Dozens of teenagers are now tweeting bomb jokes to American Airlines | Hacker News Reader

Dozens of teenagers are now tweeting bomb jokes to American Airlines

washingtonpost.com

37 pointsadamnemecek55 comments

If an airline can't differentiate between a teenager goofing around and a credible threat, then that's the airline's fault. A girl posting nonsense on twitter getting arrested just shows that "the system" is inhuman and it just chews people up and spits them out. I won't be surprised at all if this girl gets a long prison sentence and her life gets ruined. Nor will I be surprised when legions of pundits come out of the woodwork exclaiming it wasn't punishment enough, and all the copycats should be treated the same way.

The thing is, if you think for 30 seconds about the problem of defending infrastructure from crazy people, your best bet is to lurk where crazy people congregate, and keep a finger on the pulse of the ones who are poised to "do something". How often do these people actually make a threat? Don't they normally just execute the attack? Of course, even this is imperfect, and the best response is to rebuild when something gets blown up. Hurricanes happen, earthquakes happen, crazy people who hate you happen, and in every case your best "revenge" is to just outproduce entropy.

Overreaction to human threat is a symptom of a much deeper illness, and one that plays directly into the hands of real terrorists. The lives and treasure lost on 9/11 was trivial to the number of lives and treasure we've spent trying to prevent the unpreventable. We could have built the Twin Towers 10,000 times over for the money we've spent on war and the TSA and the NSA. It's fucking stupid, and I'm tired of it.

So prank calling 911 or pretending to rob a bank would be cool too?

>If an airline can't differentiate between a teenager goofing around and a credible threat, then that's the airline's fault.

I don't really want the airline making that assessment because they don't have the people/experience/knowledge/training/ability to accurately assess that threat. I would rather them make the time-wasting call to the FBI and have the FBI on record and clear it. The situation is dumb, but sometimes you have to follow procedure for dumb situations. It's easier to cover your ass than change our litigious and terrorism-fearing society, so while I agree that it shouldn't be necessary, it unfortunately is.

That said, AA's twitter response was dumb and they'd be dumber if 'respond publicly to any threats' was the status-quo.

> I don't really want the airline making that assessment because they don't have the people/experience/knowledge/training/ability to accurately assess that threat.

Is it really that hard of an assessment to make? Is the threat from a Twitter account? Yes? Okay, is there any reason to think the Twitter account is controlled by someone with the intention or ability to carry out an attack? No? Okay then.

>> is there any reason to think the Twitter account is controlled by someone with the intention or ability to carry out an attack?

You can't know that, that's why it's not OK and it's not legal. A threat is a threat. OK then.

>Okay, is there any reason to think the Twitter account is controlled by someone with the intention or ability to carry out an attack?

How does the person who controls their Twitter account decide that?

It's far easier to miss than hit, and it gets really grey. Look at any of the mass shooters in recent history. Some of them look a bit dysfunctional, but harmless. Others, not so. Would you REALLY have been able to differentiate shooters from harmless, outcast, social misfits?

It's easy to criticize, that's all I'm saying. Let's accept that this is a difficult situation to be put in, and I think notifying the FBI was the right thing. Whether or not the FBI has what it takes to make the right call, who knows. But AA does not.

This happened in the Netherlands. I don’t think anything much will happen to her. The police showing up and asking questions is enough of a deterrent. The only irrational overreaction I could think of is being put on some no-fly list. That would be awful.

> Nor will I be surprised when legions of pundits come out of the woodwork exclaiming it wasn't punishment enough, and all the copycats should be treated the same way.

No need to look very far, those people are right below the article (in the comments section). I rarely expect much from commentators on news sites but these ones are especially appalling.

Samples:

> "The feds need to put together a database of teens who post threats online and make them available to future prospective employers. I would have no issue if their lives get ruined."

> "It's high time we treat 10-14-year-olds, boys and girls alike, as severely as adults until they get the message. This means throwing them in maximum security prisons with violent hardened career criminals."

That's a really long-winded way of saying "Get your twitters off my lawn!"

It's a shame, though, because surely there's a deeper story here? Why are people doing this? Are they all teenagers? Do they know each other? How wide-spread is it? How are the airlines handling it?

In other words, it would be nice if the Post did some reporting instead of the "grumpy columnist" bit.

This appears to have spawned from 4chan, though I don't have the screenshots to verify it (reddit.com/r/4chan probably does)

Nope, it's a long-winded way of priming people to think this kind of activity is perfectly normal to ruin peoples lives over.

It started with this

http://www.businessinsider.com/twitterer-hints-of-terrorist-...

Tweeting intensifies...

http://www.buzzfeed.com/ryanhatesthis/us-airways-just-tweete...

I suppose this is just a nerd annoyance, but the false quip about forwarding her IP address to the FBI rubbed me the wrong way. After reporting the threat to the FBI, Twitter could then give the FBI that info. But AA never had that information, and whoever sent that tweet probably just used it as a scare tactic. Saying you have someone's IP address has become this bogeyman threat that more often than not is meaningless.

I know that's not really that pertinent to the whole story, but dammit is it annoying. Promulgates ignorance.

Is there something wrong with me that I am not even remotely outraged by this?

I don't think so. I found these two very amusing even:

"@AmericanAir hello my name is Ibrahim I think you guys are the BOMB!!!!!!"

"@SouthwestAir I bake really good pies and my friends call me ″the bomb” am I still allowed to fly?"

No. There is a huge difference between a threat and a credible threat. I know that they have to take things seriously, but the entire thing is teenagers throwing eggs because they could see it wasnt credible from the first second, and teenagers love to throw eggs.

Not at all, and in fact it heartens me to see this. The young haven't yet been socially worn down into worrying about being punished for things that should not be crimes. Mass protesting by kids is one of the few ways we might be able to roll back the ridiculous draconian punishments for victimless "crimes".

19 here. on the contrary, i would say our generation, unlike yours, does not give law enforcement or the gov't the benefit of the doubt as you describe, because we have had a precedent of hostile gov't and law enforcement our entire life. we weren't here for Eisenhower, JFK, Carter, or even Clinton. we became politically aware during the Bush era. we are extremely aware of the possible consequences of our actions and have no expectation that we will be treated fairly by authority figures.

Well sure, (the general) you might intellectually know. But that doesn't mean you prudently avoid possible life-altering consequences. It's not the generation's views, but the fact that you're younger and have a sense of invincibility. I've never much trusted "authority", but there's no way I would ever join in this tweet-fest. Because after being through various confrontations myself, I have found it more pleasant to generally avoid them - even when everything ends up all right in the end.

Over here in post-everything Europe, young people today unfortunately don't have much to rebel against. It might not be good for teenagers if our society drifts towards a situation where rebellious actions are either shrugged off by everybody or, alternatively, will be used to ruin your life.

There needs to be a middle ground for the kids to explore.

I agree about the need for non-binary punishment, but it's nothing new to "this" generation. Computer cracking laws have been around for decades with the same life-altering draconian penalties. My point is the only way these things are going to actually change is for masses of people to play chicken with the establishment, and see if they're really willing to destroy so many people's lives rather than just a few isolated cases.

I get your point, but come on, don't a few of these seem like they might be a bit too close to a real threat? And in the process, require more work to disqualify them.

@AmericanAir the bomb goes of in 3 hours — Alden Fernandez ♥ (@AldoFernz) April 14, 2014

@AmericanAir I have a bomb under the next plane to take off — Army Jacket . (@ShyyLicious) April 14, 2014

@AmericanAir I’m gonna bomb your 737 jet — ▲ demi ▼ (@ddlovatosteddy) April 14, 2014

@AmericanAir You really seem to not care that i’m about to bomb your plane that’s headed to Paris. Btw, my name is Ahmed. — Allie (@ComedyBatman) April 14, 2014

I can't say I find those tweets to be that funny. I'm probably not outraged, but I'm definitely not amused by it.

Well, it makes obvious what should already be obvious: that tweeting a threat is extremely easy, so without any additional information, the credibility of such a threat is extremely low. I don't know anything about the laws or policies around investigating terrorist threats, but I would hope that early in the process there is an attempt to estimate the credibility of a threat.

Outraged that 1) someone tweeted a fake bomb threat, 2) that someone actually got arrested over it, 3) that an entire industry finds itself in the legal position of having to take action to respond to something as utterly effortless as some asshat sending a tweet, or 4) that a self-described journalist seems to be wringing his/her hands over the lack of credibility (gasp) in the Twitterverse?

Is it possible that "taking all bomb threats deadly serious" is actually a poor policy? Arguments against: 1) base rate of airplane-related terrorism is very low 2) base rate of airplane-related terrorism that is preceded by a "credible threat" is much lower 3) can destroy lives of people who should know better (poor Sarah)

Perhaps these teens are engaging in a bit of civil disobedience to protest the current state of affairs. (It seems that Sarah was not, but others may be responding to her plight.)

[edit: formatting]

But if, in a very unlikely case, something actually happens then no one wants to be pointed out as the person who said 'lol idiots'.

>>> 3) can destroy lives of people who should know better

Yes. But on other hand, everyone in the right mind knows that joking about bombs and air planes is not funny for some certain institutions. So if they are smart enough to make jokes like that, they will totally find more ways to destroy or severely damage their lives.

In Vilnius (Lithuania) airport, near the check in tables, there is a warning saying that you can't joke about bombs. Because every year or two there are some geniuses who are 'joking' that they have a bomb once they board a plane.

I feel no one really cares about the possibility of a bomb being on a plane.

Everyone fears the negative PR that will destroy them if they make a mistake - they are just covering their asses, not thinking about human lives. And that fear is what drives every "security policy" since 9/11. Who cares if those policies are useless? We placed them there, we are safe!

Isnt that the problem? Why should be joking about bombs so serious? We pay airlines security to protect us, to use brains, not to simply enforce policies.

If teens keep sending fake tweets like this, how will the airlines be able to spot all of the real terrorists tweeting about the bombs they're about to detonate?

Not sure if you're being ironic. I don't think terrorists usually announce incoming bomb attacks before they happen.

I'm calling it: TOD, 12:20 AM PDT

REUTERS - In the small hours of the morning Irony coughed up a lung and died. It had been on life-support for nearly a decade when a seemingly innocent ...

I'm more upset on how blatantly racist the initial and other tweets seem.

Why do they need to arrest the girl? Certainly if they show up to her house they can tell she's not a terrorist.

The most charitable interpretation would be that they wanted to scare the shit out of her and make sure it doesn't happen again.

It also sends a message to other stupid teenagers: if you make a bomb threat at an airline, there will be a SWAT team at your door.

> It also sends a message to other stupid teenagers: if you make a bomb threat at an airline, there will be a SWAT team at your door.

Does the same apply to threats made against trains and buses?

There was a huge explosion at a bus station in Abuja on Monday, more than 70 killed. But that barely made the news in the 'West'; yet I am sure that if it had been on an aeroplane it would have been the leading story.

1. People only pay attention to something if it's rare or unusual. Hijackings and bombings are rare in some parts of the world but not others.

2. It is nearly impossible to hijack a train and make it slam into a skyscraper, because trains have little control over where they go. Planes on the other hand can be directed at virtually any target. Therefore it is rational to pay more attention to aircraft hijackings.

I'm not trying to defend the stark contrast between paranoia and apathy that you mentioned. Unfortunately, it's just a consequence of how human attention spans work.

For one thing, it's probably a crime to make a terrorist threat regardless of whether you have the intention or ability to carry out an attack.

Wouldn't that be profiling?

Not if they take the liberty of searching the house for any other evidence of terrorist intent.

I want to think this is some sort of protest over the treatment of the girl, but I actually think it's just some more kids wanting their 15 minutes of fame.

I hope the girl doesn't get in a lot of trouble. All they needed to do was to get someone to talk to her and tell her it was a really dumb idea.

Having a sense of humor is one thing; having some common sense shouldn't be another. I don't have any issues with someone being jovial but I expect it done in a responsible way. Perhaps I am just old.

14-year olds making stupid jokes on the Internet now results in international arrests.

After her initial tweet, the 14-year old apparently spent several hours on Twitter begging AA for "forgiveness", but the FBI ruined her life all the same.

>“I’m so sorry I’m scared now. I was joking and it was my friend not me, take her IP address not mine.”

>“I’m just a fangirl pls I don’t have evil thoughts and plus I’m a white girl"

>"I was kidding pls don't I'm just a girl pls."

Apparently the FBI was even more scared of her than she was of the FBI, judging from the measures it took.

>Apparently the FBI was even more scared of her than she was of the FBI, judging from the measures it took

And what extraordinary measures did they take? Picking up the phone and calling someone in the Netherlands? From what I've heard the girl practically turned herself in. I doubt anyone at the FBI spent more than a couple hours on this case.

The funny thing is, I was flying United and even though apparently you're not allowed to say the word "bomb" on a plane, they are happy to show a movie that glorifies terrorists ("The Company You Keep") as inflight entertainment.

It seems like violent metaphors or even threats of violence, are only tolerated when they come from the far left.

I know that it is a nice easy way to get an answer, but the problem has nothing to do with "the left" specifically. You're going to have to move past those media-fueled simplistic demonizations of the "other" side if you ever want to stop being part of the problem.

I can't know what problem I'm part of until you're more specific.

The problem I see is that inconsistent enforcement of both laws and social norms, allow one side of politics to be more expressive than the other. Compare "if the rich don't start dealing with the problem of inequality, violence is sure to follow", with "if politicians don't start dealing with the problem of non-White immigration, violence is sure to follow".

The larger problem I'm referring to is the division and conquering of the entirety of political debate, by deflecting anger away from the actual responsible parties and towards the people making up the "other" half.

Each group is organized in a different manner, causing the speech-asymmetry you describe - you are correct that the phrases are essentially describing similar things yet are perceived unequally. But to focus on this one specific mechanism is to miss the larger picture of how the people who identify with each side are goaded into using up their energy attacking each other while giving a pass to those in power responsible for the conditions.

Your original comment is an illustration of self-defeating groupthink occurring on your side. By misdiagnosing the situation as an instance of political speech asymmetry rather than exploring the specific inconsistency itself (say, leading back to the utter arbitrariness with which one can find oneself being seriously hassled when even just near an airport), you shoehorned the problem as if it is the sole doing of the "other" group, and left it at that. Clearly this resolves nothing.

You claim that the concepts of left and right are not useful because both sides are in fact being manipulated into fighting each other, rather than the true "responsible parties". Who exactly do you think these "responsible parties" are?

In this case, both the airlines and law enforcement for sustaining an environment where anything called a "threat" is treated as a drop-everything excuse to hassle anybody possibly involved, all without having to compensate the victims of false positives. Their behavior arises out of a cover-your-ass mentality, but that doesn't mean they should escape blame.

This is where the corruption begins, and the inconsistency you point out illustrates it. The airlines are able to show any movie because they set the status quo, not because of the movies' political affiliations.

I sincerely hope you can see the necessary difference in protocol for someone claiming to have a bomb and a movie with a bomb in it..

As for the last snipe, I'll assume it's directed at Robert Redford who directed that terrorist-glorifying movie of yours.

Would it surprise you to learn that Redford enthusiastically supported Gary Herbert (mormon, republican, A+ from NRA, wants to repeal 'unconstitutional' ACA, etc.) for lieutenant governor and for governor? The world isn't as black and white as people seem to think.

Jail them. Every last one of the punks.

I don't think that idiot kids should be encouraged to communicate threats. Not in America, anyway. Why? We also have a crazy gun culture. That sort of thing can get you killed. Besides the fact that it's very disrespectful.

Every one of these young people should receive a visit from the FBI. This behavior is not okay.

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