'My £1,000 Macbook Air was stolen at airport security and no one cares' | Hacker News Reader

'My £1,000 Macbook Air was stolen at airport security and no one cares'

theguardian.com

111 pointsraattgift127 comments

Singapore has the best system, you are given a plastic token with a number corresponding to the number on your tray. When you come out the other side of security and want to collect your tray, you have to present the plastic token otherwise they won't give you your tray back.

That other airports don't implement this system continues to astonish me.

It surprises me that other major airports choose to independently innovate without just copying Changi (Singapore's airport). Everything from free cinemas, to carpeted walkways, to water taps, to efficent immigration and security and more.

I didn't like the carpeted walkways there to be honest since it just made it more difficult to pull my hand luggage.

Heavy stuff and soft surfaces don’t mix. A hospital nearby has carpets in places. The staff pushing the half ton x-ray machine leave furrows like they are plowing a paddock.

Maybe part of the plan, it's difficult to enforce hand luggage limitations at airports without adding extra checks, but if you exceed 10kg that overweight suitcase is going to make some drag on carpet. Small nudges, similarly how BA cabin crew are instructed to never help anyone put their luggage in the overhead bin unless they have a suitable reason.

> BA cabin crew are instructed to never help anyone put their luggage in the overhead bin unless they have a suitable reason.

Is this for real? Sucks, but I can imagine most fellow passengers pick up the slack... at least I've always helped others (and vice-versa) in the US.

It is, Ive witnessed cabin crew refuse or ignore multiple times, and clearly says so on their website too that passengers must be able to put luggage in the bins themselves. Makes sense to me, if you can't lift it then it's probably overweight and should of been checked in. Obviously I'm sure they'd make exceptions for unaccompanied children, height challenged people, injured, the very elderly, those with noted back issues, 1st class passengers maybe. Seems a reasonable policy, faster boarding, reduction in abuse, space for others, etc.. https://www.britishairways.com/en-us/information/baggage-ess... It all about small nudges, disincentives to affect future behavior, back to the Singapore airside carpets. Others do pick up the slack indeed, and usually both ended up with a quick moan, whilst I really wanna comment you selfish .#*@ that suitcase is taking up half the bin, where do I put my bag, or good forbid you try put that 20kg on top of my small rugsack

It's for the safety of the cabin crew. If they had to help put people's heavy bags in the overheads on every flight, they would quickly get back injuries. It's fine for the passengers because they are not doing it often.

I mostly fly budget airlines so my hand luggage has to be lightweight, but the carpet at Changi is a minor inconvenience (especially when one is tired after a +13h flight) because my luggage practically rolls itself when you give it a nudge on an even surface!

And the variety of available food choices. Or the fact that the is a nice gym with a shower.

It is one of the best airports I have ever seen.

> efficent immigration

A couple of years ago I had to take a connected flight where one of the stops was in USA. I was never going to leave the airport, yet I had to form in a line while immigration was doing the routine bottleneck check on dozens of travelers, while my flight time was getting dangerously close. We just had to suck it up, any complaining just brought additional delays. The check was fairly automated, I guess they just needed more agents, or less gratuitous revisions.

> A couple of years ago I had to take a connected flight where one of the stops was in USA. I was never going to leave the airport, yet I had to form in a line while immigration was doing the routine bottleneck check on dozens of travelers, while my flight time was getting dangerously close. We just had to suck it up, any complaining just brought additional delays. The check was fairly automated, I guess they just needed more agents, or less gratuitous revisions.

I had this exact same experience with LHR (London Heathrow). I was never even trying to leave the airport, just make a connecting flight.

Not only did they decide that having a single security lane open was sufficient, but they also (effectively) only let one person unload their bag into the trays at a time, for a max bus throughput of 1 person at a time. If you left anything in it - and I mean anything[0] - they pulled your bag and tray to the side, and you had to wait for one of two agents to inspect it. The wait time for that was about 10-15 minutes. At no point did anybody have any sense of urgency whatsoever with their work, despite all of us being there to make connecting flights. They shuffled back and forth between the body scanner, X-ray machine, and the break area, chatting with each other. I was seventh in line, and in all, the entire process took literally 30 minutes (I timed it).

I was floored, because I've traveled around the world and never seen anything this bad. Even Heathrow security has never been that bad for me when taking off from London. There was an agent from our departing flight there to escort us, because we were holding the whole flight up. I asked her if this was typical or not, and she just rolled her eyes and laughed, "yeah, this is how it usually is".

[0] One guy next to me had his back selected because he had left his eyeglasses inside his bag, in a plastic (not metal) case.

I had to do this in Abu Dhabi. The whole story is organized in an amerturish fashion. They were parading us around through various queques in the airport in groups of ppl landing on same plane. The whole thing was really bizzare and humiliating.

What astonishes me also is the baggage claim.

I can literally take a few people’s suitcases circling around before they spot them, and leave!

Even more amazing in airports like SFO where baggage claim is after security, such that anyone can wander in off the curb and pick up a bag. I think this is uniquely American though.

It's done this way in Canada as well.

Source :): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trailer_Park_Boys

Have to remember though, that its just as easy to steal anything nobody is watching. It is not the incapacity to steal the only thing that stops stealing.

True, but when you're boarding the plane on the other end there is no sign that says 'remember, your bags will be left unattended in a public space upon arrival'.

Schiphol does it about equally dumb where the baggage carousel is past the last security check and 10 meters from the public spaces. It would be trivial to take one or more bags that aren't yours and walk out.

I have some ideas and a provisional patent on two things:

1) “Meet your baggage” a simple system that can be bolted on to most existing processes that lets you know which airport your luggage is at, where it is in the process, and when your luggage is coming out and on what carousel. So you can be standing by the chute expecting it.

2) A system for seats to recline starting from the back, letting people switch seats and pay $ and go to sleep in a comfortable reclining position, which I find is really crucial for a long flight and people are willing to pay for.

If you’re interested and have some connections with the airline industry email me at greg+airline the at symbol qbix.com

> So you can be standing by the chute expecting it.

This doesn't always work. Many times the luggage is at the carousel quicker than you are.

As for '2', airlines don't like people switching seats, before take-off they use the 'weight and balance' argument, and after take-off because it will slow things down tremendously when de-planing to sort out where everybody's carry on luggage is.

Obviously the patent already thought about these things. I will just briefly address them.

1) Luggage doesn’t come out until your phone indicates that you’re ready or went through a checkpoint. This way you can coordinate the variable time you have (eg detained or in a long line) with the baggage before it is placed on the chute. The throwers simply sort the luggage by having cleared to go down the chute, as you move through the process. They can also see on a screen for each luggage where each person is in the process. Usually it’s far easier to delay luggage than expedite it.

2) People are woken up before descent begins and the seatbelt sign is turned on. For the vast majority of flights, this can be predicted in advance. Switching happens in an orderly fashion, and people end up near their baggage before the flight ends. They actually can even pay per minute for naps in the back, requesting a sleeper seat is like requesting a flight attendant, except it lights up the request for the next seats in the back, and whoever accepts your offer can even get a cut of the $. Typically though the airlines would sell the back seats for cheaper (because you have to move) and charge far more for the people who want to sleep on the flight. Often a good relaxed sleep is worth far more and is an impulse buy on the plane.

There is no 'hold' stage for luggage other than for stuff that is suspect, it is a pretty straight line from the plane to the belt in most airports. So you'd have to redesign the airport to account for the person that wants to go and eat a steak in the taxfree zone until they exit the airport.

Anyway, good luck with your patents, I hope it works out for you.

There are also no reclining chairs in the back of planes. These things would be incremental additions, obviously SOME changes need to be made.

Thanks!!

> which I find is really crucial for a long flight and people are willing to pay for.

Which is why airlines sell properly reclinable seats for $8,000 a pop on long flights. It's called Business Class.

Proof that people will pay ahead of time.

And many will pay while on the plane!

While others can pay less by agreeing to give up their seat to someone who wants to sleep.

Do you think this is why guidelines say never to put valuables in your checked luggage? I always thought it was because fragile and valuable have a high overlap, but this public unattended space idea might make even more sense.

> Do you think this is why guidelines say never to put valuables in your checked luggage?

It's part of the reason.

Other parts include:

(1) Even with “positive bag matching” in place which should in theory prevent this, bags end up going elsewhere or elsewhen.

(2) Theft by airport and security services employees between check-in and delivery to the carousel.

but with all the security cameras in place, i imagine the risk to the thief would be too high and not worth it.

Claim you thought it was your suitcase. This probably happens by accident at least a few times per month at a busy airport, there are only so many variations on the theme of 'suitcase' and not everybody has the foresight to make theirs recognizable without opening them.

Given that someone got his macbook stolen and nobody nudged, I would not rely a lot on security cameras.

This is typical of pretty much all US airports. It's very rare to have baggage claim inside security.

The deterrent is that there are a large number of security cameras covering that space, and that continues out to parking structures, so it's a very high risk crime and not reasonably repeatable.

I don’t know about you but when I travel there is never anything valuable in my checked luggage (except for the luggage itself I guess).

I traveled and was in Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine and Spain airports few years ago, it's exactly the same: ribbon with bags, you have to spot your own. I even picked up wrong bag, then realized that it wasn't mine and put it back.

I've traveled with rifles in checked luggage occasionally. The case is required to be locked, but the locks on these cases will only stop a casual check. 30 seconds with a hammer and screwdriver are enough to get most of them open. Usually you have to pick these up from a specific point and show your ticket stub to claim them.

At SFO they claimed they never received my rifle case. 15 minutes later I found it circling on a luggage carousel.

I often travel with firearms, and even when I don't "need" to I will sometimes put an AR-15 lower receiver in a large Pelican case so I can securely lock it. A stripped lower can be had for $30 if you shop around, and I've met others why travel with sensitive electronics that have done the same thing.

I had a situation recently where someone accidentally took my bag thinking that it was theirs, and they eventually came back to baggage claim about 15 minutes later after they realized it.

If you think about it, there's a pretty serious security issue there. Someone could walk into an airport with a bomb in a bag, toss it on the baggage carousel while nobody is paying attention, and then walk out. It wouldn't get noticed by security looking for unattended baggage because it's expected for there to be unattended baggage there.

I once flew from Chicago to Dushanbe via Istanbul. My bag was checked and a sticker for it was attached to my boarding pass. While traversing through Turkey, they required both my incoming and outbound boarding passes, and kept that one. So in Dushanbe, they wouldn't give me my bag, since I no longer had the sticker.

I had to wait until every single person was off the plane and had exited with their bags, and there was only one bag left, and me. Then they believed the bag was mine and let me take it.

All of this made me slightly anxious, since I don't speak Tajik, but it worked out, I guess.

India has the same system.

I’m Changi Terminal 2 and I’m not seeing any tokens being exchanged. Are you sure that this was not airline-specific?

Side note for the unaware: Singapore’s airport has screening at each and every gate instead of a joint one right after passport control.

This was at Changi Terminal 3.

The screening at the gate is annoying IMO, because you can't buy a drink to take on the plane. It's my only complaint about Changi.

You can take drinks on the plane? I don't think it is a good idea.

Non-alcoholic drinks, sure. I usually buy a bottle of water at least, flight attendants are not always able to serve drinks, it helps to bring something with you.

OP here. My bad. Apparently they only give the token when you leave your phone or computer, but not always.

Not just Singapore , a lot of other airports do this as well ,as other comments have pointed out. This isn't the norm in the UK unfortunately. The reason boils down to staffing on the other end to check the token and to handover the tray. Token and staffing would mean added cost and liability - not something an outsourced security vendor or another government department agency would be willing to foot the bill for.

To be fair, this is trivial to automate - barcode on the token, scan on the other side, conveyor belt pops out your trays.

I don’t remember them having that for airside transfers (from a few years ago anyways). Is that new?

> That other airports don't implement this system continues to astonish me.

For the US airports where TSA directly provides airport security, this is probably mission-related. The TSA checkpoint’s mission is to make sure unauthorized people and objects don't get into the sterile section of the airport. Additional protocols to prevent theft are off mission, so resources aren't going to be devoted to identifying, establishing, and operating them.

The only counter example to this story I’ve heard involved San Francisco International.

The TSA / luggage handlers were repeatedly stealing things from checked luggage. Of course, nothing was done to follow up on the police reports that were filed.

Then, one day, airport security stole a checked service revolver from a retired cop. Once that was reported, the police immediately ran a sting operation, and arrested the perpetrators.

Not sure what the moral of the story is.

SFO is weird. Last time I travelled, an older officer asked me to keep my (not smart, but metal for sure) watch on, unless I wanted to lose it. Didn't inspire a lot of confidence in the security check or the system.

SFO is hardly the only airport where this has been occurring.

A TSA employee at Newark stole $800K worth of items.

https://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/convicted-tsa-officer-reveals...

Wow. I'd love for a campaign to raise fund to buy airport ads (or post guerrilla flyers) warning travelers about TSA criminal activity.

TSA is more dangerous than what they are supposedly protecting traveler from.

I'd suspect that this is a widespread(-ish) problem. When you check your bag, it leaves your control and is handed off between TSA and your airline just enough that they both have plausible deniability when something goes missing.

If something goes missing, they'll be happy to start pointing fingers at each other - trust me.

We know the score. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lru1Qxc1l8

TSA is no joke when it comes to weapons in checked bagged. Some travellers exploit that to protect their valuables.

https://lifehacker.com/5448014/pack-a-gun-to-protect-valuabl...

Supposedly if you proactively declare a firearm in your luggage at check-in, your luggage goes through a more stringent chain of custody.

Similar mechanics work if someone steals your purse or backpack. Not advocating lying to police, but if you tell them it contained some legal controlled substance, it'll get more attention.

I left BOTH of my laptops at the TSA checkpoint at O'Hare a few weeks ago. The TSA folks actually went to the trouble of opening the laptop, saw my flight info which happened to be on the screen, and contacted the gate, who called me up so I could go get it.

Experiences vary. In my case, the TSA went above and beyond to save me from my own stupidity.

I left an iPad in a seat back once, and didn't realize until I was outside of security. When I told security what happened, I was given a special pass to go back and get it, and the gate agent let me have it only after I accurately described it.

As you mention, experiences vary. For me, the most frustrating and awful part of airports and flying is consistently the other travelers, not TSA or airline employees.

Hehe... how do you accurately describe an iPad?

It’s an iPad 2. There is a 2cm scratch on top right of the screen from where I went skating on it getting out of bed and there is a big dent on bottom from a child dropping it. The back is scuffed as all hell from a life of pain and the Smart Cover has worn the aluminium on the side so far through that it’s almost black. The speaker does odd things regularly from the time it got watered.

How do you even remember that? Regardless, my stuff is in perfect condition, I could only say what emails I got yesterday or what apps I have installed, I guess...

Model, Case/Skin, Charge, Lock screen image. . .

M8, Supcase, Fuck if I know, Default Android 5....

Yeah, I'll take the damn bus.

Apple offers free engraving. My iPod used to say "Stolen from Ted Unangst" on the back.

That would seem to be detrimental to resale value

That's like when Buster Keaton asked a lady to describe a dollar bill.

Hadn't seen that before -- it's in "Sherlock Jr." :

https://youtu.be/cC1aD7e4ZHs?t=256

(There's a bit more to the bit -- give it a couple of minutes).

The screen wasnt locked?

Does the TSA have a key to open laptops?

They have master password

Windows displays calendar appointments on the lock screen. Not sure about Mac. Maybe that was what they saw and flight name was part of it?

Unfortunately this is a recurrent pattern in our times: unless is something really serious (like a murder) no one cares.

A friend of mine waited 3 months to get police to read his report about an e-robbery despite presenting concrete info about the robber. No one cares.

Someone I know wanted to take apart an old car I had for a project to take parts he needed. When I declined he came back when nobody was home and tried to cut the parts out in a hurry, damaging a lot of the engine and smashing both headlights for fun. I filed a police report and even gave them a name, address, and phone number. There was no doubt in anyones mind who had committed the crime, but because Police work in a small town must be so difficult nothing ever happened. No phone calls, no follow-ups, no consequences. Makes me wonder if the police only take action in personal loss cases when the person losing is a business. They'll send three cruisers and half a dozen cops to a shoplifting incident at a grocery store with an impoverished perp, but if there's going to be any kind of he-said-she-said and nobody's dead or injured you're on your own.

I believe that policing in the United States is becoming more and more a method for controlling the masses rather than means to an end.

Policing, since the very beginning of its history, has only ever been about controlling the masses.

Not "only". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles

And it actually works.

Police in the UK are far from perfect, but they definitely feel a lot closer to part of the community than elsewhere. When you see those videos of a police officer dancing or getting involved in the activity they're protecting, it isn't uncommon for it to be British police officers doing it.

Unfortunately they're under-funded and given too much paperwork, but regardless other police around the world could pick up Peelian as a way forward. It is definitely quite different from an "Us Vs. Them" attitude though.

In the USA, government policing was created to oppress Blacks.

http://plsonline.eku.edu/insidelook/brief-history-slavery-an...

It's laziness. The fact that police forces get to manage their own tasking precludes anything difficult from ever getting done unless it looks really good

I live opposite the local drug dealers - there's a daily stream of walk-ins (including kids from the local secondary school), cars parking up for a couple of minutes, and bicycle/motorcycle 'couriers'.

After 4 years of reporting this to the police, attending local police/council meetings (they also run a car trading/repair business from the residence - ask me about my experience of weekend metalworking noise levels) most locals have given up reporting incidents.

Last we heard, the local planning office is now going to send the occupants a questionnaire about how they use the property. That'll sort it then.

/End of rant

I'm guessing that's probably not apathy but quite the opposite - outright collusion - they care, but about keeping it running rather than shutting it down..

Well, we have resorted to some sarcasm with the police - I said during one meeting that there was a perception among the residents that they had a '3I' policy for the issue - they were either:

* Indifferent

* Incompetent or

* Involved

That left them a bit speechless.

No one cares... unless you have the money to make them care.

> A friend of mine waited 3 months to get police to read his report about an e-robbery despite presenting concrete info about the robber.

Isn't that outside of the police reach? I mean, unless you are in danger, or want to report the crime just for report sake, why would you call the police? Shouldn't your friend already hire a lawyer and go through court?

I understand that this is a bad experience, but I have to think that it is so rare as to make any attempt at mitigation far worse than the current system.

Since everything is on camera, and strong identification is required to pass through security, committing a theft like this is tantamount to turning yourself in to the police. While there may be a short-term gain from such a theft, in the end, the police know exactly who you are and you will get caught.

The timeframe of closure is an unpleasant experience, but far better than if someone just grabbed your laptop in a Starbucks and ran off with it.

I've got a mitigation strategy that won't be far worse than the current system. Stop requiring expensive gadgets like laptops and tablets to be removed and scanned separately. It's all security theater anyways, but that policy just separates valuable, easily-to-fence items from luggage and facilitates theft. While we're at it, stop requiring us to take off our shoes, since that policy stemmed from a comically failed attempt at terrorism that's just a dumb idea to begin with. There is less opportunity to steal from people when they're not forced to waste time and attention reapplying footwear.

Yes they may be identified but that doesn't mean they will be apprehended if they are already safely back in their home country.

The reason they don't care is because they don't have any skin in the game.

This has always worried me. Once you're through the scanner you're free to loiter at the end of the conveyor belt. No one will bother you and I doubt TSA will blink an eye if you were to grab something and put it in your bag.

Airport security is a farce. DutyFree shops are selling what should not be in a plane, not even discussing the batteries. The experience feel like an animal going to the slaughterhouse, except they don't put you to sleep yet.

Last month I flew out of San Jose, CA's airport.

They were very behind schedule from what I gathered from talking to people in line (it was my first time there).

They didn't even ask us to take our shoes off or go through the spinning metal thing or unpack electronics / liquids from our carry-ons.

I walked clean through with a do it yourself mBot robot kit[0] that wasn't in the box. It was just a bunch of loose parts thrown into a compartment of a backpack. I imagine from a random person's POV, this could have looked like a build your own bomb kit.

In the TSA's defense they did have a dog sniffing around the line. Not sure if that's standard. It was the first time I've flown since the TSA started.

[0]: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1818505613/mbot-49-educ...

By no means do the following ideas intend to imply that this is OK or that it's a problem that should exist, or that the victims deserve blame.

Ugly-up your laptop lid with stickers like a teenager. That makes it distinctive, easy to spot, just slightly less valuable, and just slightly harder to fence.

Hang onto your laptop-in-a-tub until the very last possible second before you go through screening, and then insert it on the conveyor? (I've never tried this. For all I know it may work fine or it may get you detained for 17 hours and cavity-searched by over-enthusiastic fascist bureaucrats who are immune to all explanation.)

Rise up en masse against our military-industrial overlords?

Boycott or curtail air travel? (My personal favorite, even though it's probably playing into somebody's hands.)

In case it happens anyway: Encrypt all your drives, keep daily backups, and maintain an insurance policy that covers replacement cost.

> However, Manchester and Luton both told Money that they had no set procedure and it was up to the passenger to call police themselves.

So first you are forced to be separated from your belongings ('never leave you possesions out of sight') and if something goes wrong it your problem. How convenient.

Welcome to a brave new world.

> The pain is made worse by the ransom note she received from the thief. She had remotely shut the Apple Mac down and left a message stating that she needed it back as it contained vital dissertation and other work, and would pay a reward for its return.

What's the ransom???

I don't follow. She's willing to pay a "reward for [the laptop's] return", but not the ransom? What's the difference?

Some order of price, surely.

Random is demanded. Rewards are offered.

Would the police in this case still provide a police report? Maybe that + insurance could cover a new laptop.

It's so easy to backup everything for free these days. Google Drive/Dropbox if you don't care about encryption or Arq.app if you do, Time Machine if you have a spare hard drive at home.

>It's so easy to backup everything for free these days. Google Drive/Dropbox if you don't care about encryption

those let you back up maybe 50GB (if you abuse all the promos), which is pretty small.

Use Arq, backup to Backblaze storage, and pay $0.005/GB/month. That 50 GB would cost $0.25 a month. If you can afford a MacBook, you can afford an encrypted cloud backup of your HD.

I think that once you've paid for enough school, you can't afford not to backup your dissertation.

You travel with 50GB of original content for personal use?

if you shoot lots of 4k video or raw photos, you can easily burn through a couple of 64gb sd cards on travels

The article says insurance only paid £500.

Insurance will pay in a few weeks, and odds are you need your machine before then. (Maybe tomorrow depending on the nature of travel)

We're not talking a home break-in; we're talking a process where it was in your possession, you're required to go through a government mandated process, and the result of the process means your property only a few feet away was stolen, within a couple of minutes. If I had to replace that machine, we're talking hundreds of dollars (or more) a day in lost productivity, plus the lost productivity when restoring my backup.

So the only safe way is to not take the laptop out, then they'll call you and ask you to get it out ?

This should be the top reply here. As a frequent flyer, I am worried about this issue every single time. But your suggestion is awesome: the suitcase containing the laptop will be kept safely behind the security line until you have passed through the bodyscanner, shoe swipe, blah blah security theatre; then you can wait there and watch it like a hawk when it comes back out of the machine.

Of course, at a seriously inefficient spot like "London" Stansted this will add about 20-30 mins to your time to clear security, thanks to understaffing and the enormous proportion of Italian/Spanish teenagers who don't pay attention to any of the warnings about removing all the cosmetics from their luggage. End result being a constant backlog of bags to be hand-checked. But that's probably better than losing your laptop. And at a well-run terminal like Heathrow 2 you're only looking at an extra five minutes to get it rechecked. I might just try this on my next flight...

Only one time I got away with it. And I tried it every single time. The agent looks at me and "Sir, do you have any laptop in your bag?". Maybe something about my appearance?

a somewhat similar situation happened with a friend of mine in LAX. It is not the same because the laptop was not stolen, what happened was that he picked someone else macbook pro and the other person picked his.

He only realized that upon arriving here in Brazil. After phoning the airport and having a friend from LA walk there. He got hold of the real owner of the laptop (he noticed before flight and filled a missing item request at the airport). After some back and forth they managed to exchange their laptops back over FedEx.

So in the end, nothing but money was lost as they both got hold of their own laptops back but this should have never happened in the first place if the TSA or whoever is in the scanning machines took care of what is happening. If we can put with all the trouble regulation and schemes, they can do a better job of paying attention to the process. There are more than one person per machine already...

Some backpack makers (such as North Face) make TSA Approved backpacks that allow you to keep your laptop in the bag through the scanner. They basically open up like a book and the laptop is held in a pocket where the shoulder straps attach, so there is nothing above or below it.

I have one of those (from Timbuk2), the main reason I purchased it was because it was TSA Approved and yet TSA never allowed me to keep my laptop inside it, even with it open like a book, nothing else inside it, they still required me to remove it every time...

Same here. TSA allows it at times, but not in SFO or SJC. And asian airports, including Changi, don't allow it. I like the bag though so not too angry.

Really? I've never had problems with my Surge II Transit. The only time I've run into troubles is when I'm in an international airport and go "But this is TSA approved..." to which the usual response is an angry "Sir, we're not TSA."

I bought a North Face SURGE which advertises this, but at LAX and Heathrow I was made to remove my laptop from the bag regardless. It just ended up wasting time as I tried to run the bag through with the laptop in it both times, and both times they made me take it out and send it through again.

Luckily I was able to return the bag when I got back to the states. It was nice otherwise, but I'd really bought it for the TSA convenience.

The variance between TSA employees is pretty wide. Some are pretty good about letting you use these pockets, others insist you take it out. I fly TSA Pre-Check and it's surprising how many TSA employees are hazy about the program, even when they have an Pre-Check screening lane (sometimes I've been asked to remove shoes, etc.)

IMHO, the TSA is another government program soaking up way too much money for far too little value.

I don't really understand this. It says in the article that she was advised to report the theft to the police, and that they would cooperate with the police investigation. Did she refuse to do so for some reason, but instead go to the press?

This is why I use one of those "TSA friendly" bags for my laptop: it never leaves the bag, I just unzip it and lay the bag flat.

I'd be furious if this was me tho.

FWIW; you're not allowed to do this in Europe (at least in the airports I've been in). I spent extra money on a TSA friendly backpack too, so I'm bummed. :(

All items must be in a tray, electronics have to be in a separate tray and not stacked.

Yep same in most airports in SE Asia too. TSA made everyone's job harder, sorry I mean travel safer, by banning more than 100ml of liquid, so nowadays probably reluctant to adopt more TSA rules even if they are now somewhat logical.

SE Asia airport security procedure is determined by TSA, even though they don't follow TSA procedures?

I don't know the exact details, but everyone adopted the silly 100ml liquid max per bottle nonsense post 9/11?, but the rest of stuff such TSA approved laptop bags are not in practice or at least not known by the contracted staff operating the machines and scans I've experienced in SE Asia.

I believe the regulations on liquids are set by ICAO which is part of the UN. Sometimes the US sets extra security requirements for flights to/from/in the US.

I've done it in Heathrow several times. Never had an issue..?

Certainly the story here is about the negligence of Airport Security, but let this also be a lesson to the girl about backing up your work to the cloud.

They don't care because it happens all the time.

> She has been refused access to footage identifying the crook because of data protection rules.

I am really speechless

This is going to be commonplace. The other day RaboBank in NL refused to stop spamming me citing 'privacy concerns'. No kidding. After escalating it to a supervisor the situation was quickly resolved but still, that was pretty dumb.

Tomorrow: "the airport gave my picture to a stranger without a warrant!"

Isn't the whole point of collecting security camera data for security? I don't understand how using the data for its intended purpose is breaking the law

She could have said she had cocaine hidden in place of battery. That would have been found in no time.

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