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Fun days for airport security :) How do they handle people bringing caramic knifes today? Would wooden knives display clearly on their scanners?
by Tistron 5y ago
Fun days for airport security :)
How do they handle people bringing caramic knifes today? Would wooden knives display clearly on their scanners?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- vegardx 5y agoMost ceramic knives have some metal in them for this reason.
- ksec 5y agoDidn't know that. I wonder how if it would be the same for Wood knives as well.
- laurent92 5y agoHaven’t they moved from Xray, which shows the difference between atoms thanks to wavelength, to ultrasounds, which show sharp edges and thus is suitable for anything iron, plastic or wood as long as it’s sharp?
- salawat 5y agoI'd imagine that would drive the chemical sniffing/bomb dogs absolutely insane.
- batch12 5y agoYou can already bring scissors on a plane with 4 inch blades. That's two knives.
- nephanth 5y agoCan you? I've had to leave my scissors at security at least once. It was in France though
- batch12 5y agoWas speaking for the US, sorry. https://www.tsa.gov/travel/security-screening/whatcanibring/items/scissors https://www.tsa.gov/travel/security-screening/whatcanibring/... > If packed in carry-on, they must be less than 4 inches from the pivot point
- reayn 5y agoA scissor can't really compare to a proper forged and heat treated knife, and for the purpose of using a seemingly everyday object for a more malicious purpose there are better things imo.
- cogman10 5y agoYeah, airport security is nothing but security theater. I wish we could eliminate it.
- batch12 5y agoBut then who could I get to look at me naked while I do the YMCA?
- skeeter2020 5y agoThere's a real need for security though, so while I would love to make it better (... by removing the theatre elements) that doesn't mean no security. We have lots of things that we know work but lack various wills to do so, ranging from the easy like "don't let anyone other than ticketed travellers anywhere near the terminal" to the crazy-sounding like "make flying 10x or 100x time more expensive".
- fiddlerwoaroof 5y ago> There's a real need for security though I suspect this is overstated: preventing access to the cockpit from the passenger cabin solves a lot of the issues here: if a hijacker can’t use the plane as a cruise missile, the need for security is about equivalent to attacks on metros or passenger trains.
- cogman10 5y ago> There's a real need for security though. Why? Do we need this level of security at a bus station or a train station? No? Why? Because planes can be flown into things? Lock the cabin door. Because there's lots of people on planes? Well, there's lots of people on trains, buses, or in random offices and hotels. Why are the plane people special? What about giant conventions or events? We have all this security because of 9/11, but only 1 security measure (locking cabin doors) was needed to stop the next 9/11.
- nephanth 5y agoTheater can act as a deterrent though
- thrwyoilarticle 5y agoThey barely deal with the people bringing metal guns. https://abcnews.go.com/US/exclusive-undercover-dhs-tests-find-widespread-security-failures/story?id=31434881 https://abcnews.go.com/US/exclusive-undercover-dhs-tests-fin...
- sli 5y agoMeanwhile, I've been quite literally screamed at by the TSA because I forgot to take the baggie with my toothpaste and deodorant out of my bag.
- dafelst 5y agoGetting knives past airport security seems not particularly difficult from the experience of my circle and other anecdotal sources. I've had friends and family accidentally get knives through security on many occasions, and I have also accidentally done it myself. To my knowledge none of them has ever been caught in the converse situation and had to give up a knife. I imagine if one were resourceful and deliberate about it, it would be even more successful.
- TheDudeMan 5y agoI've had to give up a knife on two occasions.
- hlehmann 5y agoBack in my scout leader days we would buy Swiss Army knives by the bucketful at TSA auctions and give them to scouts as goodies after jamborees & what not. I swear the TSA must confiscate a thousand a day.
- csee 5y agoThis would be great for ML. A knife detection algorithm that alerts the officer when it thinks it spots one when the bags go in the scanner.
- nickpeterson 5y agoIt wouldn’t be a hacker news post if ML didn’t theoretically solve a problem.
- csee 5y agoI was going to put a disclaimer because of the risk of sounding cliche/ironic/sarcastic, but figured it was a legitimately good idea so I decided to spare people.
- Shared404 5y agoExcept then you get delayed because the model decides you have a knife and "the computer can't be wrong".
- samstave 5y agoI think it would be interesting to use the process for the extremely high tolerance-cut-metal blocks, where the items in the block are such tight tolerances that when inserted, you cant see them. Then - cut all the items you want into the hunk/hunks of metal such that you can pop them out in-flight and assemble your mechanisms of chaos... You can just have non-descript blocks in a case and say they are for scientific experiments but they look like un-machined pieces in the case. heck - even have a clear lid on the case with labels of different 'alloy make-ups' to make it look more like a metallurgical kit...
- salawat 5y agoPlease don't give them ideas. It's hard enough getting one's hands on scientific materials as is.
- infogulch 5y agoIs airport security not totally overblown theater already? Why encourage it?
- irotinfkforktng 5y agoThey don't usually catch metal knives, much less ceramic ones. I used to (post-9/11, pre-pandemic) frequently fly with bags that get used daily, and I often forgot about fairly large flip-blades rolling around in the bottom. Several times, I had to surrender them to the TSA before a return flight, but usually I'd find them when I got back, and they never caught one on the first try IME. So your odds of getting a big metal knife through are likely better than 50/50, and there didn't seem to be any penalty for getting caught. Why bother with fancy materials?