UK to follow US flight ban on laptops

That's the key to understanding this. Makes less and less sense as a security measure, maybe it makes sense as an economic measure directed at middle eastern airlines?

Just because you depart from a country doesn't mean your laptop is dangerous. Moreover, up til now there hasn't any paper or statistics claiming laptops are dangerous on flights. I am sure they are trying to hide the discrimination that lies underneath the ban.

The UK restrictions do affect BA, EasyJet, Jet2, Monarch, Thomas Cook and Thomson.

Aren't they then just as dangerous in the cargo compartment in checked luggage?

I've wondered this myself as well - in my mind, 'all' one need do is pierce a fully-charged iPad and then aim the resultant jet of flame at a plane window, and like a violin, a well-publicised fear-inducing terrorist event at worst, or a downed plane at best.

Or alternatively the threat of international terrorism has been grossly overestimated.

Or, perhaps, it simply goes to show that finding people bright enough to outwit security and still being willing to blow themselves up is HARD.

I've been thinking about the same since 9/11. While they comb through small liquids and nail files in all cabin baggage I can walk into a plane with several Ampere-hours of tightly packed energy in my backpack.

The number of people in the world who are willing to execute schemes that would kill innocents is very small.

Sadly, there is likely nothing we could ever do to stop those who are truly committed to this goal. Sadder still is the fact that the null reaction is considered unacceptable by politicians and constituents alike.

Whay specify specific airlines if it's a security measure?

If it's good for dubia's security it should be good for irish or Cyprus or Sicily

> What are my alternatives now?

Buy a hard-sided bag for checking your laptop?

Similar thing happened to me. I had a lot of computing equipment to carry, including a desktop LCD screen, and it only just barely fit in the hard case. Took what felt like hours of fiddling and rearranging to get it to close. Of course, with all that electronics the case was searched, and of course the TSA didn't spend hours fiddling and rearranging - they'd obviously just jumped on it until it latched, crushing the screen.

Same here. It wasn't inspected, what ever extreme handling they did, all the packing I had for it did not allow it to survive, and it had a cracked case and something else no longer allowing it to turn on (it was a long time ago, I no longer remember the details nor have the laptop).

I think this will heavily curtail travel to the US.

If you want pure speculation: Perhaps you don't trust airport security in those countries to properly check the laptops, but you trust the airport security in third countries.

Why would anyone do that? It would be against the rules. Gotta follow the rules. /s

On a somewhat serious note - presumably your itinerary would light up like a Christmas tree somewhere. Unless, of course, you swap identities en route. That would be against the rules, though.

Also, in fairness, it may be that they have very credible intelligence that someone is planning mischief using a specific carrier or airport.

If they did it from everywhere at once too many people would complain and they would remove the restriction. This way it can be incrementally added everywhere with less push back.

If you go looking for ways there's an infinite number. The problem is where you draw the line and accept the risk. Banning everything technically is what makes terrorism effective. The greatest terrorist purpose is for us and our governments to be afraid of everything and everyone.

The UK is on the cusp of committing economic suicide, or at least crippling itself for decades. It needs all the friends it can get. I imagine this is a measure to cosy up to the US, in full knowledge that it is an unhinged administration, in the hope of getting a good trade deal out of it once we cease trading as part of the bloc.

I'm guessing this post is intended with some small level of sarcasm or passive aggression to make a "subtle" point, but assuming it's just a simple question: yes, the UK is widely considered be heavily influenced by anti-immigrant sentiment. Brexit is a high-profile example of this.

I think we have 2 plausible options:

1) UK trying to curry favour with the USG 2) There's some concrete intelligence here, which is being shared and acted on

Possibly a thinly veiled way of getting back at gulf state airlines for their business model?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/03/2...

0. They probably know of a specific attack that we don't, thanks to intelligence gathering.

1. It's much easier to install rootkits on devices when it's in checked baggage.

My guess is that the purpose of this is intelligence gathering (assuming that it is security related at all, as opposed to being retaliation against unfair competition by state subsidized airlines as some have speculated). Perhaps something like this:

1. Some international criminal group has been under surveillance. Security agencies know quite a bit more about the group than the group thinks they do.

2. Security agencies do not have much information on the membership and organization of the group within the United States.

3. There is some good reason to believe that the group is about to undertake some major action, such as a terrorist attack, in the United States, and that a specific known officer of the organization will be traveling to the US to direct the attack.

4. Security agencies want to get some alone time with something that traveler will take with him when meeting with his comrades in the US, so they can install spying equipment like a listening device, a tracking device, a key logger if the device has a keyboard, and so on. They want this so that they can get information about the organization's US membership.

5. They don't want to do anything that would tip off the organization that their officer has been targeted. Hence, they need to cover up doctoring his electronics by making it appear that it is part of a very broad operation.

This restriction on electronics fits this well. Checked electronics will spend lots of time away from the owner, giving plenty of time to doctor it.

My guess is that the rest of Europe/EASA will follow the US/UK rules very soon on this one.

The risk of an in-flight cargo fire went considerably up btw:

http://avherald.com/h?article=4a67fce7&opt=0