It was difficult not to blog about this last night, when Chris gave me the good news about his recent run-in with federal authorities ("Chris has been Wikipediafied"). No charges. Stuff back. Lots of fun stories to tell future children and audiences on the lecture circuit. This was my favorite insight from Chris’s post-mortem on the experience:
The implementation of the no-fly and mandatory-selectee lists is flawed, secretive and in no way transparent. Senator Ted Kennedy was put on the list for a while, Cat Stevens, the wife of the Senator made famous for stating that the “Internet is a series of tubes” has been repeatedly delayed at airports, due to the fact that she shares a name with the now-Muslim singer, and any passenger named Robert Johnson or John Smith is severely inconvenienced when they fly. Yet, at the same time, the 9/11 hijackers, all of whom are dead, are still on the list, while the names of the London liquid bombers were not placed on the list - due to the chance a boarding denial at the airport could tip them off to the fact that they were under investigation.
There are a number of useful links in the original post, so I recommend taking the time to read the full entry. His comments are really thought-provoking, highlighting the differences between political goals and effective practice. I’d like to see a thorough study from a complex systems perspective of security management of airports without top-down regulation.
What’s next for Chris? Some papers to submit, courses to take, and probably a new flood of blog comments to read.
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Ryan Singel posted this update on the Wired blog.
… OK, maybe some of the joy was premature. Chris just received a certified letter from TSA saying that they are opening an investigation of their own. This is a civil matter which could result in hefty (for a grad student) fines of $11K per incident, rather than jail time.