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Probably the saddest part of this article: > Meanwhile, they've beefed up water patrols around the airport and are policing the perimeter. So the response to

Probably the saddest part of this article: > Meanwhile, they've beefed up water patrols around the airport and are policing the perimeter. So the response to their non-response of the non-terrorist breach of security is to respond with overwhelming security to no actual threat. Do they really think they're fooling anyone with this security theater?

AYBABTME 14y ago
Well, now that the flaws of their security system is exposed to the whole world, they can't sit on their ass and be like 'Yeah, come and breach while you can'.
- pyre 14y ago
  Aren't they supposed to wait for the first Tuesday of the month to patch all of their security holes though? ;-)
dredmorbius 14y ago
I was just going to post the same line from the article. There's no evidence presented in the article that there's an actual security threat. There's ample evidence posted in the article that Castillo presented no threat. There are undoubtedly plenty of other avenues by which airport security could be breached. Most likely by securing access as a contractor through one of the various service providers to the airport -- including potentially as a security provider. By comparison, among the largest threats to NATO forces in Afghanistan presently are "green on blue" attacks by Afgan police/army forces. The emperor continues to have no clothes. This is no longer security theater, it's a security pole dance.
- corin_ 14y ago
  If a user on your website accidentally finds an exploit that could let him steal your user database but he didn't mean to and didn't do anything with it... do you a.) Say "well he wasn't a real threat, back to the TV" or b.) Prevent anyone else from getting in the same way? I agree with the general hatred of security theatre, but given what it is they obviously had to be seen to fix the hole rather than just leave it wide open where any terrorist could get through it.
  - flyinRyan 14y ago
    >If a user on your website accidentally finds an exploit that could let him steal your user database but he didn't mean to and didn't do anything with it... do you a.) Say "well he wasn't a real threat, back to the TV" or b.) Prevent anyone else from getting in the same way? This line of logic is going the exact wrong way. In the case of a website, there are known exploiters out there stealing data and money continuously. If you have a hole it will be found and exploited with near 100% certainty. Further, fixing your hole doesn't hurt anyone and usually doesn't even inconvenience them. Airport "security", on the other hand, is against a threat that never seems to materialize [1] and is massively inconvenient to everyone who uses the system. This sort of thing is just shadow chasing. "Oh noes! If terrorists could somehow weaponize rats, they would be able to utilize the sewer system! We better spend billions to lock down the sewers, ASAP!". This hole has been open for how long? And yet, no terrorist attacks. It's not worth investing the resources it would take to fill the hole because statistically there's no reason to believe it will ever be exploited by a terrorist. [1] Relative to internet attacks, which are constant, terrorist attacks against the US are statistically non-existent. There are probably more cyber attacks on US websites in a single day than terrorist attacks committed on US soil in its entire history.
    - corin_ 14y ago
      > This hole has been open for how long? And yet, no terrorist attacks. Typically when a website is hacked it isn't because they opened up a vulnerability the day before, it too has been around a while before anyone malicious found it. The rest of your argument is all about the general security theatre situation, where yes, I agree they are going over the top against very little threat. My point was that, given this policy, they had two choices here - either close the security hole ASAP, or say "to be honest, this whole security thing's a bit of a joke, let's all go home".
      - dclowd9901 14y ago
        Or option 3: "we know we should've known a guy had made it onto the Tarmac before he made it all the way to the terminals. There's obviously something wrong there. But there's no need to worry about ze terrorists storming airport beach fronts, so heavily armed response is probably overkill. It'd be a little difficult to miss something like that."
flyinRyan 14y ago
We live in the land where the person with the most vivid, explicit nightmare gets the most money and power. The key take away is that there are plenty of holes like this all over the place. Yet none of those holes have been exploited...

AYBABTME 14y ago

Well, now that the flaws of their security system is exposed to the whole world, they can't sit on their ass and be like 'Yeah, come and breach while you can'.

pyre 14y ago
Aren't they supposed to wait for the first Tuesday of the month to patch all of their security holes though? ;-)

dredmorbius 14y ago

I was just going to post the same line from the article. There's no evidence presented in the article that there's an actual security threat. There's ample evidence posted in the article that Castillo presented no threat. There are undoubtedly plenty of other avenues by which airport security could be breached. Most likely by securing access as a contractor through one of the various service providers to the airport -- including potentially as a security provider. By comparison, among the largest threats to NATO forces in Afghanistan presently are "green on blue" attacks by Afgan police/army forces. The emperor continues to have no clothes. This is no longer security theater, it's a security pole dance.

corin_ 14y ago
If a user on your website accidentally finds an exploit that could let him steal your user database but he didn't mean to and didn't do anything with it... do you a.) Say "well he wasn't a real threat, back to the TV" or b.) Prevent anyone else from getting in the same way? I agree with the general hatred of security theatre, but given what it is they obviously had to be seen to fix the hole rather than just leave it wide open where any terrorist could get through it.
- flyinRyan 14y ago
  >If a user on your website accidentally finds an exploit that could let him steal your user database but he didn't mean to and didn't do anything with it... do you a.) Say "well he wasn't a real threat, back to the TV" or b.) Prevent anyone else from getting in the same way? This line of logic is going the exact wrong way. In the case of a website, there are known exploiters out there stealing data and money continuously. If you have a hole it will be found and exploited with near 100% certainty. Further, fixing your hole doesn't hurt anyone and usually doesn't even inconvenience them. Airport "security", on the other hand, is against a threat that never seems to materialize [1] and is massively inconvenient to everyone who uses the system. This sort of thing is just shadow chasing. "Oh noes! If terrorists could somehow weaponize rats, they would be able to utilize the sewer system! We better spend billions to lock down the sewers, ASAP!". This hole has been open for how long? And yet, no terrorist attacks. It's not worth investing the resources it would take to fill the hole because statistically there's no reason to believe it will ever be exploited by a terrorist. [1] Relative to internet attacks, which are constant, terrorist attacks against the US are statistically non-existent. There are probably more cyber attacks on US websites in a single day than terrorist attacks committed on US soil in its entire history.
  - corin_ 14y ago
    > This hole has been open for how long? And yet, no terrorist attacks. Typically when a website is hacked it isn't because they opened up a vulnerability the day before, it too has been around a while before anyone malicious found it. The rest of your argument is all about the general security theatre situation, where yes, I agree they are going over the top against very little threat. My point was that, given this policy, they had two choices here - either close the security hole ASAP, or say "to be honest, this whole security thing's a bit of a joke, let's all go home".
    - dclowd9901 14y ago
      Or option 3: "we know we should've known a guy had made it onto the Tarmac before he made it all the way to the terminals. There's obviously something wrong there. But there's no need to worry about ze terrorists storming airport beach fronts, so heavily armed response is probably overkill. It'd be a little difficult to miss something like that."

flyinRyan 14y ago

We live in the land where the person with the most vivid, explicit nightmare gets the most money and power. The key take away is that there are plenty of holes like this all over the place. Yet none of those holes have been exploited...