to report today. The subcommittee, which is under the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform and is scheduled to hold a hearing today on TSA oversight, totaled the [...]
“Stepped-up security screening at airports in the wake of foiled terrorism plots has provoked an outcry from airline pilots and travelers, including parents of children who say they are too intrusive. With the busiest holiday travel season nearing, fliers face long security lines and new rigorous patdown checks begun in recent weeks aimed at discovering [...]
“Just when I thought I was out of the Transportation Security Administration business for a few columns, they pull me back in. Did you hear about the Camden cop whose disabled son wasn’t allowed to pass through airport security unless he took off his leg braces? “ (Daniel Rubin: Another case of TSA overkill | [...]
As fears about swine flu spread, the airline industry is bracing for the worst, worried that travelers will cancel their plans to fly to or from not only Mexico, but also almost anywhere else in the world. (NY Times)
A government list of “cleared” fliers, developed to cut airport hassles for people whose names are confused with suspects on the terrorist watch list, has grown to 80,000 names, records show. The additions to the Transportation Security Administration’s “cleared list” reflect an influx of requests from people asking to be removed from the watch list. [...]
You may have been patted down at airports or suffered the indignity of having your dirty laundry from a vacation searched at screening checkpoints. Now prepare yourself for security to get a little more personal. Passengers making airline reservations soon will be required to provide their birth date and their sex in addition to their [...]
Fewer domestic passengers left the nation’s airports through the first seven months of 2008, with fewer flights filling the friendly skies. But while a bleak economic outlook may not perk up those numbers in the short term, the federal guardian of the gates says it has no intentions of trimming its workforce in this region [...]
Air travelers who can prove they don’t belong on terrorist watch lists could be spared extra scrutiny under a new program that addresses the public’s biggest complaint about aviation safety, the nation’s Homeland Security chief said. (USA Today)
“Airport screeners are about to get new security training designed to help them think creatively about possible threats _ including those they have never thought of. “We have to prepare for attacks that don’t fit our procedures,” such as the traveler who stuffed a block of cheese wrapped in wire into a checked bag, Transportation [...]
“The Homeland Security Department plans to begin a controversial airline passenger screening program as early as January — as long as it can win over skeptical lawmakers. The department’s Transportation Security Administration plans to take over the responsibility for screening passengers against government terrorist watch lists beginning in 2009, TSA Administrator Kip Hawley told the [...]