IP: in case you were feeling more secure Some Airport Workers Bypass Security

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-airport-security0518may1
8.story 

Some Airport Workers Bypass Security
By JONATHAN D. SALANT
Associated Press Writer

May 18, 2002, 1:38 PM EDT

WASHINGTON -- While passengers and pilots pass through tightened airport
security checkpoints, baggage handlers and other workers still bypass
screeners and metal detectors by using identification cards that open locked
doors. 

The government is considering how to fix this flaw in the security net that
regulators have been strengthening since Sept. 11. Critics say they are
moving too slowly. 

"There's a hole in the system that's bigger than a barn door and should send
shudders up the spine of the traveling public and those responsible for the
security of our nation's air transportation system," said commercial airline
pilot Robert Held, who has flown for 14 years.

John Magaw, who heads the new Transportation Security Administration, or
TSA, said his agency is looking at ways to restrict access to secured areas
to "improve security and ensure the integrity of our nation's airports."
Secured areas are those places beyond airport passenger checkpoints where
employees can walk up to airplanes.

Among proposals under study are improved background checks, tamperproof
identification cards and rules that send all airport employees through
screening checkpoints, TSA spokesman Jonathan Thompson said.

Pilot programs to test various security procedures are planned for 20
airports, the agency said. Under the new airline security law, TSA must
inform Congress this month of its progress, with reports expected Monday.
Mary Schiavo, a former Transportation Department inspector general, said TSA
has been so concerned with stopping terror hijackings that it hasn't moved
quickly to prevent bombs from getting onto planes through the cargo hold or
on a food cart. 

"We haven't had an attack launched through that access," said Schiavo, now a
lawyer representing victims of airplane accidents. "I don't think they're
very worried about it."

Aviation experts fear terrorists could use employee entrances to bypass
security checkpoints and plant bombs or weapons aboard parked airplanes.
"It is a weakness in the system that's exploitable by a terrorist group or
someone who wants to make use of it," said former Federal Aviation
Administration security director Billie Vincent, president of Aerospace
Services International in Chantilly, Va.

Reports from both the Transportation Department's inspector general, Kenneth
Mead, and the FAA said airports have failed to restrict access to runways
and airplanes adequately.

While rules vary by airport, those who can obtain access cards include
cleaning crews, maintenance workers, baggage handlers, construction workers
and employees who stock airplanes with food and drinks.
The inspector general said his investigators successfully entered unsecured
ramps, runways, cargo areas and other places beyond security checkpoints
more than two-thirds of the time during a recent visit to eight major
airports. FAA special agent Bogden Dzakovic said his undercover team entered
a secured area of a major airport 85 percent of the times they tried.
Some of the special identification cards were in the hands of more than 400
airport employees recently arrested on fraud and immigration charges as part
of a Justice Department sweep.

"We need better systems that provide protection for our secured areas," said
House Transportation aviation subcommittee Chairman John Mica, R-Fla.
"There's no question we're vulnerable."

The problem has long been known. In July 2001, the FAA adopted rules that
allowed the agency to levy fines of up to $11,000 against airport employees
who hold security doors open for colleagues, lend a badge to a co-worker who
forgot it at home or allow friends to visit restricted areas.
Airport officials acknowledge the problem.

"The bottom line on access control is can it be improved? Can it be
enhanced? Certainly," said J. Spencer Dickerson, executive vice president of
the American Association of Airport Executives. "You're always finding ways
to continually improve the system."
* __ 
On the Net: Transportation Security Administration: http://www.tsa.dot.gov
House Transportation Committee: http://www.house.gov/transportation/

Copyright © 2002, The Associated Press 

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