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Comment by glenra | Hacker News Reader

I do suggest we scrap it all and go back to the 1950s. Let people walk right out to the gate to meet arrivals. Let people run through the airport right to the gate without having to stand in a line at all. Even the level of security we had before 9/11 was misguided and caused more deaths than it saved.

Here's all we should do: leave security policy up to the airlines themselves. Then there won't be the sort of single points of failure we have now. If one airline wants to reinforce the cockpit doors or arm the pilots they can just do that without getting permission from a central authority and making that the new mandated standard. Get rid of one-size-fits-all security. Let "convenient security" be just one more attribute that airline companies compete to provide, along with "comfortable seating" and "frequent flights".

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Why would the airlines have incentive to provide good-quality security? Terrorism events are rare and it seems unlikely that a reasonable amount of security infrastructure that the airline could provide would result in a substantial decrease in the probability that a sufficiently-motivated terrorist would be successful with an attack against that airline.

I just can't imagine we would get anything more than the airlines putting in a minumum amount of security theatre to meet appearances for the customers and appease the local regulations.

What airlines are doing now amounts precisely to "a large amount of security theatre to meet appearances for the customers and appease the local regulations."

I want to decentralize for two reasons:

(1) it removes single points of failure. For instance, post-911, airlines needed to GET PERMISSION to make changes such as strengthening the cockpit door or changing the protocol for opening it. Being more flexible means being able to quickly adjust to changing security circumstances.

(2) It gives customers the OPTION of purchasing LESS security. So far as I'm concerned, the airlines I fly are already far more "secure" than they need to be - I would pay extra to fly on a plane with NO security, one where people could just walk on openly carrying a rifle if they so desired.

Were it left up to the airlines, they would have to make tradeoffs between security and every other value customers have including cost and convenience. We then wouldn't get somebody's idea of "the best possible security no matter the cost". Instead we'd get "the best possible security consistent with not spending too much money and not inconveniencing or annoying passengers very much." Which is what we really want.

one where people could just walk on openly carrying a rifle if they so desired

So you also want airlines to modify cabins to handle oversized carry-on luggage? Nevertheless, the amount of people who would pay more to do this would not be commercially viable - you yourself state that cost is a significant factor for users. Keep in mind also that your security-free airline would have to have its own terminals, as its customers wouldn't be able to mingle with existing airline customers.

Also, why would you pay more for an item that's better off in checked luggage anyway? It's not like you can use the rifle between luggage drop-off and pick-up, and it's irritatingly large to carry around a cabin. It sounds like sacrificing pragmatics for pointless idealism, to me.

> So you also want airlines to modify cabins to handle oversized carry-on luggage?

No more so than they already do. See, I routinely travel with an acoustic guitar in a gig bag as my "personal item"; it fits in the overhead compartment. And when I don't have the big guitar I often carry a smaller "travel" guitar in a triangular case that is almost exactly the size and shape of a rifle case; they often let me hang that one in the coat closet to get it out of the way.

The problem here isn't that I want to carry a rifle on board, it's that I want other people to be free to carry a rifle on board. I want that because preventing them from doing so inflicts a cost on me. Preventing things like rifles means I need to get to the airport an hour before the flight and I need to stand in long security lines and let them grope and/or ogle me and search my baggage and confiscate my sunscreen and examine my guitar and send my electronics through a second time. Every. Single. Flight.

If I could skip all that nonsense - just come to the airport and walk right to the gate WITHOUT the search, that would worth at least an extra 5 or 10 bucks to me because it substantially reduces the chance that I'll miss my flight. And it would SAVE the airline money not having to pay for search goons and their equipment, and it would even make me more likely to fly.

I want other people to be able to carry a rifle because I'm not a hoplophobe. In fact, I personally would feel ever-so-slightly safer in a flight where I knew other people might be armed as a matter of default than in one where the ONLY armed people are likely to be bad guys or Official Security. Because I trust that on average, by and large, my fellow passengers are competent and well-meaning people. They're not ALL potential terrorists; any potential terrorists are seriously outnumbered and (in my world) outgunned.

I just want to get on the damn plane without the time-wasting rigamarole.

Have you ever gone skydiving? If so, did you notice that there's no airport security there - you don't have to take off your shoes and helmets and put the parachute through a metal detector? You just put on all your crap, get on the plane with it and the plane takes off. Right then and there. You can do this at small airports all over the country, using decent sized planes. And somehow nobody has ever used this as an opportunity to kick everyone out, hijack the plane and crash it into a building.

The specific threat that modern "airport security" is designed to stop is essentially nonexistent. We are fighting an imaginary hobgoblin, an empty set. The money we spend doing so is entirely wasted other than that it makes a few people feel more confident to think that we're "doing something".

We should address the same fear some other way. Maybe if we put up billboards and ran ads explaining why all the security theater makes us less safe, people would stop demanding it.

>And somehow nobody has ever used this as an opportunity to kick everyone out, hijack the plane and crash it into a building.

Because how much damage could you really do with one of these, versus a widebody jet fueled up for a long flight?

Here's someone who crashed a smaller aircraft into an office building. It just damaged a corner office and killed the teenager who was at the controls, not exactly the kind of major attack that terrorists go gunning for.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Tampa_plane_crash

I like your example about skydiving, but your reasoning is flawed. Hijacking a skydiving plane and crashing it into a building isn't likely to cause a lot of damage. More importantly, it's not likely to cause a lot of terror. The planes are relatively small, passengers are well equipped to simply jump out (therefore, no hostages), or some would happily make a fight of it, knowing they'd probably be safe getting out of the plane anyway.

Nevertheless, your point is important. There are a lot of potential "terrorist tools" that are not protected. How about a terrorist taking over a subway/train and running full speed until it crashes or derails? I can't be the only one who's noticed operators are almost always alone. Even during a shift/operator change, overpowering 2 of them wouldn't be difficult. Same goes for most other type of public transportation (commuter trains, busses, trolley, ferry, etc.)

There are a LOT of terrorist plot/targets that scare me more than a commercial airliner today. Lots of things that keep me awake at night and wonder about the world our kids will inherit. I'll be completely shocked if a commercial airliner type of plot happens again in my lifetime. At least in that environment people would be far more aggressive towards an attack during a flight. The US government is well behind the curve with TSA and it seems clear they are simply attempting to justify the TSA's existence.

It's true that some people jump out of tiny planes like a cessna but I was thinking of the larger ones like this:

http://www.skydivephiladelphia.com/wp-content/themes/asc/ima...

Even less than fully fueled that thing could put a pretty big hole in a building and the cockpit doesn't even HAVE a door separating it from the main cabin. Yes, it might prove tricky to take over a flight full of instructors and students in the air, but given that legitimate customers have easy access to the airfield at ground level before and after a jump and there's no real security there it's not hard to imagine ways a sufficiently motivated and unscrupulous person could take over such a plane at relatively minimal risk to themselves and weaponize it.

But yeah, that's just one of a zillion possible threats anybody with half a brain can come up with. The current airport security model assumes the existence of terrorists who have a really weird set of characteristics such that they are simultaneously:

(1) sufficiently driven and resourceful to successfully bring down a plane via a bomb or weapons if there were no security (this is pretty hard)

(2) NOT sufficiently driven and resourceful to find a way AROUND the current security measures (even though this is easy)

(3) also NOT sufficiently driven and resourceful as to find some OTHER way of causing a similar amount of terror and damage, such as blowing up 5 busses or funding a half-dozen "DC snipers" around the country or blowing up the security line itself.

What disturbs me is that you're arguing from the opposite extreme. Airport security does stop security threats - it raises the bar considerably. There's definitely an argument that current security is way over the top in the US, but the opposite extreme is even more silly. The moderate path is the way forward - it does not follow that all security measures are security theater.

All the arguments about 'what about blowing up trains/buses/whatever' also miss vital points - namely, that the passengers on a plane cannot escape, and small damage to a plane can doom it. This is not true of trains or buses. Combine this with the point that the public, rightly or wrongly, are more significantly affected by a plane crash, and it becomes clearer why planes are better targets for terrorism. Similarly, the demographic that uses planes are largely middle-class. Those who use public transport have a much larger proportion of working-class people on them, who have less political power, and the media also cares less about them.

You also still have to face the issue of running your own terminals, because any international airport has its sterile zone, which is connected to every other international airport in the world. Until you get them all accepting your citizenry carrying weaponry, your local international airport is going to keep its sterile zones. And running your own terminals is going to cost you more than $5 extra/ticket...

Because I trust that on average, by and large, my fellow passengers are competent and well-meaning people.

'On average' is the problem here. The general public includes all sorts of idiots, terrorist or otherwise. Anyone who's had a job facing the general public will be aware that there are plenty of people who fuck with you just because they can. Particularly in an enclosed environment where people sometimes get heavily inebriated.

And regarding the skydiving, light aircraft have only rarely been used for terrorism. The same is very much not true of heavy aircraft, which have a long track record of terrorism.

The specific threat that modern "airport security" is designed to stop is essentially nonexistent.

Ultimately, this is a chicken-and-egg problem. Hijacking has been made extremely difficult by the current measures, but even before 9/11, hijacking was much more difficult in the 90s than in the 70s due to increasing the bar for security. The threat is there, but higher security means you have to be better-resourced in order to defeat it.

Perhaps put another way: if there is actually no threat, then why do you say you'd feel safer if your fellow passengers were armed? Shouldn't you be saying it'd make no difference?

> Airport security does stop security threats - it raises the bar considerably.

As somebody who flies a lot for work, it raises the bar enough to stop a really stupid terrorist. Those business travellers that you see flying week in, week out know more about airport security flaws than the TSA.

On the other hand airplane security does raise the bar. The change to have reinforced cockpit doors was the only thing that changed after 9/11 that makes flying safer.

It's worth pointing out that we weren't discussing security changes post 9/11, but the presence of security at all. Pre 9/11 security did pretty well (as I said, see 90s vs 70s), which would be fine with a small bit of tuning. But to completely remove security altogether? It's throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

I'm only saying to completely remove security altogether with respect to how we treat the PASSENGERS. That is, when people walk into a plane let them be "protected" to much the same degree as when they walk down the street or get on a bus or a train. Protected by a little sensible thought put into how the environment is designed and a little faith in human nature, not at all protected by strip searches and behavior rules written out in minute detail and a legion of guards with uzis wearing camo on every corner.

In response to prior experience with hijackers, pre-9/11 "security" primarily involved disarming the passengers and training passengers and crew alike that they should act like sheep, exercise no judgment of their own and obey any commands given by hijackers. 9/11 should have sufficiently demonstrated the fundamental flaw with that approach - that it is brittle. It was perhaps worth trying back then, but it didn't work and we should try something else instead.

There are many busses in NYC where the bus driver is in a bulletproof compartment; he doesn't have to come out until/unless it's safe. One cannot reasonably expect to hijack such a bus. Planes can be similarly safe against hijacking so long as airlines take cockpit security seriously. Make sure the door is strong and secure, make sure the pilots can see OUT of it well when they need to - this might involve a bulletproof glass window - and make sure there are clear protocols such that nothing going on in the main cabin can force the pilots to come out. Let the pilots be armed as well if they so desire. Beyond that, we might want to encourage passengers NOT to be sheep, but it would probably suffice to merely let them exercise common sense. (The would-be shoe bomber and underwear bomber were ignominiously foiled by fellow passengers.) "Taking control" of a huge room full of hundreds of people is not an inherently easy thing to do and it's not clear it could ever happen again in a similar situation now that the risk is known. Given that ordinary technology and protocols and social institutions make controlling the cabin unlikely and controlling the cockpit nearly impossible even WITH the use of weapons, why bother searching for them?

There is a weird feedback loop in operation: we are unusually afraid of plane hijackings, so plane hijackings are an unusually good way to make people afraid. But hijacking is already nearly impossible, so we just need to stop being afraid of it. The solution to terrorism is to stop being terrorized. Modern security leaves people defenseless as it sends the message that they SHOULD be afraid; getting rid of security would send the message that the threat isn't so bad that we need to be paranoid about it. Paradoxically, this would actually make planes a less attractive target for terrorists.

There is no baby in there; it's ALL bathwater. It's dirty and gross and needs to be tossed out.

It's not about "using it", it's about transporting as you see fit. A good-quality rifle can easily cost $3000, and is a device of precision mechanisms & optics - not something you want strangers throwing about for hours a la "checked-in luggage", especially as if you're transporting it you will need it in good working order upon arrival (likely the point of the trip). Sure it's long, but a slim-fit case can go into the coat rack well; "takedown" models in-case would fit well in the overhead bin.

Yes, I have travelled with one. Check-in etc was more a hassle, and no more "safe" for all concerned, than if I'd just carried it on.

Some smaller flights make the issue laughable: for all the trouble of checking in luggage, screening it, and securing it for the trip, it's all ultimately just stowed behind a curtain in the cabin.

I agreed with you more before this post. Let's consider the advantages of centralization:

(1) A single agency can have within its mandate, expertise, and budget the security apparatus, which requires full-stack authority: airport design and administration, customs officials, airlines, planes, luggage, etc. The airlines can focus on the task they actually want to perform and are qualified to perform, whereas the one agency responsible for security can be audited and held accountable for that task as a unit.

(2) Customers cannot purchase less security. This is an advantage. It is nonsense for a customer to walk openly onto an aircraft carrying a rifle.

I think "airport security" has much less to do with passenger security than the risks inherent with allowing planes to fly through our skies. 9/11 is a clear example that many more people than the passengers of the flight can be affected via air-terrorism. This is why planes are controlled.

I'm not opposed to that control; I just marvel at how awful a job the U.S. government does at determing the cost/convenience/effectiveness tradeoffs. In my experience in the United States, this seems to be a systemic problem with governmentally-administered services that does not seem to exist so much in other governments.

There aren't many airlines, and I expect the overwhelming majority of consumers would consistently purchase the cheapest option. If airlines are the agency entrusted with safe flight, this makes everyone less safe. Rather, airport and flight security seems better serviced as an airport-surcharge or tax. What's missing is effective, accountable security provided by experts that we trust. I don't know why that isn't something we can solve.

> It is nonsense for a customer to walk openly onto an aircraft carrying a rifle.

I'm not sure that I agree. Prior to metal detectors and airport security here in the US plenty of guns were carried on planes and very few bad outcomes were the result. I've heard of planes getting hijacked and going to Cuba but nothing in the way of mass murders on airplanes.

I wish that instead of just stating this as a fact that you had argued it in some way. For point 1 you gave reasoning. For point 2 you just said "this is true" and stopped.

If you had said something like "air is necessary for life" yeah sure, I won't belabor that point. It's scientifically verifiable at least for humans.

But when the parent was posting "I wish people could just carry rifles and it not be a big deal" it's clear that your position is more of an opinion than a fact. You might consider it a fact, but you're replying to glenra who quite obviously doesn't agree.

> I've heard of planes getting hijacked and going to Cuba but nothing in the way of mass murders on airplanes.

Now you have:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Air_Lines_Flight_773

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Southwest_Airlines_Flig...

While these incidents are tragic, two incidents in the span 50 years of passenger aviation since WW2 don't seem like a big problem.

More people have been killed by lunatics while going to church without churches imposing a security theatre on attendees.

That was an response to the previous poster's incorrect observation about hearing "nothing in the way of mass murders on airplanes."

It appears that you incorrectly interpreted it as a complete list, as you concluded that only two incidents have occurred. http://listverse.com/2014/03/26/10-people-who-committed-murd... gives other examples of people who have committed mass murder on an airplane, including http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continental_Airlines_Flight_11 (as a consequence of a suicide-by-bomb insurance fraud).

Also, the context was "mass murders on airplanes." Mass murder means typically 4 or more deaths. I have found many murders which took place at churches in the US [1] and ending up with one or two death. However, I haven't haven't found much in the way of mass murders of the sort that is supposed to be identified by security theater measures.

[1] If we go outside of the US then there are certainly metal detectors at some synagogues, bomb detectors at Mecca’s Holy Mosque, etc.

Over the decades of following online discussions, I'm growing ever more irritated at pedantic declarations of wrongness by countering reasonable generalizations with obscure/rare exceptions. Yes, out of the total vast number of commercial "airbus" flights ever, a minuscule number have suffered such incidents; likewise, a tiny number of holy sites are secured due to extreme attraction of violent nutjobs; taken in context both in absolute percentage of instances and in this being a casual discussion involving short comments of understandably less than peer-reviewed encyclopedic thoroughness, we don't have to spend time arguing minute absolutes.

I appreciate your comment. I should have been clear to separate my opinion that "availability of rifles on planes make them less safe" away from the argument that "less-safe planes should not be a passenger choice because the harm caused by the lax security is commit against non-passengers as well".

A pretty common argument around the pro-gun community is that removing guns from a specific area (schools, movie theaters, airlines) makes those places a prime target for mass shootings/terrorism -- the attacker knows that the area is gun-free and that, if he can get his own weapons into the area, he can't be (easily) challenged.

I'm not entirely sure if this is true or not, but it seems accurate -- have there been mass shootings in areas before they declared "gun-free zones?" Anyways, my point wasn't to argue for or against this, just that it seemed relevant to your comment -- you say that there were no issues when we used to let people just walk on planes with their guns, but once we started banning them, we started having things like 9/11.

As a frequent pro-gunner, the argument as I see it is more that if you want a gun-free zone that might actually be safer, then you need the whole airport-style rigmarole - metal detectors and armed security at every entrance, everybody entering gets their bodies and bags scanned or searched until you can positively verify that there aren't any guns, carefully designed walls, fences, and doors to make sure that nobody ever gets through anywhere but the official entrances with security, etc.

Putting up a sign saying gun-free zone at a place with no security makes things less safe, since it can only deter people who would never commit a crime anyways.

I think there are several factors to consider.

Terrorism is an infinitesimally small threat, but many on the political side chose to treat it with heavy gloves despite the diminishing returns because (1) the Zero-risk cognitive bias makes people want to force than small risk to zero [1] and (2) the federal government views the TSA as a jobs program. Even though they're largely ineffective, no politician would dare to propose the dismantling thereof because the opposing side could use this as ammunition in the form of 'X is allowing the terrorists in' or 'X has cost us 10,000 jobs.'

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-risk_bias

> Even the level of security we had before 9/11 was misguided and caused more deaths than it saved.

Even if I grant that it saved no lives, it's not obvious to me how it caused any.

> Here's all we should do: leave security policy up to the airlines themselves.

Airplanes filled filled with thousands of pounds of jet fuel hurtling overhead create externalities, with costs borne by the community. While customers certainly would consider safety and security in choosing an airline, those killed on the ground in Lockerbie and in the WTC and at the Pentagon did not make that choice.

> > Even the level of security we had before 9/11 was misguided and caused more deaths than it saved.

> Even if I grant that it saved no lives, it's not obvious to me how it caused any.

This is discussed elsewhere in the thread, mainly here:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8220129

When you make flying less attractive, people are more likely to drive. Driving is orders of magnitude more dangerous, so people die in car crashes who wouldn't have if they had flown.

Security makes flying less attractive because:

- higher monetary cost for the flight (some of this is reflected in explicit "security fees", some not)

- bigger time commitment due to having to arrive early to allow for security

- bigger chance of missing the flight (if you're the sort of person who tends to cut it close on time)

- less flexibility. For instance, before the modern security era you could just buy a ticket and then if it turns out you couldn't use it you could sell it on craigslist. Or if the flight was overbooked you could directly sell your ticket to somebody on standby - the airlines didn't care.

- greater chance of being stolen from because you are forcibly separated from your valuables which are accessed out of your sight.

- greater stress due to the fear of losing one's valuables.

- more stress due to fears related to dealing with security personnel, long lines, being treated like sheep, having one's personal space invaded and more.

The most DIRECT way all this translates into extra deaths is that fewer people fly so more die on the road. One INDIRECT way it translates into extra deaths is that fewer people travel at all (or do so more expensively) which damages economic growth; economic growth tends to promote health.

How exactly has airport security caused any deaths?

Airport security makes flying much more expensive (both in time and in money) and inconvenient and generally unpleasant than it would otherwise be. So many people who otherwise would take a plane on a short trip choose to drive instead. Some of those people die needlessly in traffic accidents, since driving is orders of magnitude more dangerous than flying. That's the primary mechanism of harm.

A common estimate I've seen is that roughly 500 extra people a year die due just to the added security costs post-9/11.

A little googling finds a few relevant popular-press articles including these:

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-11-18/how-airport-...

http://www.wired.com/2012/04/is-airport-security-killing-500...

One of the relevant academic papers is by Cornell University researchers Garrick Blalock, Vrinda Kadiyali, and Daniel H. Simon, “The Impact of Post-9/11 Airport Security Measures on the Demand for Air Travel,” published in The Journal of Law and Economics in November 2007. (pdf here: http://dyson.cornell.edu/faculty_sites/gb78/wp/JLE_6301.pdf )

I seriously doubt that a $5.60 fee has a significant effect on demand for $200-$500 plane tickets.

If that were the case, one could argue that the overpriced food at the airport also kills people.

As for your sources: The paper linked by Business Week doesn't say anything about the price of airport security deterring people, rather it is about the aggregate group that substituted driving for flying after 9/11, which has a myriad of causes. It does not support the assertion that the price of the TSA kills people.

The second link asserts that the time spent due to TSA procedures puts more people on the road, but I doubt this for two reasons: 1. security has been quick and efficient in my 2x-4x flights per year experience and 2. the rule of getting to the airport 1 hour before domestic and 2 hours before international flights existed before 9/11 too. So if somebody spends 30 minutes in a security line or 5 minutes, that affects their time twiddling their thumbs at the gate and not their travel time (and therefore doesn't really impact the decision to fly or drive).

Personally, I don't fly if I don't have to. The cost of flights has nothing to do with it.

The way things are now, I feel threatened in an airport. Especially a US airport, though Canadian ones aren't much better. I feel a heightened possibility that my valuables be stolen from me. That it's done under the color of law makes it even worse than being in a rough neighborhood.

Some may say this is unreasonable, but I know two people who've been stolen from by TSA.

I'd rather drive 8 hours than be subjected to a warrantless search.

Do you know they were stolen from by the TSA, or by baggage handlers? Getting rid of the TSA wouldn't solve the latter problem.

TSA theft happens all the time. They have the ability to take stuff from passengers basically with impunity. What are you doing to do, start a row in the security line?

http://rt.com/usa/tsa-stealing-from-travelers-358/

As a matter of TSA policy. They're directed & empowered to take things which are harmless (save for absurdly extraordinary efforts with minute operational payoff), under the threat of "give this up or lose your paid ticket".

On case is someone I know directly, the other is a friend of a friend who I haven't met personally.

Both alledged thefts were of jewelry in carry on, so if the allegations are true then it was TSA.

We are forced to divest ourselves of metalic objects and then put them through an xray, out of our sight, operated by a low class, unaccountable workforce.

Going through there gives me this mix of feelings: anxiety from being on my guard, fear that I may lose costly property, anger towards whose who designed this awful system and the liars who enable it, pity for the poor losers who work in it, and despair that Americans allow themselves to be treated this way - like chattel.

This comment is correct. People do avoid flying in particular because it is so annoying and humiliating. I know this anecdotally from talking to both frequent and infrequent flyers, and I believe several statistics and studies bear it out, though I haven't carefully analyzed the methodology.

Additionally, the economic costs of slowing and discouraging plane flight are staggering. The loss of people's time spent waiting in the airport is a tangible economic price. Thousands of human hours wasted daily. The security procedures make what should be very short trips (for example, New York to DC) inconvenient enough that it becomes a toss up between plane, train, and car. In my opinion, this is a significant step backwards for our effective infrastructure.

I'm not sure if it's true, but I've read that the airlines didn't want to have any part in security after 9/11 because of the liability.

> I do suggest we scrap it all and go back to the 1950s. Let people walk right out to the gate to meet arrivals.

You could do this in the 90s. It still boggles my mind that someone thought it should be stamped out.

It's also a bit surprising that meeting people at the gate is thought of as some bizarre behavior that only happened in ancient antiquity. All of these restrictions, and all of these new bureaucracies are brand new, completely created and maintained over the administrations of only two presidents.

You can still dos it in Australia, for domestic flights (albeit you have to pass the security check.) Still, I was quite surprised the first time I noticed so.

Methinks he was referring to not what we think of now as the "gate" (the extended building reaching to the plane), but in fact walking right out on the tarmac.

Nah, I meant what we think of now as "gate". For instance, I remember going out to meet people at the gate at SFO in the 1990s. I'm not quite old enough - or perhaps didn't grow up in a small enough town? - to remember routinely walking out on the tarmac to greet a plane.

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