What Do You Think?

[John.hergy]

why is it always about some group making more money, more power and control for the government rather than simple, little to no extra cost common sense.

The government keeps saying it needs to cut cost and save money how about stop buying expensive junk that produces little to no positive benefits potentially creates health risks.

leave it to the government to justify keeping a bad idea in place by coming up with a worse option to implement if we don't like the one they are using now.




copied from:
http://titanews.co.cc/business/an-end-to-the-airport-pat-down-212097.html

An end to the airport pat down?

6/07/11


Singapore (CNN) – Every business traveler knows the drill: Remove your belt, jewelry, sometimes even your shoes; take everything out of your pockets and then hope you don’t get selected for the dreaded pat down.

The airport security process, considered an inconvenience at best and at worst a personal invasion, is fait accompli for travelers these days. No one likes it, but everyone who wants to fly – and fly safely – gets in line.

Now a group that represents the world’s largest airlines is claiming it doesn’t always have to be this way.

“We must replace a 40-year-old concept with a risk-based approach, powered by intelligence and technology,” said Giovanni Bisignani, director general of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), in a speech to the trade group’s members. “Our passengers should be able to get from the curb to the gate with dignity, without stopping, without stripping, without unpacking and certainly without groping.”

IATA unveiled its aptly dubbed “Checkpoint of the Future” at this week’s annual general meeting in Singapore. Although the project is still nothing more than a concept, the mock-up showed a fully automated security system. Passengers are able to confirm their identity with a passport and iris scan alone, and then proceed down a tunnel.

While they walk, the system performs all the normal safety checks, including an X-ray, liquid scan, shoe scan and explosive detector: all without the need to stop and remove your laptop.

The idea also includes multiple paths for different types of travel. Those who regularly take to the skies could apply for the “known traveler” status, which would reduce screening significantly for each trip. Those considered a high risk would enter a tunnel with an enhanced set of checks. Even if a passenger sets off a detector, IATA said he or she would just be diverted to another automated check, not a manual pat down.

The “Checkpoint of the Future” sounds a bit like concept car – great fun at the auto show, but not showing up in the driveway anytime soon.

However, Ken Dunlap – head of security for IATA – insisted that the system “is science fact and not science fiction.” He said he expects the new checkpoints to be implemented in the next five to seven years.

Despite his optimism, Dunlap was vague when asked about the overall cost of the project, and putting such technology to work would take sustained collaboration by the airline industry, airport operators and participating governments.

As airline passengers today face an ever stricter web of security restrictions, the “Checkpoint of the Future” provides the promise of a pat-free check-in: A promise that may or may not provide much comfort next time you get pulled out of the security line.

[John.hergy]

http://travel.usatoday.com/flights/story/2011/05/Traveler-verification-seen-as-alternative-to-airport-pat-downs/47279106/1


By Roger Yu, USA TODAY
05/18/2011

Upset with being frisked and having a naked image taken of you at airports?

Increasingly, stringent air security screening methods such as these are under question. And they're not just being questioned by travelers upset at being groped. A consensus is building among the airline industry, business and leisure travel groups and even top government officials that something needs to change.

The alternative they're looking to: traveler verification systems akin to trusted traveler programs, in which people's backgrounds are checked beforehand, and they verify who they are when they get ready to board a flight.

The Transportation Security Administration and airlines already are testing a verification program for airline crews, which could end aggressive screening of them. It's time, airlines around the world say, that similar programs — and tiered programs — should be extended to trusted or known travelers.

Travelers' frustrations at the stop-and-go jam at airport security checkpoints have been rising for years, as new layers of screening measures were introduced with each terrorist threat. The bubble may have burst last year when TSA introduced body-scan machines and aggressive pat-downs, irking many travelers concerned that their privacy was being violated.

The travel industry argues that a prevalent public perception that you're assumed guilty until found innocent at air checkpoints discourages foreign visitors, dampening an already gloomy outlook amid a sluggish economy.

"People are saying enough is enough," says Bob Poole, director of transportation policy for the libertarian Reason Foundation. "Body-scans and pat-downs should be only for secondary screening."

But it's not just libertarians concerned about government intrusion who say it's time airport screening methods changed. The TSA recently acknowledged that it needs to account for frequent travelers who pose no risk and are willing to provide personal information to prove it.

"We are evaluating a variety of measures to support TSA's risk-based, intelligence-driven approach that will strengthen security while improving the screening experience," says Nicholas Kimball, a TSA spokesman.

John Pistole, TSA's chief, told a group of lawyers in March that the agency is exploring "checkpoint of the future" concepts "to focus (its) limited resources on higher-risk passengers, while speeding and enhancing the passenger experience at the airport."

TSA and industry officials are discussing a variety of options, including a test at a few airports with a dedicated lane for airlines' most frequent fliers who are willing to undergo a background check.

"I think Pistole is serious," Poole says, arguing that TSA has flouted Congress for years since it called for a risk-based, tier approach in the legislation that created TSA after 9/11. "It's a sea change if they follow through on it."

Pat-downs put down

No sooner than aggressive pat-downs were introduced in October than interested parties began to lobby for what they think is the right approach in reshaping screening.

Two influential organizations, the International Air Transport Association, a global airline trade group, and the U.S. Travel Association, representing travel companies, suppliers and destinations, have pitched proposals to divide travelers into three groups at checkpoints.

In the proposals, travelers who opt in and pass a stringent check on their risk profile — likely by paying to have their backgrounds checked — would be given access to an expedited lane with minimal screening. People would still walk through a basic scanning machine, but would get to keep their shoes on and leave their laptop in the bag.

Travelers whose names show up as a potential risk to air security would be steered to a lane where more thorough screening would take place, possibly including aggressive pat-downs and full-body scanners.

Travelers who are neither trusted nor deemed risky would get an intermediate level of screening in a lane that looks a lot like what's available today. But the line would be shorter as risky or trusted travelers are steered to other lanes. "People are being pulled out in the current system, and that slows down (traffic flow)," says Anthony Council, a spokesman for IATA, adding that about 3% of passengers are screened secondarily. Travelers of all types will be occasionally steered to the high-risk lane to keep everyone honest.

On the surface, the proposals appeal to some travelers.

"I would definitely welcome anything that both recognized who the non-threats are and eases their passage through security," says business traveler John Kernitzki, a training consultant from Glendale, Ariz. "I would most certainly pay any reasonable fee, understanding that the vetting process, if done right, isn't expensive."

Numerous industry surveys echo Kernitzki's sentiments. More than 70% of respondents from a 2010 survey by the Global Business Travel Association said they'd be willing to pay for a voluntary opt-in screening program if it gives them faster passage through screening.

Dispersing travelers into tiers isn't enough, USTA says. Its proposal also calls for encouraging travelers to bring on board fewer carry-ons to ease the checkpoint bottleneck. In so doing, it called for airlines to waive the fees they assess for the first bag checked.

A matter of trust

USTA and other industry officials also are calling for the Homeland Security Department to leverage its experience in running its current trusted traveler programs and possibly include their members in the low-risk immigration check category: Global Entry for international travelers; Nexus for U.S.-Canada border crossings; Sentri for U.S.-Mexico borders.

By paying $100, Global Entry members who pass a background check can skip long immigration clearance lines at U.S. airports by using designated kiosks. Global Entry has been popular, passing the 1 million-membership milestone earlier this year after starting in 2008. It's been expanded to the Netherlands (for Dutch citizens coming to the U.S.). Plans are to introduce it in Britain and Germany, says Joanne Ferreira, a Homeland Security Department spokeswoman.

Bill Curry, a business adviser in Princeton, N.J., belongs to Global Entry and Nexus, and says they work "flawlessly."

"One screener said, 'We know more about you than your mother,'" Curry says. "But if (TSA's program) can do the same thing through airport security, sign me up, and do it quickly."

TSA had tried a separate known-travelers program before, working with private companies such as Verified Identity Pass' Clear for a so-called Registered Traveler program. The program was designed to give paid subscribers vetted by TSA a faster lane at participating airports. But TSA chose not to partake in applicants' background checks and withdrew its endorsement, leading to the demise of Clear and its fledgling competitors.

Any changes will require active assistance from airlines, which currently have a limited role in intelligence gathering and are happy about that.

Secure Flight, an initiative that was put in place last year, redefined the industry's obligations in determining if a terrorist is on board. Secure Flight made it clear that it was TSA's job to cross-check flight passenger information with the government's no-fly or other terrorist watch lists. Airlines, which handled the task for years, now simply pass on the names, birth dates, gender, destination/origin and flight numbers to TSA. "Secure Flight was a huge improvement," says John Chaussee, director of federal airport security for Southwest Airlines.

TSA is hoping later this year to test known-traveler proposals for a small segment of top frequent fliers, who'd undergo a background check. If they're clear to fly, they'd be given a designation on their boarding passes that approves expedited screening — a task that would require airline cooperation.

If successful, TSA could expand the concept to other types of travelers. TSA hasn't finalized how a program would function, but all participating travelers will have their backgrounds checked.

TSA and airlines also will have to figure out how such a program can co-exist with the front-of-the-line privileges that airlines already offer high-paying and other elite customers.

Ken Maxwell, JetBlue's vice president of security, says the airline "would be willing to discuss ways (of allowing TSA access to its frequent-flier data) within the confines of privacy laws."

"That's a conversation we'd be willing to entertain," he says. "Perhaps marrying the frequent-flier data with TSA's vetting provides an opportunity for a different kind of business design that customers can benefit from. The industry is willing to have those kinds of discussions."

Business traveler Steve Klein of Richardson, Texas, says exchanging data on his travel with the government for easier clearance is a trade he's willing to make.

"Time at the airport is more valuable than money," he says. "There's nothing proprietary on my frequent-flier data that I'm aware of. I have nothing to hide."

Checking, checking

Proponents of risk-based screening also urge the TSA to look for other ways to vet travelers who are already known to the government.

Those who have already had their backgrounds checked — federal employees with a security clearance, Global Entry members and airport employees with access to secure parts of the airport — should be deemed low-risk, they say.

Another challenge is determining people's risk classification, says Hans Miller of Civitas Group, a security advisory firm. "TSA background checks cost a lot of money. So what are we talking about? What are we looking for?"

Some advocates of vetting programs have mentioned the possible need to consider travelers' standing in society, data beyond their criminal history or fingerprints. Information available on commercial databases, such as mortgage and employment history, would help catch someone who has no previous record of crimes in the U.S., they say.

TSA once tried something similar called Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System II (CAPPS II), which searched through information in government and commercial databases. But Congress put a stop to it because it was too intrusive, Miller says.

Despite an array of issues to be worked out, nearly all interested parties agree that changes to a more risk-based system will go a long way to break TSA's pattern of adding more stringent measures in response to the latest incident or risk — something many passengers increasingly are objecting to.

"The policy of only reacting and adding more stuff is a losing game," Poole says. "No security system is going to guarantee 100%, but we need to grow up and level with the American people."