12 ms·

How Israel handles airport security

550 points by epo 16y ago

aresant 16y ago
Article leaves out the very real and very big catch: "Israel values its security, and pays for it. According to an analysis by Bloomberg News, Israel spends around 10 times more per passenger than the United States does." A little more on that: "[An analyst] estimated El Al's security bill at $100 million a year, which amounts to $76.92 per trip by its 1.3 million passengers. Half is paid by the Israeli government," Peter Robison wrote. The United States, in comparison, spent in 2008 $5.74 billion to monitor and protect 735,297,000 enplanements, or around $7.80 a passenger." The TSA system is a production line - hire cheap unskilled labor, and train around a process and manuals. In the USA the Israeli version would be very difficult in addition to very costly. That doesn't even take into account the question of the uproar the system would cause with the suggestion of racial profiling. References via: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aFyfihM1e3G4&refer=politics http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a... and http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/01/07/would_you_pay_25_for_71_seconds_of_scrutiny_in_an_airport http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/01/07/would_you_pay...
- jbl 16y ago
  The TSA system is a production line - hire cheap unskilled labor, and train around a process and manuals. This is the big thing that popped out at me from reading the article. The personnel described sound highly experienced and trained. I wonder how long and how much it would cost to bring your standard TSA screener up to that level.
  - jambo 16y ago
    I think this is outside the realm of possibility for many current TSOs.
  - anigbrowl 16y ago
    Don't forget that Israel has conscription, requiring 2 or 3 years of military service for all Israelis over 18. Given Israel's somewhat unique security situation this policy is likely more of an asset than a waste, but it's not obvious that it could be successfully generalized to larger or more diverse countries, where the benefits to the state might conflict more sharply with individual freedoms.
  - SkyMarshal 16y ago
    It sounds from the article that the Israeli airport security personal are all ex-IDF. It's a job they naturally matriculate into after serving their required 2yrs in the IDF. I am not an expert, but I imagine that given the primary mission of the IDF in dealing with Palestine, they probably receive training and some experience (depending on where they are assigned) in how to spot potential terrorists using behavioral profiling. So when they leave and join airport security, they hit the ground running. US soldiers on the other hand probably aren't given much behavioral profiling training. We seem to specialize in blowing stuff up, steamrolling it with tanks, then randomly throwing money at it afterwards. If any military or ex-military know differently, please correct me. Gen. Petraeus may be slowly improving that SOP, in Iraq and Afghanistan at least, but I'm not sure how much his work there is getting rebased to general boot camp and officer training programs. Eg, are these kinds of soft skills percolating throughout the US military, or are only the Special Forces and other groups specifically tasked with winning hearts and minds in Afghanistan getting this training? So the question remains, would filling the TSA ranks with military veterans and paying them higher wages provide a more Israeli-like airport security force? Dunno. Certainly worth considering, but there are some significant differences.
    - tjmc 16y ago
      There is definitely soft skills training in the US military. This was an interesting read: http://www.amazon.com/Interrogators-War-Breaking-Al-Qaeda-Afghanistan/dp/0719566207 http://www.amazon.com/Interrogators-War-Breaking-Al-Qaeda-Af... It's a military interrogator's account of the techniques used in Afghanistan.
    - RyanMcGreal 16y ago
      >It sounds from the article that the Israeli airport security personal are all ex-IDF. Every Israeli adult is ex-IDF, except for those adults who are still in the IDF.
      - wheels 16y ago
        Not true. About a quarter of men and a third of women do not enlist: http://www.haaretz.com/news/idf-nearly-28-of-israeli-males-avoided-conscription-in-2007-1.232645 http://www.haaretz.com/news/idf-nearly-28-of-israeli-males-a...
- epo 16y ago
  The other thing it omits is the difference in treatment between Arabs and non-Arabs. Profiling is inevitable. If you don't know who is threatening you and pay special attention to those people then you are a fool. But most of those people aren't threatening you and will feel aggrieved, this is how resentments grow and fester. EDIT choosing who you pay attention to is obviously key, casting your net too widely is what ticks people off. These are not easy problems to solve without removing the cause of the discontent which is making people threaten you in the first place.
- credo 16y ago
  I disagree on both counts. 1. Costs: I think the value of preventing a terrorist attack greatly outweighs the $76/passenger cost of screening. Besides, it contributes a lot of value to the economy by (a) reducing the long lines we have in our airports today and (b) eliminating the unnecessary intrusive procedures 2. Racial profiling: Behavioral profiling is not the same as racial profiling. Besides do you really think that the low-paid unskilled TSA workers don't currently do any racial profiling ?
  - nodata 16y ago
    Can I ask how are you comparing costs here? 76 dollars per passenger is an obscene amount of money: look at the dollar totals. In terms of lives saved, the TSA is already a gigantic waste of money. You could save a lot more lives per dollar by doing hundreds of other different things.
    - alex_c 16y ago
      $77 per passenger is a huge amount, especially compared to the cost of a cheap domestic flight. But what is the hidden cost of the clusterfuck that American airports are becoming? I would gladly pay an extra $38 per flight if it meant going through a sane, competent, and, if not pleasant, at least not overtly hostile system.
      - harisenbon 16y ago
        Why not even make it opt in? Ticket price plus a 38 dollar "treat me like a human being" tax. I'd pay it.
        aberkowitz 16y ago
        What has it come to when we have to pay more, just to be treated as humans?
        chopsueyar 16y ago
- DanI-S 16y ago
  Economy of scale? Israel has far fewer people, far fewer flights and far fewer airports than the US.
  - sliverstorm 16y ago
    It may not work that way though. This reminds me of mom-and-pop restaurant (Israel) vs. chain (USA)- the chain, while benefiting from economy of scale, can never manage to retain the mom-and-pop feel and quality.
  - clr 16y ago
    The security is also in place in a modified fashion at flights returning to Israel from other countries. They hire and train and house their security overseas - another reason the job is so attractive to young people.
- yummyfajitas 16y ago
  That probably underestimates what it would cost us to have Israeli style security. In the US, we would need to pay market rates for airport security personnel. In Israel, they can pay far less since much of Israel's domestic security is provided by forced labor. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription#Countries_with_and_without_mandatory_military_service http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription#Countries_with_and...
  - endtime 16y ago
    I don't think airport security officials in Israel are doing their national service stint, though I could be wrong.
    - beagle3 16y ago
      You are not wrong.
  - ars 16y ago
    Uh, soldiers are paid. And airport security work is not by soldiers anyway, it's regular employment.
    - yummyfajitas 16y ago
      Forced labor wages < market wages. If they were not, there would be no need for forced labor. As for airport security not being done by soldiers, my mistake. I only visited Israel once, but I was under the impression the airport guys were IDF. I guess I'm misremembering the uniforms. Thanks for the correction.
      - jbooth 16y ago
        It's only sort of forced -- conscription is there for cultural reasons, not out of necessity. From what I understand (which could be wrong), pretty much anyone can get out of the army there if they want. But people like the symbolism of "everyone serves". Certainly it doesn't behave according to standard "market" rules though, even in a situation where they abolished the "forced" part and left it to culture to enforce service from 18-21.
- Lagged2Death 16y ago
  If you were a member of Congress or a lobbyist for a security equipment manufacturer, you'd see high costs as a benefit, not a problem. As long as the cost would result in profits for a (relative) few. I think our government would gladly pay Israeli-level security costs - if it could spend it on machinery made in the USA, rather than on salaries and training. It sounds to me like the Israelis are the ones that have a process and who are devoted to their manuals. Every horror story we hear about the TSA seems to involve TSA agents not having a clue how to behave like civilized people, let alone effective security officers, in even the most mundane situations.
- bigiain 16y ago
  "Israel values its security, and pays for it. According to an analysis by Bloomberg News, Israel spends around 10 times more per passenger than the United States does." I'll bet those numbers change if you include the cost of a pair of world trade center towers and the associated expenses of that incident. "Cheap and ineffective" != "inexpensive"
  - amalcon 16y ago
    More comprehensive pre-flight screening could not have stopped the Sept. 11 attacks, because they did not involve sneaking contraband onto the plane. The cardboard box cutters that were used in the attack were allowed at the time.
    - __david__ 16y ago
      Yeah but the Israeli style behavioural profiling very well might have flushed their intentions out.
      - BrandonM 16y ago
        Exactly. This is a perfect argument for the Israeli style of behavioral profiling as opposed to the American style of trying to imagine every possible way to hijack a plane.
      - amalcon 16y ago
        It might have, but surely not to the level of certainty that your GP suggested.
    - shimfish 16y ago
      That's why, apart from pre-flight screening, they have a policy of having plainclothes air marshals on every flight and locking the cabin door.
- jemfinch 16y ago
  "To be fair, this compares per-passenger costs for El Al, Israel's national carrier, to the costs for the TSA, the U.S. agency responsible for air safety. Ideally, we'd want to compare the airport security costs for Shin Bet, a Israeli security agency." I think it's a bit disingenuous to quote the previous statement without this one.
jakarta 16y ago
The biggest problem with adopting the Israeli model IMO is with resources. You would have to spend a lot of money training and hiring people who would be good at behavioral profiling. The other problem is that Israel is a tiny country, they only have two international airports -- so they can focus all of their resources on those two airports. That's not the case here in the US.
- protomyth 16y ago
  You could probably recruit ex-military http://www.mikeroweworks.com/job-site/vetsmilitary-resources/ http://www.mikeroweworks.com/job-site/vetsmilitary-resources...
- jaspero 16y ago
  I don't think resources are the problem. You can decentralize TSA jobs. San Francisco area just needs to monitor one airport or three bay area airports. So, I think decentralization is the key and saying that US has too many airports is not an excuse.
  - foobarbazoo 16y ago
    You can enter any major airport securely by flying in from a smaller, regional airport. So you need to secure those. But you can get into a smaller, regional airport securely by flying in from an even smaller airport. So you need to secure those too. We have a lot of airports in the US that need to be secured. The better response is to tell Americans that airplanes are a terrorist target, just like busses (which are bombed all the time in Israel, thanks to their stellar airport security making airlines a harder target), and to remain vigilant. That is all. Taking off our shoes, submitting to naked photographs and (just for fun) radiation is beyond laughable. It seems people would rather be demeaned than live in (an irrational) fear. Sad. Even sadder: more Americans will die by choosing to drive rather than fly. Somehow, I doubt Big Sis sheds a tear.
nivertech 16y ago
Yeah, we have the best airport security in Israel ;) I witnessed a case, when a guy, who joked with the "profiling" girl, was escorted to his jet by security guard. I second, that profiling is not by race, but behavior (and maybe accent). Their questions can be funny and sometimes even rude. Still it's better than removing your shoes, posing naked and getting radiation.
yuvadm 16y ago
While the rest of the world has plenty to learn from the Israeli security model, there are two caveats which are left unmentioned: 1) Israel is a small country and is able to quickly identify terrorist threats via intelligence gathering. This is not something you can scale globally. 2) It would be naive to think that profiling is not done on a racial basis. Plenty stories exist about Arab-Israelis being unnecessarily harassed by security. Same stories for Jewish-Israeli? Almost none. Racial profiling is a big part of the game. One thing is certain - the entire world must stop the masquerade going on these days at airports. "Security"? Give me a break.
icegreentea 16y ago
While many of the Israel procedures might be kinda hard to implement in the States or Canada (or elsewhere), there's really a few that really should be looked at. Like the whole containment thing. "First, the screening area is surrounded by contoured, blast-proof glass that can contain the detonation of up to 100 kilos of plastic explosive. Only the few dozen people within the screening area need be removed, and only to a point a few metres away. Second, all the screening areas contain 'bomb boxes'. If a screener spots a suspect bag, he/she is trained to pick it up and place it in the box, which is blast proof. A bomb squad arrives shortly and wheels the box away for further investigation." I mean... you gotta admit. That just makes so much sense.
- daten 16y ago
  Consider how many bottles of liquid the TSA confiscates in a day because they might be explosives. Now imagine actually treating each of those as if the agent really believed it was a threat in the style described in the article. Does this still make sense?
  - bruceboughton 16y ago
    It would make sense if they actually put some thought into identifying threats, rather than simply confiscating items previously used in thwarted attacks.
    - hrabago 16y ago
      This is the part that disappoints me the most, especially after the toner ban. I would expect this from the third world country I came from, where actors win elections because they play likable characters in movies, but not here in the US.
      - Natsu 16y ago
        > I would expect this from the third world country I came from, where actors win elections because they play likable characters in movies, but not here in the US. In that case, I'm going to have to disappoint you about American politics by mentioning Ronald Reagan, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jerry Springer, Clint Eastwood, Howard Stern, Shirley Temple, Al Franken & co. were all both. I guess I'm less sure about the "likable characters" part, and at least one of those failed to actually get elected (but became an ambassador instead), but even so, I'm only mentioning the more famous ones. There are quite a few more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_actor-politicians http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_actor-politic...
amichail 16y ago
Here's a Facebook approach to airport security: http://www.google.com/buzz/amichail/TgPjwEJCJup/A-simple-solution-to-eliminating-terrorism-on http://www.google.com/buzz/amichail/TgPjwEJCJup/A-simple-sol...
- nodata 16y ago
  or.. we look at the number of people who have been killed in terrorist attacks, and compare it to _everything_else_. Then spend the money on the more important stuff first.
  - aneth 16y ago
    Maybe we should look at the number of times the US has been invaded by a foreign army, and conclude a military is not necessary...
    - foobarbazoo 16y ago
      Half a dozen? Do tell, how often is too often?
- gojomo 16y ago
  I love it. "Can anybody share an invite for today's AA510 to DFW? KTHXBYE!"
ihodes 16y ago
You get the feeling, going through Ben Gurion, that these are professionals working the security line. They're efficient, polite but terse, and thorough. They definitely do behavioral profiling, but racial profiling they do not: Arabs and Americans and Israelis, etc, could go through without minimal questioning, but there were obviously people security paid more attention to than others. I also didn't feel like a criminal going through their airport, which, in stark contrast, I did as soon as I got back to the US and went through customs and then TSA again.
SandB0x 16y ago
I have dual Israeli citizenship and have flown to and from Tel Aviv quite a few times. * The line interviewers are smart people, and it's seen as a good first job after military service. In other places this might be seen as a dead-end or undesirable job. * The atmosphere in Ben Gurion is very calm because everyone feels safe (or at least I do). * The only time I've seen any mild panic was due to my (late) great-aunt. She was a neurosurgeon, but could be alarmingly absent-minded in daily life. She'd taken my sister and I to the airport for our flight back to London, back when we were both in our teens. For some reason, my great aunt had a kind of small suitcase on wheels with her that day, and when my sister and I stood in the queue, she left it next to us and went off to find the bathroom. The line moved forwards and the suitcase didn't. The security guards spotted this fact within about 30 seconds, and started asking whose the bag was. We didn't realise it was my aunt's, and after nobody claimed it they started ushering us all back and making radio calls. When my aunt came back we all got an earful from the security staff.
- tshtf 16y ago
  If you were an Israeli Arab, do you think you'd feel the same way about the situation at Ben Gurion?
  - siculars 16y ago
    How do you know s/he is not an Israeli Arab?
  - SandB0x 16y ago
    What situation? The one where everyone flies safely? You might get a bit more attention as an Israeli Arab, or as a foreign national, but the profiling is mostly behavioural. They might have a look through your things, but then again they they gave my dad's luggage a load of attention on a recent trip and he's an air force veteran. It's also more or less impossible to distinguish (visually) Israeli Arabs and Sephardim/Mizrahim. You're not going to get hassle for having darker skin. I've got a hunch you haven't been to Ben Gurion or Israel, but if you did and had a hard time then that's a shame and I hope you have a better trip at some point in the future. (And siculars I'm not an Israeli Arab, but valid question. I don't want to clog this place up by discussing politics, so I'm leaving it here.)
BRadmin 16y ago
This article is from 2009 and was submitted back to HN then - and had some insightful comments. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1024850 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1024850
ja27 16y ago
"Eight years after 9/11, why are we still so reactive, so un-Israelified?" Because L-3 / Lockheed Martin / Haliburton / etc. don't sell training in behavior tracking / FACS? Isn't it all just a money-grab by the usual suspects?
daten 16y ago
The TSA has already attempted the behavior profiling.. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/06/behavioral_prof_3.html http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/06/behavioral_pro...
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
idoh 16y ago
I had a first hand experience flying out of Israel with the questioning side. For various accidental and benign reasons I got a little extra questioning, which was on the topics of: do I speak Hebrew?, what synagogue do I go to in the US?, and why didn't I have any checked luggage? In the end I gave the guards the phone number of my relatives, and they talked to them, and that's how I got through the checkpoint. So anyway, they do seem to focus on the person and their circumstances, and not on what that person is or is not carrying. Also, the guards were not the typical process-following types that you'd see at the TSA. Their job is to engage you in conversation, and make decisions without following a flowchart.
ck2 16y ago
Doesn't Israel also destroy the homes of any bomber's family? (seriously, google it) That is more likely the deterrent. So should the USA do that too for all our domestic terrorists?
- eliben 16y ago
  Nah, you just invade their country. [Joking, to point out how stupid such generalizations can be]
- maxawaytoolong 16y ago
  I don't know why you were downvoted because house demolitions are indeed official policy in response to terrorist bombings. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Defense_Forces#House_demolitions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Defense_Forces#House_dem...
  - tome 16y ago
    Just one reason from many: because it doesn't deter anyone without a house in Israel.
BlazingFrog 16y ago
Although it was fairly explicitly pointed in the article (by Rafi Sela), I'm not seeing much of it discussed here. I think a big part of it is cultural. Americans may object to this but I believe that, by virtue of having been shielded from any major aggression on its territory outside of 9/11, they don't know how to react to threats in a reasonable way. Most of what has been done by the government since then resembles more knee-jerk, fear-tainted overreaction than a sensible response to a grave, but also well documented abroad, problem. Mr Sela uses the "Americans-take-too-much-shit-from their government" line but I believe this is simply out of inexperience in dealing with these issues.
liad 16y ago
have flown out of israel dozens of times. before you get anywhere near the terminal you are stopped and men with uzi submachine guns look in the car and ask a couple of questions. these guys are razor sharp and know exactly what they're looking for. you feel safe and nervous at the same time
idan 16y ago
I am a dual citizen (IL/USA), have flown in/out of many airports around the world, know my way around a security apparatus. Every time the TSA pulls another ridiculous stunt in the name of "security", these Israeli airport security consultants get interviewed to death. Here we go again! As before, every article on the subject stops short of highlighting the uncomfortable truth which precludes the TSA adopting the Israeli model: a lack of brainpower among TSA screeners. The article correctly points out that the Israeli model is more about evaluating the person and less about evaluating their luggage. Problem is, evaluation implies good judgment -- a quality demonstrably lacking in enough TSA agents as to make a generalization accurate. The TSA does not employ the quality of manpower that it needs to in order to base its operations on subjective character evaluations. Even if the TSA were able to foot the bill and hire/train such manpower, it would still be unpalatable to enough people in the US that such a system would fail. Evaluation is inherently subjective and discriminatory. There is no impartial way to say "I'm deciding whether or not you represent a threat." Some agents will let their personal views influence their judgment. Some passengers will inevitably feel persecuted for their skin color, rightly or wrongly. Several lawsuits later, the system would be neutered to the point where agents are no longer free to exercise their judgment, and we're back to square one. Finally, it's worth noting that the security expert in the article is spinning a rose-tinted tale of airport efficiency experienced mainly by Jewish passengers. Ask an Israeli Arab and you'll likely hear a tale of exasperating interrogations and adversarial, dumb agents -- much like the TSA. I wrote more on the subject a few months ago, in a comment for a similar article: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1025173 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1025173 Feel free to ask me questions, I'll answer to the best of my knowledge.
- idan 16y ago
  Another way of looking at things: implementing the Israeli security approach in US airports is like trying to switch a large enterprise (say, IBM-large) from classical waterfall software development to agile methodologies. It's an almost impossible task because not every team can handle the flexibility, ambiguity and self-responsibility of agile.
SkyMarshal 16y ago
Published On Wed Dec 30 2009 Wow, this is an old article. Interesting how the idea seemed to get completely ignored by the MSM and government for the past year, while things just get worse at the airports.
danielnicollet 16y ago
"This is to see that you don't have heavy metals on you or something that looks suspicious," said Sela. Sorry but what do heavy metals have to do with airport security? is this just typo or have I completely lost my understanding of basic explosives chemistry and other terror related topics?
- Tomek_ 16y ago
  I'd though that, for example, guns are quite often made of heavy metals, don't they?
- 2arrs2ells 16y ago
  This is a check for knives/guns/bullets, right?
  - prawn 16y ago
    I've always wondered re knives - couldn't you just take on carefully pre-fractured plastic that you snapped once on board?
    - devinj 16y ago
      No, you'd take a ceramic knife most likely. Much sharper, and still wouldn't be detected. I suspect the test is more for guns than knives.
      - aberkowitz 16y ago
        Unless you take a homemade* ceramic knife through security, it would be spotted just like any other metal object [1]. * Good luck with that. [1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFnT5INymiY#t=6m40s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFnT5INymiY#t=6m40s
      - prawn 16y ago
        Haven't planes been hijacked with Stanley knives (or box cutters or whatever Americans call them)? And if the response to that is locking the cockpit, then what will guns do differently? (Shoot the windows? Could they get the exit row and open the emergency door?) Surely, now, the response to either would be to rush the assailant?
DanielBMarkham 16y ago
Second, all the screening areas contain 'bomb boxes'. If a screener spots a suspect bag, he/she is trained to pick it up and place it in the box, which is blast proof. A bomb squad arrives shortly and wheels the box away for further investigation. Or we can take naked pictures of children and grope people, taking hours to board planes, and evacuating the entire terminal at the first indication of trouble. I really don't like my own tone of voice -- it sounds like I am ranting. But I'm not. At least I don't think I am. This is just common sense. Small, agile decentralized systems with an emphasis on layers and innovation are going to beat treating people like they were F-15s passing down the assembly line at a defense plant. This factory, top-down mentality has got to go. I guess I'm just still amazed that we gotten this far out of whack. If you had told me we would be doing this, even right after 9-11, I wouldn't have believed you. Body scans? Invasive searches? Sure thing. Not a problem. Sign me up -- as long as its rare and happens on an ad-hoc basis. But what we have now? It's a total travesty. The lunatics are truly running the asylum. (Ok, maybe I am ranting)
Tomek_ 16y ago
I'm not sure if I'd really feel better when surrounded by armed soldiers and being questioned a couple of times on my way to the plane (also inside the bus that takes me to the airport as I understand) than if I would just have to go through a security gate, eventually take off my shoes and get my baggage scanned by x-ray. I mean, I was a couple of times questioned at the airport, with the usual questions ("did anyone other than you have access to your baggage?", etc.) and once they ordered me to open my baggage - and that didn't make me feel more safe or anything like that, rather uncomfortable and a bit pissed of, in a "wtf? do you seriously think I'm gonna explode the plane or what?" way. Shortly speaking, I prefer to go through all those gates, have my baggage checked by security guys themselves ("go ahead, there's nothing there") than being bothered by some questions and be "under suspicion". Don't know, maybe it's just that I'm from Europe and we don't care.
- aberkowitz 16y ago
  The current system in the US strictly follows a flowchart. It has no preparation for anything other than "generic terrorism". With an infinite set of previously unthought of plans, this is a system terrorists can game to their advantage. The Israeli system requires competent individuals trained to adapt to any scenario.
doron 16y ago
This solution is all well and good (i will disregard issues of legal liberties afforded in this country for the moment) But it doesn't scale,Israel has one single main airport, the US has dozens of points for international entry, and many more domestic. It is easy and fairly cost effective when you have one location you have to worry about.
- zephyrfalcon 16y ago
  "But it doesn't scale,Israel has one single main airport, the US has dozens of points for international entry, and many more domestic. It is easy and fairly cost effective when you have one location you have to worry about." People say this, but it makes little sense to me. Compare having one factory that makes a product, vs having a hundred factories that make that same product. The latter is much more cost efficient per factory.
srean 16y ago
Despite the overwhelming possibility of being downvoted it needs mention that the Israeli model as practiced may not be that good an example for US to follow. It has been documented by several respected human rights organizations and UN that Israel's security measures are often used as a proxy for punishment and harassment for disagreeing with the official govt line. In spite of some erosion of liberties in US in the last decade or so, the American society continues to be orders of magnitude more open and free. I can confidently say that the way I will be treated by the American authorities does not depend on whether I or any of my family members were critical of American policy, neither is it dependent on places in US that are on my itinerary. Mention anything that remotely leans towards the UN view of the occupation to the Israeli security, or that you intend to visit any place in the occupied territories your experience will diverge dramatically (in its defense, personal anecdotal indicates that this may be regardless of whether you are Jewish or not). It still would have been acceptable had that selective part of the treatment made the airport, the flight or Israel any safer. But it is not clear to me that the specialization based on the views of a traveller does. I am wary of copying a model that has a tendency for abuse unless I see convincing counterweights in place. All depends on the implementation details and the operational processes.
- krelian 16y ago
  Did you even read the article?
  - srean 16y ago
    Why wouldnt I ? Predictably enough, it seems the downvotes have started ringing in.
- chopsueyar 16y ago
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair
dmn 16y ago
Related Article: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1897940 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1897940
coffeemug 16y ago
I cannot believe people bring up Israeli airport security as an example of a system the U.S. should model. The security agents are neither intelligent, nor well trained, nor polite. The entire system is based on racism and I would take TSA security over the Israeli model any day. People were complaining here about a pat down search in public by a TSA agent equaling sexual harassment. I was actually taken to a public bathroom by an El Al agent and strip searched, purely because my last name "sounds Turkish". From my anecdotal experience, El Al has security personnel that appears trained to a naked eye, but in reality is extremely ineffective, flawed, and unethical. I had the misfortune to go through El Al security four times. These all occurred in a span of two weeks, roughly in the same circumstances (I had to fly into Israel, fly out, fly back in, and fly back out). I can tell you that the outcome of their screening is heavily inconsistent and highly dependent on the prejudices of the particular agent doing the interview, and not necessarily on advanced training procedures. I had the same answers for their questions every time. Two of the times the agents were Israeli jews who immigrated from Russia. Since we share a common background, both let me pass after very few questions because my trip details seemed perfectly reasonable to them. The other two times, I was interviewed by jews of clearly middle-eastern descent - both had no understanding of my cultural background, and both thought my trip details were extremely suspicious, subjecting me to a detailed search. So the outcome of the interviews was effectively random, which means they might as well perform random searches. The interviews were highly unethical, inappropriate, and degrading. Even more importantly, they were completely ineffective, resulting in a random outcome highly dependent on each agent's personal prejudices. I don't know what good security looks like, but I can tell you that this most certainly isn't it.
- berntb 16y ago
  >>I don't know what good security looks like, but I can tell you that this most certainly isn't it. I don't know much about airport security either. What I do know is that there exists lots of well financed organizations that want to blow up Israeli airports and airplanes -- with a bad track record during the last few decades. So something is done right, which might be kept a secret. If not the interviews, what?
- shin_lao 16y ago
koevet 16y ago
The same article was commented by Bruce Scheiner on his blog. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/01/adopting_the_is.html http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/01/adopting_the_i... Very interesting comments, bottom line "Israel model does not scale well".
- epo 16y ago
  True but no one is suggesting that the USA should mimic the Israeli system slavishly, they should however learn from it and devise their own system with the intention to detect and deal with the potential bad guys as early as possible while disrupting every one else as little as possible. Henry Ford did not invent car manufacturing nor did MacDonalds invent the beefburger, they just made mass manufacturing scale well. The USA needs a transport security system which works at American scales and doesn't tick people off.
harscoat 16y ago
Flew there with my girl friend. We were very happy to be there 2 days only after sudden invitation to see a prospect. So when we handed our passports to the interviewer to get the Israel (Holy land!) visa Stamp, we were laughing of sheer joy to be there. Interviewer glared at us and asked abruptly: "what makes you laugh?!"
- harscoat 16y ago
  Hey guys who downvote: we were happy(!!) to arrive in Israel where friends of mine (who did Aliyah) where waiting for us all rejoicing themselves. That should be a ok/secure reason and attitude when arriving landing at the desired airport! (It turned out to be one of the greatest trip of our life: TelAviv, Jerusalem, the Dead See and the most fantastic En Gedi kibboutz).
  - epo 16y ago
    Perhaps it was a rather boring anecdote and seemed almost off-topic.
shimonamit 16y ago
I was once late to the airport (in Israel) where I was scheduled to pick up my mother. I parked the car and ran towards the gate. A guard was standing at the entrance with her hands crossed doing nothing by observing. When she saw me coming she made a few quick steps towards me and signaled me to stop and stand aside for questioning. I felt a bit uncomfortable, first because it was abrupt and I was being singled out, but also because she was behaving like a shepherd dog trying to seize my eyes (which I later understood why). She was very polite and dismissed me after presenting my ID and answering a few short questions. This got me thinking about the silent perimeters, and how smart it is they were only engaged when triggered. The take home lesson for me was: smart earns respect. They were a step ahead of me and I was responding, not them.
ffffruit 16y ago
It all sounds absolutely reasonable (and dare I say pleasant) but how well does something like this scale? I am thinking Heathrow with 5 terminals with, I guess, 10 different entrances each where people arrive from.
stuaxo 16y ago
Just because it's runs more efficiently doesn't make it more desirable, it is after all - a militarised society, I don't particularly want to go to the US at the moment as it's moving that way.
maurits 16y ago
So, I have been to this airport traveling as a press photographer, which means you have an interesting itinerary and lots of interesting bits of kit in your luggage.I can add a little human aspect to this article. Last time the guy in front of me at the for mentioned first shielded baggage screening was suspected of having an explosive prompting the entire security machine to life and an evacuation. A false alarm and 30 odd minutes later I am again standing in line, pretty wasted at 5 in the morning. During the whole process the staff stayed very polite and very efficient, making the process quite painless. Every time I get treated rude and unpleasant by security staff/goons in my own home-country airport for really no good reason what so ever, I think about this. I feel that a little manners & humanity would go a long way in getting support for security measures.
thesz 16y ago
There are two notions of directing people, named after German words: Auftragstaktik and Befehlstaktik. Auftragstaktik: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission-type_tactics http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission-type_tactics Befehlstaktik stands for "detailed order control". It looks like Auftragstaktik is used in Israeli airports and TSA employ Befehlstaktik. To quote an article about Auftragstaktik: "Ironically, since WW2, only the Israeli Defence Force seem to have come close to matching the Wehrmacht of WW2 in the exercise of command in this style". So, they just use their military training and applied it to another field. And people from military works as screening officers at airports, for that being very good first job after military. Very clever.
berntb 16y ago
After reading this discussion, I'd be sorely disappointed if I ever flew in/out if Israel and wasn't checked out carefully. :-) But they are probably good at profiling curious tourists too. Reminds me of when me and a few friends bicycled around Northern Ireland once in the 90s. If I made a querying hand gesture to military at checkpoints if we should get over for questioning, they laughed, without even hearing my non-native English... ("More stupid tourists that just want to get close looks at our bullpups.")
steveplace 16y ago
This kind of analysis has a major flaw: these two countries are apples and oranges, by sheer size. We've seen this before: when pundits comment on relative outperformance of infrastructure, education, etc., they forget that the US is a really, really, big place-- and things may not scale as well. Israel has 2 international airports. The US has quite a few more. So the solutions presented here may not scale well as there is no true "funnel."
moo 16y ago
What I hear is the Israeli border guards have juvenile, petty behavior. What comes to mind is denying Noam Chomsky entry into Israel back in May. Also the border guards who put 3 rifle rounds through Lily Sussman's MacBook. 21 year old Lily had Arab letters stuck on her MacBook's keyboard. Before anyone tells me I haven't been to an Israel airport, I haven't been to the moon either but I still know it is mostly rock. Link to shot MacBook incident: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/12/video-interview-with-macbook-bullet-girl/ http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/12/video-interview-with-...
darklajid 16y ago
I want to chime in here as well. Disclaimer/Disclosure: I plan to relocate to Tel Aviv soon (from Germany), the company I'm working for has its headquarter there. I like the country, try to learn the language etc.. But: Every time I do the flight I'm nervous about the problems that _will_ come up. Coworker needed to strip to his underwear. Another one had his bag completely devastated several times. My (german, local branch) boss has probably more stamps from IL in his passport than anything else and does the trip routinely: I've never seen him getting through without problems, taking apart the hand luggage and asking lots of weird questions, sometimes for hours. There are some procedures in place to make this easier in the future. For a while companies can now announce guests/coworkers etc. in advance and make their life easier by providing names, passport numbers and dates of arrival/departure in written form. But that takes time and sucks if you need to fly over "now". Regarding the "safe" feeling: Nope, cannot confirm that. In Frankfurt the normal check-in is like this: * Check in and get your ticket * Pass the boarding pass control * Pass the security (think ~TSA) control * Move to the gate and board For El Al it's like this: * Talk to a "Security officer" about your plans to stay and your luggage. Who packed it? Where? Did you leave it for a second? Did someone ask you to bring something to IL? etc.. * Get a ticket and a token with cryptic (probably: "Search this one, Yes/No") markers * Pass boarding pass control * Pass security (~TSA) control * Go to the gate * Pass IL security, taking that token (and, every single time I traveled) sit down and wait for an officer. * Answer lots of questions, let them check your luggage (again) * Move to the gate, guarded by security officers with submachine guns (remember: We're still in FFM, Germany at this point...) In Tel Aviv, Ben Gurion, it's the same. The most upvoted post was from someone with an Israeli citizenship. Yeah - right. There are two lanes in Ben Gurion, Israeli and "Other". The latter is crap, takes ages, needs you to be there while they x-ray all your luggage (this is before you get a ticket, so you are present with your check-in luggage as well). Lots of questions. And, from experience, you end up at a desk where someone tells you to open your (check-in) luggage, to search your underwear and private possessions in front of you. Seriously: This is _not_ better than anything you US guys are currently complaining about. And no, this does _not_ make me feel safe, at all. Edit: Something I completely missed to mention: The article actually tries to tell you that the process is quick and effective. Maybe (not sure) it is for people with an IL passport. For me it means being at the airport 3 hours in advance, instead of 45-60 minutes. Otherwise I'm just not able to make it. My next trip is schedule to depart at ~3 am, I know that I'll be on the _german_ airport at 0:00 - for the sake of this efficient process. Same on the route back. What an improvement..

550 points by epo 16y ago

Article leaves out the very real and very big catch: "Israel values its security, and pays for it. According to an analysis by Bloomberg News, Israel spends around 10 times more per passenger than the United States does." A little more on that: "[An analyst] estimated El Al's security bill at $100 million a year, which amounts to $76.92 per trip by its 1.3 million passengers. Half is paid by the Israeli government," Peter Robison wrote. The United States, in comparison, spent in 2008 $5.74 billion to monitor and protect 735,297,000 enplanements, or around $7.80 a passenger." The TSA system is a production line - hire cheap unskilled labor, and train around a process and manuals. In the USA the Israeli version would be very difficult in addition to very costly. That doesn't even take into account the question of the uproar the system would cause with the suggestion of racial profiling. References via: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aFyfihM1e3G4&refer=politics http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a... and http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/01/07/would_you_pay_25_for_71_seconds_of_scrutiny_in_an_airport http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/01/07/would_you_pay...

jbl 16y ago
The TSA system is a production line - hire cheap unskilled labor, and train around a process and manuals. This is the big thing that popped out at me from reading the article. The personnel described sound highly experienced and trained. I wonder how long and how much it would cost to bring your standard TSA screener up to that level.
- jambo 16y ago
  I think this is outside the realm of possibility for many current TSOs.
- anigbrowl 16y ago
  Don't forget that Israel has conscription, requiring 2 or 3 years of military service for all Israelis over 18. Given Israel's somewhat unique security situation this policy is likely more of an asset than a waste, but it's not obvious that it could be successfully generalized to larger or more diverse countries, where the benefits to the state might conflict more sharply with individual freedoms.
- SkyMarshal 16y ago
  It sounds from the article that the Israeli airport security personal are all ex-IDF. It's a job they naturally matriculate into after serving their required 2yrs in the IDF. I am not an expert, but I imagine that given the primary mission of the IDF in dealing with Palestine, they probably receive training and some experience (depending on where they are assigned) in how to spot potential terrorists using behavioral profiling. So when they leave and join airport security, they hit the ground running. US soldiers on the other hand probably aren't given much behavioral profiling training. We seem to specialize in blowing stuff up, steamrolling it with tanks, then randomly throwing money at it afterwards. If any military or ex-military know differently, please correct me. Gen. Petraeus may be slowly improving that SOP, in Iraq and Afghanistan at least, but I'm not sure how much his work there is getting rebased to general boot camp and officer training programs. Eg, are these kinds of soft skills percolating throughout the US military, or are only the Special Forces and other groups specifically tasked with winning hearts and minds in Afghanistan getting this training? So the question remains, would filling the TSA ranks with military veterans and paying them higher wages provide a more Israeli-like airport security force? Dunno. Certainly worth considering, but there are some significant differences.
  - tjmc 16y ago
    There is definitely soft skills training in the US military. This was an interesting read: http://www.amazon.com/Interrogators-War-Breaking-Al-Qaeda-Afghanistan/dp/0719566207 http://www.amazon.com/Interrogators-War-Breaking-Al-Qaeda-Af... It's a military interrogator's account of the techniques used in Afghanistan.
  - RyanMcGreal 16y ago
    >It sounds from the article that the Israeli airport security personal are all ex-IDF. Every Israeli adult is ex-IDF, except for those adults who are still in the IDF.
    - wheels 16y ago
      Not true. About a quarter of men and a third of women do not enlist: http://www.haaretz.com/news/idf-nearly-28-of-israeli-males-avoided-conscription-in-2007-1.232645 http://www.haaretz.com/news/idf-nearly-28-of-israeli-males-a...
epo 16y ago
The other thing it omits is the difference in treatment between Arabs and non-Arabs. Profiling is inevitable. If you don't know who is threatening you and pay special attention to those people then you are a fool. But most of those people aren't threatening you and will feel aggrieved, this is how resentments grow and fester. EDIT choosing who you pay attention to is obviously key, casting your net too widely is what ticks people off. These are not easy problems to solve without removing the cause of the discontent which is making people threaten you in the first place.
credo 16y ago
I disagree on both counts. 1. Costs: I think the value of preventing a terrorist attack greatly outweighs the $76/passenger cost of screening. Besides, it contributes a lot of value to the economy by (a) reducing the long lines we have in our airports today and (b) eliminating the unnecessary intrusive procedures 2. Racial profiling: Behavioral profiling is not the same as racial profiling. Besides do you really think that the low-paid unskilled TSA workers don't currently do any racial profiling ?
- nodata 16y ago
  Can I ask how are you comparing costs here? 76 dollars per passenger is an obscene amount of money: look at the dollar totals. In terms of lives saved, the TSA is already a gigantic waste of money. You could save a lot more lives per dollar by doing hundreds of other different things.
  - alex_c 16y ago
    $77 per passenger is a huge amount, especially compared to the cost of a cheap domestic flight. But what is the hidden cost of the clusterfuck that American airports are becoming? I would gladly pay an extra $38 per flight if it meant going through a sane, competent, and, if not pleasant, at least not overtly hostile system.
    - harisenbon 16y ago
      Why not even make it opt in? Ticket price plus a 38 dollar "treat me like a human being" tax. I'd pay it.
      - aberkowitz 16y ago
        What has it come to when we have to pay more, just to be treated as humans?
        chopsueyar 16y ago
DanI-S 16y ago
Economy of scale? Israel has far fewer people, far fewer flights and far fewer airports than the US.
- sliverstorm 16y ago
  It may not work that way though. This reminds me of mom-and-pop restaurant (Israel) vs. chain (USA)- the chain, while benefiting from economy of scale, can never manage to retain the mom-and-pop feel and quality.
- clr 16y ago
  The security is also in place in a modified fashion at flights returning to Israel from other countries. They hire and train and house their security overseas - another reason the job is so attractive to young people.
yummyfajitas 16y ago
That probably underestimates what it would cost us to have Israeli style security. In the US, we would need to pay market rates for airport security personnel. In Israel, they can pay far less since much of Israel's domestic security is provided by forced labor. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription#Countries_with_and_without_mandatory_military_service http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription#Countries_with_and...
- endtime 16y ago
  I don't think airport security officials in Israel are doing their national service stint, though I could be wrong.
  - beagle3 16y ago
    You are not wrong.
- ars 16y ago
  Uh, soldiers are paid. And airport security work is not by soldiers anyway, it's regular employment.
  - yummyfajitas 16y ago
    Forced labor wages < market wages. If they were not, there would be no need for forced labor. As for airport security not being done by soldiers, my mistake. I only visited Israel once, but I was under the impression the airport guys were IDF. I guess I'm misremembering the uniforms. Thanks for the correction.
    - jbooth 16y ago
      It's only sort of forced -- conscription is there for cultural reasons, not out of necessity. From what I understand (which could be wrong), pretty much anyone can get out of the army there if they want. But people like the symbolism of "everyone serves". Certainly it doesn't behave according to standard "market" rules though, even in a situation where they abolished the "forced" part and left it to culture to enforce service from 18-21.
Lagged2Death 16y ago
If you were a member of Congress or a lobbyist for a security equipment manufacturer, you'd see high costs as a benefit, not a problem. As long as the cost would result in profits for a (relative) few. I think our government would gladly pay Israeli-level security costs - if it could spend it on machinery made in the USA, rather than on salaries and training. It sounds to me like the Israelis are the ones that have a process and who are devoted to their manuals. Every horror story we hear about the TSA seems to involve TSA agents not having a clue how to behave like civilized people, let alone effective security officers, in even the most mundane situations.
bigiain 16y ago
"Israel values its security, and pays for it. According to an analysis by Bloomberg News, Israel spends around 10 times more per passenger than the United States does." I'll bet those numbers change if you include the cost of a pair of world trade center towers and the associated expenses of that incident. "Cheap and ineffective" != "inexpensive"
- amalcon 16y ago
  More comprehensive pre-flight screening could not have stopped the Sept. 11 attacks, because they did not involve sneaking contraband onto the plane. The cardboard box cutters that were used in the attack were allowed at the time.
  - __david__ 16y ago
    Yeah but the Israeli style behavioural profiling very well might have flushed their intentions out.
    - BrandonM 16y ago
      Exactly. This is a perfect argument for the Israeli style of behavioral profiling as opposed to the American style of trying to imagine every possible way to hijack a plane.
    - amalcon 16y ago
      It might have, but surely not to the level of certainty that your GP suggested.
  - shimfish 16y ago
    That's why, apart from pre-flight screening, they have a policy of having plainclothes air marshals on every flight and locking the cabin door.
jemfinch 16y ago
"To be fair, this compares per-passenger costs for El Al, Israel's national carrier, to the costs for the TSA, the U.S. agency responsible for air safety. Ideally, we'd want to compare the airport security costs for Shin Bet, a Israeli security agency." I think it's a bit disingenuous to quote the previous statement without this one.

jakarta 16y ago

The biggest problem with adopting the Israeli model IMO is with resources. You would have to spend a lot of money training and hiring people who would be good at behavioral profiling. The other problem is that Israel is a tiny country, they only have two international airports -- so they can focus all of their resources on those two airports. That's not the case here in the US.

protomyth 16y ago
You could probably recruit ex-military http://www.mikeroweworks.com/job-site/vetsmilitary-resources/ http://www.mikeroweworks.com/job-site/vetsmilitary-resources...
jaspero 16y ago
I don't think resources are the problem. You can decentralize TSA jobs. San Francisco area just needs to monitor one airport or three bay area airports. So, I think decentralization is the key and saying that US has too many airports is not an excuse.
- foobarbazoo 16y ago
  You can enter any major airport securely by flying in from a smaller, regional airport. So you need to secure those. But you can get into a smaller, regional airport securely by flying in from an even smaller airport. So you need to secure those too. We have a lot of airports in the US that need to be secured. The better response is to tell Americans that airplanes are a terrorist target, just like busses (which are bombed all the time in Israel, thanks to their stellar airport security making airlines a harder target), and to remain vigilant. That is all. Taking off our shoes, submitting to naked photographs and (just for fun) radiation is beyond laughable. It seems people would rather be demeaned than live in (an irrational) fear. Sad. Even sadder: more Americans will die by choosing to drive rather than fly. Somehow, I doubt Big Sis sheds a tear.

nivertech 16y ago

Yeah, we have the best airport security in Israel ;) I witnessed a case, when a guy, who joked with the "profiling" girl, was escorted to his jet by security guard. I second, that profiling is not by race, but behavior (and maybe accent). Their questions can be funny and sometimes even rude. Still it's better than removing your shoes, posing naked and getting radiation.

yuvadm 16y ago

While the rest of the world has plenty to learn from the Israeli security model, there are two caveats which are left unmentioned: 1) Israel is a small country and is able to quickly identify terrorist threats via intelligence gathering. This is not something you can scale globally. 2) It would be naive to think that profiling is not done on a racial basis. Plenty stories exist about Arab-Israelis being unnecessarily harassed by security. Same stories for Jewish-Israeli? Almost none. Racial profiling is a big part of the game. One thing is certain - the entire world must stop the masquerade going on these days at airports. "Security"? Give me a break.

icegreentea 16y ago

While many of the Israel procedures might be kinda hard to implement in the States or Canada (or elsewhere), there's really a few that really should be looked at. Like the whole containment thing. "First, the screening area is surrounded by contoured, blast-proof glass that can contain the detonation of up to 100 kilos of plastic explosive. Only the few dozen people within the screening area need be removed, and only to a point a few metres away. Second, all the screening areas contain 'bomb boxes'. If a screener spots a suspect bag, he/she is trained to pick it up and place it in the box, which is blast proof. A bomb squad arrives shortly and wheels the box away for further investigation." I mean... you gotta admit. That just makes so much sense.

daten 16y ago
Consider how many bottles of liquid the TSA confiscates in a day because they might be explosives. Now imagine actually treating each of those as if the agent really believed it was a threat in the style described in the article. Does this still make sense?
- bruceboughton 16y ago
  It would make sense if they actually put some thought into identifying threats, rather than simply confiscating items previously used in thwarted attacks.
  - hrabago 16y ago
    This is the part that disappoints me the most, especially after the toner ban. I would expect this from the third world country I came from, where actors win elections because they play likable characters in movies, but not here in the US.
    - Natsu 16y ago
      > I would expect this from the third world country I came from, where actors win elections because they play likable characters in movies, but not here in the US. In that case, I'm going to have to disappoint you about American politics by mentioning Ronald Reagan, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jerry Springer, Clint Eastwood, Howard Stern, Shirley Temple, Al Franken & co. were all both. I guess I'm less sure about the "likable characters" part, and at least one of those failed to actually get elected (but became an ambassador instead), but even so, I'm only mentioning the more famous ones. There are quite a few more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_actor-politicians http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_actor-politic...

amichail 16y ago

Here's a Facebook approach to airport security: http://www.google.com/buzz/amichail/TgPjwEJCJup/A-simple-solution-to-eliminating-terrorism-on http://www.google.com/buzz/amichail/TgPjwEJCJup/A-simple-sol...

nodata 16y ago
or.. we look at the number of people who have been killed in terrorist attacks, and compare it to _everything_else_. Then spend the money on the more important stuff first.
- aneth 16y ago
  Maybe we should look at the number of times the US has been invaded by a foreign army, and conclude a military is not necessary...
  - foobarbazoo 16y ago
    Half a dozen? Do tell, how often is too often?
gojomo 16y ago
I love it. "Can anybody share an invite for today's AA510 to DFW? KTHXBYE!"

ihodes 16y ago

You get the feeling, going through Ben Gurion, that these are professionals working the security line. They're efficient, polite but terse, and thorough. They definitely do behavioral profiling, but racial profiling they do not: Arabs and Americans and Israelis, etc, could go through without minimal questioning, but there were obviously people security paid more attention to than others. I also didn't feel like a criminal going through their airport, which, in stark contrast, I did as soon as I got back to the US and went through customs and then TSA again.

SandB0x 16y ago

I have dual Israeli citizenship and have flown to and from Tel Aviv quite a few times. * The line interviewers are smart people, and it's seen as a good first job after military service. In other places this might be seen as a dead-end or undesirable job. * The atmosphere in Ben Gurion is very calm because everyone feels safe (or at least I do). * The only time I've seen any mild panic was due to my (late) great-aunt. She was a neurosurgeon, but could be alarmingly absent-minded in daily life. She'd taken my sister and I to the airport for our flight back to London, back when we were both in our teens. For some reason, my great aunt had a kind of small suitcase on wheels with her that day, and when my sister and I stood in the queue, she left it next to us and went off to find the bathroom. The line moved forwards and the suitcase didn't. The security guards spotted this fact within about 30 seconds, and started asking whose the bag was. We didn't realise it was my aunt's, and after nobody claimed it they started ushering us all back and making radio calls. When my aunt came back we all got an earful from the security staff.

tshtf 16y ago
If you were an Israeli Arab, do you think you'd feel the same way about the situation at Ben Gurion?
- siculars 16y ago
  How do you know s/he is not an Israeli Arab?
- SandB0x 16y ago
  What situation? The one where everyone flies safely? You might get a bit more attention as an Israeli Arab, or as a foreign national, but the profiling is mostly behavioural. They might have a look through your things, but then again they they gave my dad's luggage a load of attention on a recent trip and he's an air force veteran. It's also more or less impossible to distinguish (visually) Israeli Arabs and Sephardim/Mizrahim. You're not going to get hassle for having darker skin. I've got a hunch you haven't been to Ben Gurion or Israel, but if you did and had a hard time then that's a shame and I hope you have a better trip at some point in the future. (And siculars I'm not an Israeli Arab, but valid question. I don't want to clog this place up by discussing politics, so I'm leaving it here.)

BRadmin 16y ago

This article is from 2009 and was submitted back to HN then - and had some insightful comments. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1024850 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1024850

ja27 16y ago

"Eight years after 9/11, why are we still so reactive, so un-Israelified?" Because L-3 / Lockheed Martin / Haliburton / etc. don't sell training in behavior tracking / FACS? Isn't it all just a money-grab by the usual suspects?

daten 16y ago

The TSA has already attempted the behavior profiling.. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/06/behavioral_prof_3.html http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/06/behavioral_pro...

deleted 16y ago
[deleted]

idoh 16y ago

I had a first hand experience flying out of Israel with the questioning side. For various accidental and benign reasons I got a little extra questioning, which was on the topics of: do I speak Hebrew?, what synagogue do I go to in the US?, and why didn't I have any checked luggage? In the end I gave the guards the phone number of my relatives, and they talked to them, and that's how I got through the checkpoint. So anyway, they do seem to focus on the person and their circumstances, and not on what that person is or is not carrying. Also, the guards were not the typical process-following types that you'd see at the TSA. Their job is to engage you in conversation, and make decisions without following a flowchart.

ck2 16y ago

Doesn't Israel also destroy the homes of any bomber's family? (seriously, google it) That is more likely the deterrent. So should the USA do that too for all our domestic terrorists?

eliben 16y ago
Nah, you just invade their country. [Joking, to point out how stupid such generalizations can be]
maxawaytoolong 16y ago
I don't know why you were downvoted because house demolitions are indeed official policy in response to terrorist bombings. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Defense_Forces#House_demolitions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Defense_Forces#House_dem...
- tome 16y ago
  Just one reason from many: because it doesn't deter anyone without a house in Israel.

BlazingFrog 16y ago

Although it was fairly explicitly pointed in the article (by Rafi Sela), I'm not seeing much of it discussed here. I think a big part of it is cultural. Americans may object to this but I believe that, by virtue of having been shielded from any major aggression on its territory outside of 9/11, they don't know how to react to threats in a reasonable way. Most of what has been done by the government since then resembles more knee-jerk, fear-tainted overreaction than a sensible response to a grave, but also well documented abroad, problem. Mr Sela uses the "Americans-take-too-much-shit-from their government" line but I believe this is simply out of inexperience in dealing with these issues.

liad 16y ago

have flown out of israel dozens of times. before you get anywhere near the terminal you are stopped and men with uzi submachine guns look in the car and ask a couple of questions. these guys are razor sharp and know exactly what they're looking for. you feel safe and nervous at the same time

idan 16y ago

I am a dual citizen (IL/USA), have flown in/out of many airports around the world, know my way around a security apparatus. Every time the TSA pulls another ridiculous stunt in the name of "security", these Israeli airport security consultants get interviewed to death. Here we go again! As before, every article on the subject stops short of highlighting the uncomfortable truth which precludes the TSA adopting the Israeli model: a lack of brainpower among TSA screeners. The article correctly points out that the Israeli model is more about evaluating the person and less about evaluating their luggage. Problem is, evaluation implies good judgment -- a quality demonstrably lacking in enough TSA agents as to make a generalization accurate. The TSA does not employ the quality of manpower that it needs to in order to base its operations on subjective character evaluations. Even if the TSA were able to foot the bill and hire/train such manpower, it would still be unpalatable to enough people in the US that such a system would fail. Evaluation is inherently subjective and discriminatory. There is no impartial way to say "I'm deciding whether or not you represent a threat." Some agents will let their personal views influence their judgment. Some passengers will inevitably feel persecuted for their skin color, rightly or wrongly. Several lawsuits later, the system would be neutered to the point where agents are no longer free to exercise their judgment, and we're back to square one. Finally, it's worth noting that the security expert in the article is spinning a rose-tinted tale of airport efficiency experienced mainly by Jewish passengers. Ask an Israeli Arab and you'll likely hear a tale of exasperating interrogations and adversarial, dumb agents -- much like the TSA. I wrote more on the subject a few months ago, in a comment for a similar article: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1025173 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1025173 Feel free to ask me questions, I'll answer to the best of my knowledge.

idan 16y ago
Another way of looking at things: implementing the Israeli security approach in US airports is like trying to switch a large enterprise (say, IBM-large) from classical waterfall software development to agile methodologies. It's an almost impossible task because not every team can handle the flexibility, ambiguity and self-responsibility of agile.

SkyMarshal 16y ago

Published On Wed Dec 30 2009 Wow, this is an old article. Interesting how the idea seemed to get completely ignored by the MSM and government for the past year, while things just get worse at the airports.

danielnicollet 16y ago

"This is to see that you don't have heavy metals on you or something that looks suspicious," said Sela. Sorry but what do heavy metals have to do with airport security? is this just typo or have I completely lost my understanding of basic explosives chemistry and other terror related topics?

Tomek_ 16y ago
I'd though that, for example, guns are quite often made of heavy metals, don't they?
2arrs2ells 16y ago
This is a check for knives/guns/bullets, right?
- prawn 16y ago
  I've always wondered re knives - couldn't you just take on carefully pre-fractured plastic that you snapped once on board?
  - devinj 16y ago
    No, you'd take a ceramic knife most likely. Much sharper, and still wouldn't be detected. I suspect the test is more for guns than knives.
    - aberkowitz 16y ago
      Unless you take a homemade* ceramic knife through security, it would be spotted just like any other metal object [1]. * Good luck with that. [1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFnT5INymiY#t=6m40s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFnT5INymiY#t=6m40s
    - prawn 16y ago
      Haven't planes been hijacked with Stanley knives (or box cutters or whatever Americans call them)? And if the response to that is locking the cockpit, then what will guns do differently? (Shoot the windows? Could they get the exit row and open the emergency door?) Surely, now, the response to either would be to rush the assailant?

DanielBMarkham 16y ago

Second, all the screening areas contain 'bomb boxes'. If a screener spots a suspect bag, he/she is trained to pick it up and place it in the box, which is blast proof. A bomb squad arrives shortly and wheels the box away for further investigation. Or we can take naked pictures of children and grope people, taking hours to board planes, and evacuating the entire terminal at the first indication of trouble. I really don't like my own tone of voice -- it sounds like I am ranting. But I'm not. At least I don't think I am. This is just common sense. Small, agile decentralized systems with an emphasis on layers and innovation are going to beat treating people like they were F-15s passing down the assembly line at a defense plant. This factory, top-down mentality has got to go. I guess I'm just still amazed that we gotten this far out of whack. If you had told me we would be doing this, even right after 9-11, I wouldn't have believed you. Body scans? Invasive searches? Sure thing. Not a problem. Sign me up -- as long as its rare and happens on an ad-hoc basis. But what we have now? It's a total travesty. The lunatics are truly running the asylum. (Ok, maybe I am ranting)

Tomek_ 16y ago

I'm not sure if I'd really feel better when surrounded by armed soldiers and being questioned a couple of times on my way to the plane (also inside the bus that takes me to the airport as I understand) than if I would just have to go through a security gate, eventually take off my shoes and get my baggage scanned by x-ray. I mean, I was a couple of times questioned at the airport, with the usual questions ("did anyone other than you have access to your baggage?", etc.) and once they ordered me to open my baggage - and that didn't make me feel more safe or anything like that, rather uncomfortable and a bit pissed of, in a "wtf? do you seriously think I'm gonna explode the plane or what?" way. Shortly speaking, I prefer to go through all those gates, have my baggage checked by security guys themselves ("go ahead, there's nothing there") than being bothered by some questions and be "under suspicion". Don't know, maybe it's just that I'm from Europe and we don't care.

aberkowitz 16y ago
The current system in the US strictly follows a flowchart. It has no preparation for anything other than "generic terrorism". With an infinite set of previously unthought of plans, this is a system terrorists can game to their advantage. The Israeli system requires competent individuals trained to adapt to any scenario.

doron 16y ago

This solution is all well and good (i will disregard issues of legal liberties afforded in this country for the moment) But it doesn't scale,Israel has one single main airport, the US has dozens of points for international entry, and many more domestic. It is easy and fairly cost effective when you have one location you have to worry about.

zephyrfalcon 16y ago
"But it doesn't scale,Israel has one single main airport, the US has dozens of points for international entry, and many more domestic. It is easy and fairly cost effective when you have one location you have to worry about." People say this, but it makes little sense to me. Compare having one factory that makes a product, vs having a hundred factories that make that same product. The latter is much more cost efficient per factory.

srean 16y ago

Despite the overwhelming possibility of being downvoted it needs mention that the Israeli model as practiced may not be that good an example for US to follow. It has been documented by several respected human rights organizations and UN that Israel's security measures are often used as a proxy for punishment and harassment for disagreeing with the official govt line. In spite of some erosion of liberties in US in the last decade or so, the American society continues to be orders of magnitude more open and free. I can confidently say that the way I will be treated by the American authorities does not depend on whether I or any of my family members were critical of American policy, neither is it dependent on places in US that are on my itinerary. Mention anything that remotely leans towards the UN view of the occupation to the Israeli security, or that you intend to visit any place in the occupied territories your experience will diverge dramatically (in its defense, personal anecdotal indicates that this may be regardless of whether you are Jewish or not). It still would have been acceptable had that selective part of the treatment made the airport, the flight or Israel any safer. But it is not clear to me that the specialization based on the views of a traveller does. I am wary of copying a model that has a tendency for abuse unless I see convincing counterweights in place. All depends on the implementation details and the operational processes.

krelian 16y ago
Did you even read the article?
- srean 16y ago
  Why wouldnt I ? Predictably enough, it seems the downvotes have started ringing in.
chopsueyar 16y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair

dmn 16y ago

Related Article: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1897940 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1897940

coffeemug 16y ago

I cannot believe people bring up Israeli airport security as an example of a system the U.S. should model. The security agents are neither intelligent, nor well trained, nor polite. The entire system is based on racism and I would take TSA security over the Israeli model any day. People were complaining here about a pat down search in public by a TSA agent equaling sexual harassment. I was actually taken to a public bathroom by an El Al agent and strip searched, purely because my last name "sounds Turkish". From my anecdotal experience, El Al has security personnel that appears trained to a naked eye, but in reality is extremely ineffective, flawed, and unethical. I had the misfortune to go through El Al security four times. These all occurred in a span of two weeks, roughly in the same circumstances (I had to fly into Israel, fly out, fly back in, and fly back out). I can tell you that the outcome of their screening is heavily inconsistent and highly dependent on the prejudices of the particular agent doing the interview, and not necessarily on advanced training procedures. I had the same answers for their questions every time. Two of the times the agents were Israeli jews who immigrated from Russia. Since we share a common background, both let me pass after very few questions because my trip details seemed perfectly reasonable to them. The other two times, I was interviewed by jews of clearly middle-eastern descent - both had no understanding of my cultural background, and both thought my trip details were extremely suspicious, subjecting me to a detailed search. So the outcome of the interviews was effectively random, which means they might as well perform random searches. The interviews were highly unethical, inappropriate, and degrading. Even more importantly, they were completely ineffective, resulting in a random outcome highly dependent on each agent's personal prejudices. I don't know what good security looks like, but I can tell you that this most certainly isn't it.

berntb 16y ago
>>I don't know what good security looks like, but I can tell you that this most certainly isn't it. I don't know much about airport security either. What I do know is that there exists lots of well financed organizations that want to blow up Israeli airports and airplanes -- with a bad track record during the last few decades. So something is done right, which might be kept a secret. If not the interviews, what?
shin_lao 16y ago

koevet 16y ago

The same article was commented by Bruce Scheiner on his blog. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/01/adopting_the_is.html http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/01/adopting_the_i... Very interesting comments, bottom line "Israel model does not scale well".

epo 16y ago
True but no one is suggesting that the USA should mimic the Israeli system slavishly, they should however learn from it and devise their own system with the intention to detect and deal with the potential bad guys as early as possible while disrupting every one else as little as possible. Henry Ford did not invent car manufacturing nor did MacDonalds invent the beefburger, they just made mass manufacturing scale well. The USA needs a transport security system which works at American scales and doesn't tick people off.

harscoat 16y ago

Flew there with my girl friend. We were very happy to be there 2 days only after sudden invitation to see a prospect. So when we handed our passports to the interviewer to get the Israel (Holy land!) visa Stamp, we were laughing of sheer joy to be there. Interviewer glared at us and asked abruptly: "what makes you laugh?!"

harscoat 16y ago
Hey guys who downvote: we were happy(!!) to arrive in Israel where friends of mine (who did Aliyah) where waiting for us all rejoicing themselves. That should be a ok/secure reason and attitude when arriving landing at the desired airport! (It turned out to be one of the greatest trip of our life: TelAviv, Jerusalem, the Dead See and the most fantastic En Gedi kibboutz).
- epo 16y ago
  Perhaps it was a rather boring anecdote and seemed almost off-topic.

shimonamit 16y ago

I was once late to the airport (in Israel) where I was scheduled to pick up my mother. I parked the car and ran towards the gate. A guard was standing at the entrance with her hands crossed doing nothing by observing. When she saw me coming she made a few quick steps towards me and signaled me to stop and stand aside for questioning. I felt a bit uncomfortable, first because it was abrupt and I was being singled out, but also because she was behaving like a shepherd dog trying to seize my eyes (which I later understood why). She was very polite and dismissed me after presenting my ID and answering a few short questions. This got me thinking about the silent perimeters, and how smart it is they were only engaged when triggered. The take home lesson for me was: smart earns respect. They were a step ahead of me and I was responding, not them.

ffffruit 16y ago

It all sounds absolutely reasonable (and dare I say pleasant) but how well does something like this scale? I am thinking Heathrow with 5 terminals with, I guess, 10 different entrances each where people arrive from.

stuaxo 16y ago

Just because it's runs more efficiently doesn't make it more desirable, it is after all - a militarised society, I don't particularly want to go to the US at the moment as it's moving that way.

maurits 16y ago

So, I have been to this airport traveling as a press photographer, which means you have an interesting itinerary and lots of interesting bits of kit in your luggage.I can add a little human aspect to this article. Last time the guy in front of me at the for mentioned first shielded baggage screening was suspected of having an explosive prompting the entire security machine to life and an evacuation. A false alarm and 30 odd minutes later I am again standing in line, pretty wasted at 5 in the morning. During the whole process the staff stayed very polite and very efficient, making the process quite painless. Every time I get treated rude and unpleasant by security staff/goons in my own home-country airport for really no good reason what so ever, I think about this. I feel that a little manners & humanity would go a long way in getting support for security measures.

thesz 16y ago

There are two notions of directing people, named after German words: Auftragstaktik and Befehlstaktik. Auftragstaktik: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission-type_tactics http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission-type_tactics Befehlstaktik stands for "detailed order control". It looks like Auftragstaktik is used in Israeli airports and TSA employ Befehlstaktik. To quote an article about Auftragstaktik: "Ironically, since WW2, only the Israeli Defence Force seem to have come close to matching the Wehrmacht of WW2 in the exercise of command in this style". So, they just use their military training and applied it to another field. And people from military works as screening officers at airports, for that being very good first job after military. Very clever.

berntb 16y ago

After reading this discussion, I'd be sorely disappointed if I ever flew in/out if Israel and wasn't checked out carefully. :-) But they are probably good at profiling curious tourists too. Reminds me of when me and a few friends bicycled around Northern Ireland once in the 90s. If I made a querying hand gesture to military at checkpoints if we should get over for questioning, they laughed, without even hearing my non-native English... ("More stupid tourists that just want to get close looks at our bullpups.")

steveplace 16y ago

This kind of analysis has a major flaw: these two countries are apples and oranges, by sheer size. We've seen this before: when pundits comment on relative outperformance of infrastructure, education, etc., they forget that the US is a really, really, big place-- and things may not scale as well. Israel has 2 international airports. The US has quite a few more. So the solutions presented here may not scale well as there is no true "funnel."

moo 16y ago

What I hear is the Israeli border guards have juvenile, petty behavior. What comes to mind is denying Noam Chomsky entry into Israel back in May. Also the border guards who put 3 rifle rounds through Lily Sussman's MacBook. 21 year old Lily had Arab letters stuck on her MacBook's keyboard. Before anyone tells me I haven't been to an Israel airport, I haven't been to the moon either but I still know it is mostly rock. Link to shot MacBook incident: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/12/video-interview-with-macbook-bullet-girl/ http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/12/video-interview-with-...

darklajid 16y ago

I want to chime in here as well. Disclaimer/Disclosure: I plan to relocate to Tel Aviv soon (from Germany), the company I'm working for has its headquarter there. I like the country, try to learn the language etc.. But: Every time I do the flight I'm nervous about the problems that _will_ come up. Coworker needed to strip to his underwear. Another one had his bag completely devastated several times. My (german, local branch) boss has probably more stamps from IL in his passport than anything else and does the trip routinely: I've never seen him getting through without problems, taking apart the hand luggage and asking lots of weird questions, sometimes for hours. There are some procedures in place to make this easier in the future. For a while companies can now announce guests/coworkers etc. in advance and make their life easier by providing names, passport numbers and dates of arrival/departure in written form. But that takes time and sucks if you need to fly over "now". Regarding the "safe" feeling: Nope, cannot confirm that. In Frankfurt the normal check-in is like this: * Check in and get your ticket * Pass the boarding pass control * Pass the security (think ~TSA) control * Move to the gate and board For El Al it's like this: * Talk to a "Security officer" about your plans to stay and your luggage. Who packed it? Where? Did you leave it for a second? Did someone ask you to bring something to IL? etc.. * Get a ticket and a token with cryptic (probably: "Search this one, Yes/No") markers * Pass boarding pass control * Pass security (~TSA) control * Go to the gate * Pass IL security, taking that token (and, every single time I traveled) sit down and wait for an officer. * Answer lots of questions, let them check your luggage (again) * Move to the gate, guarded by security officers with submachine guns (remember: We're still in FFM, Germany at this point...) In Tel Aviv, Ben Gurion, it's the same. The most upvoted post was from someone with an Israeli citizenship. Yeah - right. There are two lanes in Ben Gurion, Israeli and "Other". The latter is crap, takes ages, needs you to be there while they x-ray all your luggage (this is before you get a ticket, so you are present with your check-in luggage as well). Lots of questions. And, from experience, you end up at a desk where someone tells you to open your (check-in) luggage, to search your underwear and private possessions in front of you. Seriously: This is _not_ better than anything you US guys are currently complaining about. And no, this does _not_ make me feel safe, at all. Edit: Something I completely missed to mention: The article actually tries to tell you that the process is quick and effective. Maybe (not sure) it is for people with an IL passport. For me it means being at the airport 3 hours in advance, instead of 45-60 minutes. Otherwise I'm just not able to make it. My next trip is schedule to depart at ~3 am, I know that I'll be on the _german_ airport at 0:00 - for the sake of this efficient process. Same on the route back. What an improvement..