Airport security line cutters are target of first-in-the-nation California bill | Hacker News Reader

Airport security line cutters are target of first-in-the-nation California bill

politico.com

A little zero-sum class warfare to distract from the fact that the TSA is the most wasteful and useless government agency in human history.

Unfortunately, the state government cannot alter TSA's authority.

How’s it work with SFO where they have their own contractors for security screening that aren’t federally employed TSA agents?

Airports can run their own agency but they still have to follow TSA’s guidelines. If they aren’t there, then TSA would be.

The TSA hate/dislike wouldn’t be anywhere near as strong as it is if it weren’t for the poor service levels, which is the key selling point for Clear.

SFO was the only airport where i had to wait in the security line starting from inside the plane. took 2.5hrs to reach passport control.

went again in february this year. 3 guys checking passports of hundreds of travellers. another 1.5hrs wasted.

meanwhile back in london i just scan my passport and go thru the automated gates. why can’t the US solve this issue? is it unions? is it federal government? what’s going on?

Passport control is CBP (a part of USCIS) and doesn't really have any relation to TSA, which is security checks to go from the "unsecured" (curbside) part of the airport to the "secured" (planeside) part.

> back in london i just scan my passport

Presumably your passport is a UK passport? Generally it's much quicker for a country's nationals to enter a border than foreigners.

>Generally it's much quicker for a country's nationals to enter a border than foreigners.

The UK is somewhat unusual in letting nationals of a number of countries, including the US, simply scan their passports at an electronic barrier and pass through without speaking to anyone, essentially the same as their own nationals; it usually just takes a few seconds. Many EU countries do this for EU and sometimes other European nationals, but rarely for the US.

The US is rather unusual in having their own nationals need to go through a non-trivial border control process, even with Global Entry. However, this is in part because many European countries have separate border control and customs processes, with border control before baggage reclaim, while the US tends to have them combined.

My son just back to the US after a trip to the UK. He was amazed by the automated scanning going into the UK. Then he got home and was treated like a criminal by the US border people.

> Many EU countries do this for EU and sometimes other European nationals, but rarely for the US.

EU countries are expanding this. France lets Can/US/Aus/NZ and probably others use the e-gates.

Belgium, Germany, Italy, Portugal and others do too with different eligibility lists: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automated_border_control_sys...

Some other EU countries too, but only on exit.

(No physical exit controls are a nice thing about US/Canada, but in my EU experience, the rate limiting step is really security, not exit controls).

It's called the "Screening Partnership Program"[1].

It's an agreement the airport makes with the TSA to maintain TSA standards (and I believe the airport gets federal funding to run it).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screening_Partnership_Program

Don't all states have the ability to ignore federal law (enforcement) leading to situations like sanctuary cities and legalized cannabis?

Not really, states don't have a way to prevent federal agents from enforcing federal law. The best they can do is decline to cooperate with and help those agents. Plenty of dispenseries have been shut down by feds over the years against the wishes of the state.

the TSA is literal street sweepings, but that does not mean private companies should be able to sell the ability to skip lines in public airports. if the government wants to implement its own program they can.

$12 billion. So you're right that it's not a lot relative to the size of the federal budget. But it is a lot relative to the TSA's accomplishments:

1. Has never prevented an act of terrorism in its history

2. Robs travelers of their time and sanity

3. Makes life a living hell for people with unfortunate names

heh, I meant as in "the garbage that no other department wanted" rather than "not much money in the grand scheme of things". I agree it's a total waste of everything.

No idea if this will pass or not but paying a private company to cut lines in airports seemed like a flimsy value prop

As someone who uses Clear, it has a significant benefit in that, for a comparatively low cost, it makes time through the airport more consistent.

If I have priority check-in through airline status, or am not checking baggage, then security waiting time is the main variable in the time to get from the terminal entrance to the gate (we'll ignore disaster airports like LAX where time from the freeway to the terminal is a major variable). If Clear lets me essentially not wait in line for security, that reduces an expectation of a, say, 0-45 minute time through security to a 0-5 minute time through security. Even if it might often not save me any time getting through security, the reduction in uncertainty means I can safely plan to arrive at the airport much later, while having the same low chance of missing the flight.

Some airline status provides priority security, but it is less common, usually at higher levels, and less consistent outside major hubs for each airline. Flying business or first would work, but would be vastly more than the cost of Clear for frequent travellers, while providing few other benefits for short flights.

In Europe, some airports just directly offer a paid priority security option, which sometimes is actually quite inexpensive. But it seems this may not be allowed by the TSA, and the alternative is the fiction of Clear supposedly offering some identity verification benefit.

Isn't Clear just a more exclusive TSA PreCheck? It only works because the normies haven't saturated it.

It's actually worse because you still have to go through the normal security check, you just get to skip the line. This may be dependent on the airport though.

Not if you have TSA precheck as well.

Most US airports I’ve been to have 4 types of queues:

* No TSA precheck, no Clear

* TSA precheck, no Clear

* No TSA precheck, Clear

* TSA precheck, Clear

They all work exactly as you expect (you get the benefits of either precheck or clear or both at once, depending on the queue).

At most large airports in the U.S., there is a separate CLEAR line for PreCheck from the CLEAR line for standard security. CLEAR is a benefit to skip the queue, but it doesn't usually have an impact on the level of scrutiny.

Is it actually worse if you get to skip the line? As the person you responded to mentioned, TSA PreCheck is now so saturated that the TSA PreCheck line will sometimes be longer than the regular line.

To me, the only way to really do it is Clear+Pre. Clear "bypasses" the ID verification step, and then you get inserted into a Pre line, which at most airports, under normal circumstances means: shoes stay on, remove any metal and jacket and just walk through an X-ray. Laptops, iPads, etc., stay in bags and go through X-ray too.

It's the line that adds uncertainty more than precheck vs normal. I can have my electronics and liquids out, and shoes off, in 30 seconds or so. As I'm frequently travelling internationally, I need to be prepared for the combination of different rules, and so can't rely on precheck to let me pack differently.

Clear does often have a precheck/non-precheck distinction, but when I had precheck (and not clear), I had enough trouble with miscommunications between different TSA agents about a line being one or the other that resulted in delays and secondary bag screening, at least at LAX, that it did not seem particularly useful. I did not appreciate being told by one person not to remove anything from my bag, then shouted at by another person for not having removed anything from my bag.

I also pay for Clear, and basically echo your take. My home airport has a separate like for Clear + Precheck, and basically only frequent travelers have both, so even though the line is sometimes longer it moves much faster. It's worth it for me to eliminate the variance of a first-time traveler who got randomed to precheck being slow.

> In Europe, some airports just directly offer a paid priority security option, which sometimes is actually quite inexpensive. But it seems this may not be allowed by the TSA, and the alternative is the fiction of Clear supposedly offering some identity verification benefit.

The question is why a non governmental entity is inserted into the middle of transportation security, with a profit incentive.

There already existed an entire apparatus for airport transportation security. There already existed an entire apparatus for fingerprint and other biometric verification to expedite the security screening process (precheck and global entry).

So then why did the government give Clear the right to bypass the official process? Why not just have a precheck plus or whatever system? Why not just have everyone do their biometrics when they do them every 5 years for precheck as it is?

It is, in reality, just paying for a separate line, nothing else. It is not a more convenient or even different security process, as precheck tries to be, it is just a more consistently short line to get to that process. The entire identity verification aspect is nonsense, and everyone knows it is nonsense. It is arguably slower than just showing an agent my passport.

I agree that it makes little sense, and doesn't seem like it should be allowed, but for some reason, the airports in the US have decided that paid priority security lines should be outsourced to a for-profit private intermediary offering a nonsense security service.

> The question is why a non governmental entity is inserted into the middle of transportation security, with a profit incentive.

Reminds me of ID.me, the for-profit company that authenticates users for certain IRS services including IRS Direct File [1]. For some reason, the government agency asks us to present our government-issued ID to a private company to verify our identity when Login.gov [2] exists to provide “the public’s one account for government”.

[1]: https://directfile.irs.gov/

[2]: https://login.gov/

Also a travesty. Especially when USPS could have rolled out an identity verification API years ago. They already verify your identity in person in order to get a US passport, they have physical office space and employees everywhere. What a lost opportunity. Now we are beholden to minimum wage mobile phone company employees to ensure we don’t get our 2FA SMS hijacked.

I used to race my coworkers through those lines. Going through normal security 9/10 times, I would win. They’d finally come through the other side to find me sipping on a Starbucks coffee. But when I lost, I lost big time, and I’d have to meet them in the bar.

Because the TSA is so wildly incompetent that it became the only choice if you wanted to go through the airport in a reasonable amount of time.

Typical California... instead of addressing why people even find a value proposition in clear (nobody wants to wait forever to get your drivers license scanned by an incompetent TSA employee) they go after the superior solution.

Yes, I understand the TSA is a federal agency. But the reality is CA is influential enough that they can push the TSA to do better. They already have with eg; the EPA.

I agree, in principle, that companies like CLEAR shouldn't exist in airports. But this is once again a reflection of the public sector getting bottom of the barrel talent and as a result being stifled in any sort of innovation.

Can someone share background on how they got privileges in the first place (as a startup) to escort passengers to the front of the queue? Do they act as designated reps of the airlines?

Here's a great and kind of terrifying story on CLEAR:

https://onezero.medium.com/clear-conquered-u-s-airports-now-...

Thanks. Non-paywalled: https://archive.ph/Wx8WS

Meanwhile...

Ted Cruz wants lawmakers to get security escorts through America’s airports https://www.politico.com/news/2024/02/03/ted-cruz-airport-se...

Sen. Ted Cruz faces backlash over his push for airport special privileges for members of Congress https://www.khou.com/article/news/politics/national-politics...

As a frequent traveler (80 flights alone last year), I feel like this bill is rather useless.

First, Clear is not present at all airports. Sometimes it's not even available at all terminals of the same airport (see JFK terminal 7 2 years ago) https://www.clearme.com/where-to-use-clear

Secondly, Clear lines clear (heh) much slower than the TSA-pre lines. EWR is a great example of this.

Lastly, TSA-Pre is going to eat Clear's lunch with their new programs: https://www.tsa.gov/news/press/releases/2024/03/06/tsa-and-d...

https://www.afar.com/magazine/tsa-precheck-is-introducing-se...

Global entry kiosks clear me to enter the country in 3 seconds. No reason going through security should take any longer.

I’m even miffed about global entry being a separate program you have to sign up for. Should just be an automatic thing after you’ve made X entries without any issues. As if the gov isn’t already assigning risk scores to people and pre-evaluating who is high or low risk.

You have to consider the fact that most airports were built pre-9/11. The architectural constraints of the airport means long lines are unavoidable if you need to scan people and carry-on luggages for things like metal and sharp objects. Global entry only deals with international passengers which represents fraction of all passengers traveling in the US (which is what the front security deals with).

It also doesn't help that the security have to deal with passengers who don't follow the rules: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-england-patriots-jack-jones...

To be fair, airports were already screening for that pre-9/11.

The tech has gotten a lot better which… should make things faster and easier to pinpoint and locate problematic objects instead of doing random checks?

I think long lines are mainly due to growth of travel and aviation (more planes, bigger planes, and jamming more people in the same plane) without corresponding growth in airport security infra.

If there were lineups at the shops in the airport, they’d build new and bigger shops in no time.

For anyone else curious about the brief mention of purple peeps being banned, turns out it's because it uses Red Dye 3 which Consumer Reports claims is a known carcinogen.

https://advocacy.consumerreports.org/press_release/popular-p...

I had clear for a bit when I traveled for work more often. It was nice, and it's definitely not "for rich people". It's less than $200 a year. I bet most people pay more for streaming services for non-essential entertainment. I've always been torn on if it's something viable long term though. While they're at it, they should ban fast passes at amusement parks.

That's $800 for a family of 4. With the median household income at under $80,000, it's ridiculous to think the average person can afford to spend that much just to skip a line a couple times a year.

> it's ridiculous to think the average person can afford to spend that much just to skip a line a couple times a year.

Well, sure, it's ridiculous to pay that much if you only travel a couple times a year. It's like how paying $700/year for airline lounge access is ridiculous if you only travel a couple times a year.

But $800 for a family of 4 is much closer to the average person than, say, using a private jet to skip security lines.

It is not. Your partner is discounted abd kids go free.

But a family of 4 is not the value proposition here. They are explicitly targeting frequent flyers that stand in the queue so often that the time saves add up.

If you're only traveling once a year, you can handle a 45 minute wait twice (although yes, it still sucks). If you're traveling once a week, it's a completely different ballpark.

Saddest part is that all these congress folks will almost certainly still have some kind of way to cut through things while taking it away from everyone else. I don't think CLEAR is fair, but let's make the whole airport process more humane for everyone.

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