Lack of Security

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1

Been thinking about this a lot, and forgive me if it's already been
brought up. However, one thing I've heard time and time again about this
whole incident, is American people screaming about the lack of security.

The security we display in most aspects of our society echo the same
security we display in most of our networks as well.

Look at Microsoft's Windows for instance. Probably one of the most
insecure OS'es on the Internet at the moment. Yet, millions of people
still tolerate it. Time and time again, it has been the target of
attacks. However, Microsoft releases a flimsy patch, and tells us
everything is going to be OK. A few months later (sometimes weeks or
days), it gets nailed again. All of this, for convenience.

Now ask yourself, why was it so easy to hijack these planes? Because we
have sacrificed security for convenience - and our enemy used that
against us. Well, something to chew on. G'Night.

2

Can someone explain to me how only allowing ticketed passengers past security checkpoints is going to accomplish anything toward increased security? The only thing I can even dream of is that it will reduce the number of people passing the checkpoints.

These hijackers were ticketed passengers.

No carry-on? OK, so it will reduce hiding places for non-metallic weapons. On the other hand, so much for taking your laptop with you - are you willing to entrust your laptop to baggage handlers? Willing to put your Palm in your checked luggage?

This is just my feeling, but I honestly believe these measures are only giving the *appearance* of security, apparently to make the general public feel better.

I do agree, though, with the comments on network security - so many, many are much more lax about the security of their networks than airports have been. As an anecdote, when I came to my current job last year, the network was wide open. Since, I've placed servers behind firewalls, and blocked things like NetBIOS (you wouldn't believe the cry that went up from customers when I did that - they *want* to use NetBIOS shares between business offices in various cities)

3

Can someone explain to me how only allowing ticketed passengers past
security checkpoints is going to accomplish anything toward increased
security? The only thing I can even dream of is that it will reduce the
number of people passing the checkpoints.

And thus reduce the number of people and bags etc that need to be checked,
which will allow for more time to do thorough checks.
Why is it important that non-passengers be able to get all the way to the gate?

4

And by reducing the number of people passing the checkpoint, you can more
thoroughly check a higher number of people.

5

I understand that, and I don't believe it's important that non-passengers get all the way to the gate.

My point is that the hijackers were ticketed passengers. Short of strip search, it's entirely possible that the weapons they had would not have been discovered. Unless we're going to do at least a pat-down of all passengers.

In short, from what I've seen, the "security" measures now being put in place would have done little or nothing to avert yesterday's attacks.

As has been pointed out earlier - enter the country legally, do everything exactly as authorities ask. Then take whatever action you want once the flight is in the air.

The air marshall program is a good idea - I worry a little that a group of determined people could overpower him/her and end up in possession of their weapon.

6

Being in Canada and traveling to the US on occasion I was suprised the
first time I went and found that non-passengers could get to the gate
by just passing through security the same as passengers.

Yet in Canada, only passengers with valid tickets/boarding passes can get
through security, which seems a lot more sane to me at least.

Keith

7

Terribly sorry to stray so much from on topic, but I have a question I can't
satisfactorily answer my self. First I wish to convey my deep sorrow and
sympathy to all listmembers directly or indirectly affected by this attack.
Our thoughts and prayers are with you here in Canada, and we shall strike
with one heart and mind at those that perpetrated this act. My question
follows:

You can't get into a cab in NYC that doesn't have a shield that protects the
cabbie from the passengers. Why on earth is the cabin even accessible from
the passenger compartment? Could planes not be constructed to isolate the
cabin entirely from the passengers? You could certainly provide limited
seating for pilots that were flying along forward of this partition.

Is there any good reason for the amount of trust which is required in the
present model?

Regards,

Geoff Zinderdine
DSL Support Technician
MTS Communications

8

My point is that the hijackers were ticketed passengers. Short of strip
search, it's entirely possible that the weapons they had would not have
been discovered. Unless we're going to do at least a pat-down of all
passengers.

If the weapons would have been discovered will be something fo a later debate
if we ever find the weapons (knives - plastic or metal).

In short, from what I've seen, the "security" measures now being put in
place would have done little or nothing to avert yesterday's attacks.

Not so much the security measures of yesterday (since they are very much in
the past now) but the fact that the US has a relaxed security infrastructure
at the airports, borders, etc...probably gave the terrorists a sense that
they could get through airport security undetected....I doubt they would have
tried the same tactics on an LL or European airline.

As has been pointed out earlier - enter the country legally, do everything
exactly as authorities ask. Then take whatever action you want once the
flight is in the air.

The air marshall program is a good idea - I worry a little that a group of
determined people could overpower him/her and end up in possession of their
weapon.

Bottom line is that airport security as well other public transportation and
public establishments must have better security...it's time for us to join
the paranoia the rest of the world has...not a good thing but unfortunately
it is necessary.

steve

9

You can't get into a cab in NYC that doesn't have a shield that
protects the
cabbie from the passengers. Why on earth is the cabin even
accessible from
the passenger compartment? Could planes not be constructed to isolate the
cabin entirely from the passengers? You could certainly provide limited
seating for pilots that were flying along forward of this partition.

Is there any good reason for the amount of trust which is required in the
present model?

I think not, and hope that Boeing and Airbus (and other manufacturers) will
start redesigning their planes with an option of a completely separate flight-deck
etc. There will likely be severe drawbacks to this though:
  - no medical attention possible to pilots if one suffers a sickness and
    a doctor happens to be on board
  - no possibility of a steward(ess) of passenger taking over in case
    the flight-crew gets disabled.

10

Yes, security in airports is a serious problem. However this can happen at
any level. The problem is the terrorist and their "kamikaze" mentality.
If a terrorist creates a makeshift bomb, attaches it to their bodies and
decides to walk into the nearest mall, what stops this individual from
killing hundreds?

Airport security is an issue, but it is not the answer to terrorism, by ANY
means. What if these terrorist decided to take four vehicles filled with
explosives to the Holland Tunnel, Midtown Tunnel, GW Bridge and the
Williamsburg bridge? What would we do then? Blame bridge and tunnel
security? Once again, the problem is the terrorist.

The intelligence agencies in the United States are the best in the world.

Get your shit straight!

~ Clarke ~

11

How does the pilot go to the bathroom? How does the pilot change
positions with a relief pilot on flights over 12 hours? How does the
pilot/co-pilot perform emergency maintance in the lower avionics
compartments if their is some type of failure? How can the pilot
visually inspect any type wing damage/other damage that may/may not
have an effect on how the plane flies? If both pilots are
killed/overcome/pass out, how would a passenger/flight attendant get to
the controls to bring the plane down with direction from ATC?

The current model needs trust as it allows for a greater number of
survival possibilities for the aircraft.

Don't band-aid the problem. Eliminate the problem.

I have a friend that used to work in security for a large major
airline. The Air Marshalls have never disappeared. You just don't
know they are there. The only people that know they are there is the
flight crew. They dress like you and me and act like you and me. An
Air Marshall on any one of those 4 flights could have easily eliminated
the situation unless the pilot was an imposter from takeoff.

12

If our 'best' had no hint that what happened yesterday was going to occur,
then perhaps the statement above is wrong. (Either way(if they knew, or not)
expect changes, and more money for them.)

13

Stopping terrorism of this nature is impossible. In the free society that we
live in, and I emphasize the work FREE, it's impossible to stop these kind
of attacks.
Those who blame the government intelligence agencies should not have any
problem when their FREE rights and privacy are taken away from them in the
near future.

Security at what cost? Our freedom and privacy?

~ Clarke ~

14

So are you advocating a loss of freedom in the physical world for
security? I'm willing to accept certain measures to make the planes
and airports more secure, sure. But I refuse to lose any freedoms
provided by the Bill of Rights. Of course, many believe that's outdated
anyway. The 5th and 4th Amendments are already pretty useless thanks to
the "war on drugs". The 2nd is the big enemy right now to most. After
that's finally chipped away the 1st will probably be next, all in the
interest of National Security and safety. I should go find my tin foil...

And since my primary job these days is security, I can say insecure
systems come from three primary causes; human error, human ignorance and
human laziness. Neither of which will be erradicated anytime soon. Human
error generally causes the problem, human ignorance means you don't know
there's a problem, and human laziness keeps you from fixing it.

Remember guys, while there's a lot of 0-day used by the underground, most
attacks are for known and correctable bugs.

Regards,

15

Why is it important that they not? It seems to me that the only
difference between a person with a ticket and a person without now is just
the ticket. Neither have baggage and all have to go through the same
checkpoints. The only thing is more time for shaking people down that
either raise suspicion or set the metal detector off. What does the
removal of curbside checking provide?

My wife brought up an interesting point. We travel with small children,
and they tend to need things to keep them occupied while they're in small
confined spaces for hours at a time. They also need things like diapers,
formula, pacifiers, snacks, etc. which will be impossible to transport
without some sort of carry on bag. Make no mistake, these are reactionary
feel good measures that are designed to make people feel safer, but will
probably not amount to anything significant except more irritable
passengers. If they thought air rage was bad now, it's only going to get
worse because flying was already becoming a huge pain in the ass. I can
only imagine what this is going to do to the airline industry, considering
they were already having enough problems. Midway Airlines already closed
up shop according to CNN this morning. I'm certainly not comfortable
checking my laptop with baggage handlers. There's no telling where it
will end up, whom it will end up with, or what shape it will end up in.

You won't see anyone contest these new rules either, because no one wants
to be seen as rocking the boat. This is what politicians and beuracrats
do.

Regards,

16

Why is it important that they not? It seems to me that the only
difference between a person with a ticket and a person without now is just
the ticket. Neither have baggage and all have to go through the same
checkpoints. The only thing is more time for shaking people down that
either raise suspicion or set the metal detector off. What does the
removal of curbside checking provide?

The difference is that those with tickets will get on the plane and thus
pose a higher potential security risk. So they should be screened more
closely, which will require time and resources. Not screening those
who don't want to fly will free up those resources. Why should non-passenger
be screened in the first place. They can stay outside the security perimeter.

My wife brought up an interesting point. We travel with small children,
and they tend to need things to keep them occupied while they're in small
confined spaces for hours at a time. They also need things like diapers,
formula, pacifiers, snacks, etc. which will be impossible to transport
without some sort of carry on bag. Make no mistake, these are reactionary

Here I agree. I do think that as a short-term measure this is OK, until
new procedures have been worked out, *tested* and implemented, but in the long
term carry-on will have to return.

17

Not that this has anything to do with NANOG, but ...

Why be limited to just AN air marshall?

Allow some already licensed citizens to carry their own handguns on planes
after running them through some sort of civilian air marshall program -
maybe run by the National Guard at high school level or earlier for the
future members to get a headstart, and by the FBI for those actively on
planes.

For those in the program who don't choose to carry all the time off the
planes, provide issue weapons that get turned in at the far end for those
coming with none, and provide checking/storage at either end for those more
comfortable their own but perhaps not wanting a weapon with them at some
business meeting.

Yes, you may lose a plane or two through screwups or until training and
screening get refined, but far better hundreds in the unlucky plane than
thousands when buildings or sports stadiums or monster urban cryo-LNG tanks
are successful targets. Its not that the terrorists would be personally
afraid of these civilians, but they would be rightly afraid their success
rate would be severely crimped.

If all the passengers of the planes this week were aware of what was really
about to happen, I suspect the outcome would have been a lot different. If
you are apt to be dying anyway, make sure the bastards don't get their way
totally. One plane apparently did that.

But if you then tilt the scale towards the public's side a bit more than
hand to hand combat with a knife (or gun or bomb) wielding terrorist allows,
and add a few civilian marksmen you have a much safer plane that I would not
mind flying on. Go to your local gun club and watch the local police come
for their annual requalifying now that they need a properly lead proofed and
ventilated range the city/town can no longer afford, and then watch the
average club member shoot. On average, guess who is the better shot by far!

This juncture should not be one where the public is further disarmed, but
should be one where Americans, even those that don't like guns, should
seriously consider learning to use them well if and when needed, and should
be demanding more of their rights to self defense be returned.

And give them bonus frequent flyer miles or special discounts, and a
Saturday of intense training every 3 months or so that they even get paid to
attend. Make the system popular, but demand some serious training.

And don't whine about Columbine and guns and school kids. Normal American
kids and guns are fine. Some quality instruction helps. I grew up in a
neighborhood in Cambridge Mass where all the kids had access to guns and
could shoot as much as they could afford. Noone got hurt. One of the Harvard
Professors (www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/1999/05.27/mm.perry.html ) across
the street owned marsh islands off the north shore and the neighborhood kids
took turns being his kid's guests. You could shoot all you wanted but had to
bring or pay for your own ammo. Handguns, rifles, and shotguns. That was in
the early 50s and I was pretty young as we moved away from there at the end
of my 7th grade. I was a lucky city kid with access to instruction and
shooting space. Country kids will all laugh because they always had such
access. We didn't have garbage TV back then and more important did not have
prescription psych mind-rape drugs being pumped into school kids as a bad
crutch or source of Federal $$s by school systems that have wandered far
away from real teaching ability. Keep the psychs and their
Columbine/Wakefield style drugs OUT of schools and certainly out of any
civilian air marshall program and you can have a safe system.

From: "Dave Stewart" <dbs@ntrnet.net>
To: "Mathias K�rber" <mathias@koerber.org>; <nanog@merit.org>
Sent: Wednesday, September 12, 2001 11:22 PM
Subject: RE: Lack of Security

And thus reduce the number of people and bags etc that need to be checked,
which will allow for more time to do thorough checks.
Why is it important that non-passengers be able to get all the way to the
gate?

......

18

The intelligence agencies in the United States are the best in the world.

This is actually not true. In order for anyone to get world class
explosives, they would need to be well connected and to have access to
explosives, that is, someone will have to supply them. Among these network
of terrorists, some of them deal with supplying explosives, some with
aquiring them, some with planning, some with other financial aspects. Like
any other military (or large organization), they have a few departments.
Most of the people are rather sane, and work in a more or less normal
manner to do their "job". The ones carrying out the missions are the vast
minority of such an organization.

Intelligence gathering should and must be at the preliminary stage, by
infiltrating such organizations, in any possible way. An operation of the
size the US witnessed involved many people, at all levels of the
organization. If the organization was well covered by the CIA/???, then
the information would have reached them long time before the actual hit.

This is what intelligence is all about.

--Ariel

19

So are you advocating a loss of freedom in the physical world for
security? I'm willing to accept certain measures to make the planes
and airports more secure, sure.

No, I was talking about convenience.

But I refuse to lose any freedoms provided by the Bill of Rights. Of
course, many believe that's outdated anyway.

Convenience and American Rights are two different things. I wish more
American people would learn the difference. I'm not saying that you
don't, as you were unsure as to what I was talking about.

However, I have to ask. How is improving and tightening security around
air ports, sea ports, and borders a infringing on your rights?

And since my primary job these days is security, I can say insecure
systems come from three primary causes; human error, human ignorance and
human laziness.

Agreed 100% - and I don't claim to be perfect by any stretch of the
imagination. However, you have to start somewhere to get the ball in
motion. You have to get people used to the idea of having to take extra
steps in order to accomplish something. Again, I'm not saying your
rights should be revoked. I'm saying some of the conveniences we are
used to need to be made a little less convenient.

Remember guys, while there's a lot of 0-day used by the underground,
most attacks are for known and correctable bugs.

Yes, just like the tragedy that occured on Tuesday. They used a well
known exploit in our system. Could we have stopped them with better
security? It doesn't matter - preventing from happening again, is what
matters to me.

20

". The ones carrying out the missions are the vast minority of such an

organization.

This is highly incorrect, especially when looking at extremist Muslamic
religous groups.

Religious Extremism. Islamic extremists literally pose the largest danger in
terms of religious terrorism. Sunni terrorists, such as Ramzi Yousef,
convicted in the New York Trade Center bombing, tend to be representative of
this trend, whereas Shi'a terrorists continue to pursue their goals in a
more collective fashion, obtaining direction and support from Iran. Although
the Sunni-Shi'a schism remains, some cooperation between members of the two
branches of Islam has been evident.

Muslim terrorists are often Mujahadeen, devoted to Islam and committed to
Jihad, ("Holy War"), possessing combat experience of such locations as
Afghanistan, Bosnia, and Chechnya. Well-schooled in handling weapons,
explosives and communications equipment, they know the value of the
Internet, fax machines, cellular telephones and encryption. Increasingly
sophisticated and willing travellers, they have access to excellent false
documentation and international contacts, and can blend easily into a local
�migr� community, where they can plan and execute attacks without being
readily identified. It is their nebulous, unstructured characteristics,
combined with zealous dedication, which contribute in large measure to the
menace they present. Osama bin Laden is one such extraordinary example, made
several times more dangerous by virtue of his immense wealth, personal
capabilities, and charisma.

Intelligence gathering should and must be at the preliminary stage, by
infiltrating such organizations, in any possible way. An operation of the
size the US witnessed involved many people, at all levels of the
organization. If the organization was well covered by the CIA/???, then
the information would have reached them long time before the actual hit.

This is what intelligence is all about.

Intelligence is the best weapon for countering terrorism, but getting good
intelligence on terrorism is challenging because it necessitates direct
communication with the terrorists. CIA guidelines have discouraged hiring
terrorist spies. This limits the information we can gather on terrorists and
their agendas.

~ Clarke ~