Comment by closewith
11 hours ago
> My point is that security can never be strict enough to catch someone who's truly motivated and funded, without making it impossible to admit people at a reasonable pace, and the current rules don't really help with that except for cutting down on the riff raff terrorists.
This is the classic HN developer arrogance and oversimplification, but let's accept this as true for argument's sake. It turns out that "riff raff terrorists" are the only ones we needed to stop as there's been no successful bombings of Western airlines in 25 years, and there have been foiled attempts.
The existence of master locksmiths (and door breaching charges) doesn't mean you shouldn't lock your door at night.
And nobody's going to fall for that "open the cockpit door or I kill the flight attendant" again.
> and there have been foiled attempts.
have there?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Failed_airliner_bombi... ->
2001: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Flight_63_(2...
2006: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_pl...
... which is what we're discussing here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_repercussions_due_to_...
2009: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northwest_Airlines_Flight_253
2010: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_transatlantic_aircraft_bo...
2016: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daallo_Airlines_Flight_159
2017: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Australian_aeroplane_bomb...
Literally none of these were foiled by the security circus we all have to go through.
If anything, they are evidence that serious attempts are foiled by intelligence services long before the perpetrators get anywhere near an airport, and the others were just incompetent idiots.
1 reply →
> The existence of master locksmiths (and door breaching charges) doesn't mean you shouldn't lock your door at night.
The TSA checkpoints are the equivalent of moving all your belongings onto the lawn, and then locking the door.
Why bother with the plane when now you have potentialy a magnitude more people in the queue to TSA?