Racial profiling

[AlexCrowley 0]

The following article is written by security expert Bruce Schneier, author of several bestselling books on the topic of security, including 'Applied Cryptography' and 'Secrets and Lies'. The following is an exerpt of 'Beyond Fear' in which he discusses the pros and cons of profiling, and why racial profiling is ineffective. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/07/profiling.html

Good security has people in charge. People are resilient. People can improvise. People can be creative. People can develop on-the-spot solutions. People can detect attackers who cheat, and can attempt to maintain security despite the cheating. People can detect passive failures and attempt to recover. People are the strongest point in a security process. When a security system succeeds in the face of a new or coordinated or devastating attack, it’s usually due to the efforts of people.

On 14 December 1999, Ahmed Ressam tried to enter the U.S. by ferryboat from Victoria Island, British Columbia. In the trunk of his car, he had a suitcase bomb. His plan was to drive to Los Angeles International Airport, put his suitcase on a luggage cart in the terminal, set the timer, and then leave. The plan would have worked had someone not been vigilant.

Ressam had to clear customs before boarding the ferry. He had fake ID, in the name of Benni Antoine Noris, and the computer cleared him based on this ID. He was allowed to go through after a routine check of his car’s trunk, even though he was wanted by the Canadian police. On the other side of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, at Port Angeles, Washington, Ressam was approached by U.S. customs agent Diana Dean, who asked some routine questions and then decided that he looked suspicious. He was fidgeting, sweaty, and jittery. He avoided eye contact. In Dean’s own words, he was acting “hinky.” More questioning­there was no one else crossing the border, so two other agents got involved--and more hinky behavior. Ressam’s car was eventually searched, and he was finally discovered and captured. It wasn’t any one thing that tipped Dean off; it was everything encompassed in the slang term “hinky.” But the system worked. The reason there wasn’t a bombing at LAX around Christmas in 1999 was because a knowledgeable person was in charge of security and paying attention.

There’s a dirty word for what Dean did that chilly afternoon in December, and it’s profiling. Everyone does it all the time. When you see someone lurking in a dark alley and change your direction to avoid him, you’re profiling. When a storeowner sees someone furtively looking around as she fiddles inside her jacket, that storeowner is profiling. People profile based on someone’s dress, mannerisms, tone of voice ... and yes, also on their race and ethnicity. When you see someone running toward you on the street with a bloody ax, you don't know for sure that he’s a crazed ax murderer. Perhaps he’s a butcher who’s actually running after the person next to you to give her the change she forgot. But you’re going to make a guess one way or another. That guess is an example of profiling.

To profile is to generalize. It’s taking characteristics of a population and applying them to an individual. People naturally have an intuition about other people based on different characteristics. Sometimes that intuition is right and sometimes it’s wrong, but it’s still a person’s first reaction. How good this intuition is as a countermeasure depends on two things: how accurate the intuition is and how effective it is when it becomes institutionalized or when the profile characteristics become commonplace.

One of the ways profiling becomes institutionalized is through computerization. Instead of Diana Dean looking someone over, a computer looks the profile over and gives it some sort of rating. Generally profiles with high ratings are further evaluated by people, although sometimes countermeasures kick in based on the computerized profile alone. This is, of course, more brittle. The computer can profile based only on simple, easy-to-assign characteristics: age, race, credit history, job history, et cetera. Computers don't get hinky feelings. Computers also can't adapt the way people can.

Profiling works better if the characteristics profiled are accurate. If erratic driving is a good indication that the driver is intoxicated, then that’s a good characteristic for a police officer to use to determine who he’s going to pull over. If furtively looking around a store or wearing a coat on a hot day is a good indication that the person is a shoplifter, then those are good characteristics for a store owner to pay attention to. But if wearing baggy trousers isn't a good indication that the person is a shoplifter, then the store owner is going to spend a lot of time paying undue attention to honest people with lousy fashion sense.

In common parlance, the term “profiling” doesn't refer to these characteristics. It refers to profiling based on characteristics like race and ethnicity, and institutionalized profiling based on those characteristics alone. During World War II, the U.S. rounded up over 100,000 people of Japanese origin who lived on the West Coast and locked them in camps (prisons, really). That was an example of profiling. Israeli border guards spend a lot more time scrutinizing Arab men than Israeli women; that’s another example of profiling. In many U.S. communities, police have been known to stop and question people of color driving around in wealthy white neighborhoods (commonly referred to as “DWB”--Driving While Black). In all of these cases you might possibly be able to argue some security benefit, but the trade-offs are enormous: Honest people who fit the profile can get annoyed, or harassed, or arrested, when they’re assumed to be attackers.

For democratic governments, this is a major problem. It’s just wrong to segregate people into “more likely to be attackers” and “less likely to be attackers” based on race or ethnicity. It’s wrong for the police to pull a car over just because its black occupants are driving in a rich white neighborhood. It’s discrimination.

But people make bad security trade-offs when they’re scared, which is why we saw Japanese internment camps during World War II, and why there is so much discrimination against Arabs in the U.S. going on today. That doesn't make it right, and it doesn't make it effective security. Writing about the Japanese internment, for example, a 1983 commission reported that the causes of the incarceration were rooted in “race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership.” But just because something is wrong doesn't mean that people won't continue to do it.

Ethics aside, institutionalized profiling fails because real attackers are so rare: Active failures will be much more common than passive failures. The great majority of people who fit the profile will be innocent. At the same time, some real attackers are going to deliberately try to sneak past the profile. During World War II, a Japanese American saboteur could try to evade imprisonment by pretending to be Chinese. Similarly, an Arab terrorist could dye his hair blond, practice an American accent, and so on.

Profiling can also blind you to threats outside the profile. If U.S. border guards stop and search everyone who’s young, Arab, and male, they’re not going to have the time to stop and search all sorts of other people, no matter how hinky they might be acting. On the other hand, if the attackers are of a single race or ethnicity, profiling is more likely to work (although the ethics are still questionable). It makes real security sense for El Al to spend more time investigating young Arab males than it does for them to investigate Israeli families. In Vietnam, American soldiers never knew which local civilians were really combatants; sometimes killing all of them was the security solution they chose.

If a lot of this discussion is abhorrent, as it probably should be, it’s the trade-offs in your head talking. It’s perfectly reasonable to decide not to implement a countermeasure not because it doesn’t work, but because the trade-offs are too great. Locking up every Arab-looking person will reduce the potential for Muslim terrorism, but no reasonable person would suggest it. (It’s an example of “winning the battle but losing the war.”) In the U.S., there are laws that prohibit police profiling by characteristics like ethnicity, because we believe that such security measures are wrong (and not simply because we believe them to be ineffective).

Still, no matter how much a government makes it illegal, profiling does occur. It occurs at an individual level, at the level of Diana Dean deciding which cars to wave through and which ones to investigate further. She profiled Ressam based on his mannerisms and his answers to her questions. He was Algerian, and she certainly noticed that. However, this was before 9/11, and the reports of the incident clearly indicate that she thought he was a drug smuggler; ethnicity probably wasn’t a key profiling factor in this case. In fact, this is one of the most interesting aspects of the story. That intuitive sense that something was amiss worked beautifully, even though everybody made a wrong assumption about what was wrong. Human intuition detected a completely unexpected kind of attack. Humans will beat computers at hinkiness-detection for many decades to come.

And done correctly, this intuition-based sort of profiling can be an excellent security countermeasure. Dean needed to have the training and the experience to profile accurately and properly, without stepping over the line and profiling illegally. The trick here is to make sure perceptions of risk match the actual risks. If those responsible for security profile based on superstition and wrong-headed intuition, or by blindly following a computerized profiling system, profiling won’t work at all. And even worse, it actually can reduce security by blinding people to the real threats. Institutionalized profiling can ossify a mind, and a person’s mind is the most important security countermeasure we have.

A couple of other points (not from the book):

* Whenever you design a security system with two ways through -- an easy way and a hard way -- you invite the attacker to take the easy way. Profile for young Arab males, and you'll get terrorists that are old non-Arab females. This paper looks at the security effectiveness of profiling versus random searching.

* If we are going to increase security against terrorism, the young Arab males living in our country are precisely the people we want on our side. Discriminating against them in the name of security is not going to make them more likely to help.

* Despite what many people think, terrorism is not confined to young Arab males. Shoe-bomber Richard Reid was British. Germaine Lindsay, one of the 7/7 London bombers, was Afro-Caribbean. Here are some more examples:

In 1986, a 32-year-old Irish woman, pregnant at the time, was about to board an El Al flight from London to Tel Aviv when El Al security agents discovered an explosive device hidden in the false bottom of her bag. The woman’s boyfriend--the father of her unborn child--had hidden the bomb.

In 1987, a 70-year-old man and a 25-year-old woman--neither of whom were Middle Eastern--posed as father and daughter and brought a bomb aboard a Korean Air flight from Baghdad to Thailand. En route to Bangkok, the bomb exploded, killing all on board.

In 1999, men dressed as businessmen (and one dressed as a Catholic priest) turned out to be terrorist hijackers, who forced an Avianca flight to divert to an airstrip in Colombia, where some passengers were held as hostages for more than a year-and-half.

The 2002 Bali terrorists were Indonesian. The Chechnyan terrorists who downed the Russian planes were women. Timothy McVeigh and the Unibomber were Americans. The Basque terrorists are Basque, and Irish terrorists are Irish. Tha Tamil Tigers are Sri Lankan.

And many Muslims are not Arabs. Even worse, almost everyone who is Arab is not a terrorist -- many people who look Arab are not even Muslims. So not only are there an large number of false negatives -- terrorists who don't meet the profile -- but there an enormous number of false positives: innocents that do meet the profile.

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[ViperPilot 0]

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Terrorism/TerrorAttacks.html

There's a list of islamic terrorist attacks from 6 Apr 94 to 12 Jul 2005. There's a total of 130. By the way, these are only the ones perpatrated against Israel. "Victims include citizens from the United States, Israel (Jews and Arabs), Romania, Thailand, Norway, the Former Soviet Union, South Africa, Ethiopia."

http://eightiesclub.tripod.com/id301.htm

This one shows a timeline of islamic terror between 1985-1986. This list provides 19 cases.

This next list is of Islamic terrorist attacks within the US or against Americans abroad. It includes 24.

1979

Nov. 4, Tehran, Iran: Iranian radical students seized the U.S. embassy, taking 66 hostages. Fourteen were later released. The remaining 52 were freed after 444 days on the day of President Reagan's inauguration.

1982–1991

Lebanon: Thirty US and other Western hostages kidnapped in Lebanon by Hezbollah. Some were killed, some died in captivity, and some were eventually released. Terry Anderson was held for 2,454 days.

1983

April 18, Beirut, Lebanon: U.S. embassy destroyed in suicide car-bomb attack; 63 dead, including 17 Americans. The Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility.
Oct. 23, Beirut, Lebanon: Shiite suicide bombers exploded truck near U.S. military barracks at Beirut airport, killing 241 Marines. Minutes later a second bomb killed 58 French paratroopers in their barracks in West Beirut.
Dec. 12, Kuwait City, Kuwait Shiite truck bombers attacked the U.S. embassy and other targets, killing 5 and injuring 80.

1984

Sept. 20, east Beirut, Lebanon: truck bomb exploded outside the U.S. embassy annex, killing 24, including 2 U.S. military. It is believed that Hezbollah, backed by Iran and Syria, is responsible.
Dec. 3, Beirut, Lebanon: Kuwait Airways Flight 221, from Kuwait to Pakistan, hijacked and diverted to Tehran. Two Americans killed. It is believed that Hezbollah, backed by Iran and Syria, is responsible.

1985

April 12, Madrid, Spain: Bombing at restaurant frequented by U.S. soldiers, killed 18 Spaniards and injured 82. Claimed by Islamic Holy War.
June 14, Beirut, Lebanon: TWA flight 847 en route from Athens to Rome hijacked to Beirut by Hezbollah terrorists and held for 17 days. A U.S. Navy diver executed. Nabih Berri, a moderate Shiite leader of the Amal milia, Imad Mugniyah, Ali Atwa, and Hassan Izz-Al-Din were among those involved.
Oct. 7, Mediterranean Sea: gunmen attack Italian cruise ship, Achille Lauro. One U.S. tourist killed. Hijacking linked to Libya.
Dec. 18, Rome, Italy, and Vienna, Austria: airports in Rome and Vienna were bombed, killing 20 people, 5 of whom were Americans. Bombing linked to Libya.

1986

April 2, Athens, Greece:A bomb exploded aboard TWA flight 840 en route from Rome to Athens, killing 4 Americans and injuring 9. Leila Khaled, a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, was one of the hijackers.
April 5, West Berlin, Germany: Libyans bombed a disco frequented by U.S. servicemen, killing 2 and injuring hundreds.

1988

Dec. 21, Lockerbie, Scotland: N.Y.-bound Pan-Am Boeing 747 exploded in flight from a terrorist bomb and crashed into Scottish village, killing all 259 aboard and 11 on the ground. Passengers included 35 Syracuse University students and many U.S. military personnel. Libya formally admitted responsibility 15 years later (Aug. 2003) and offered $2.7 billion compensation to victims' families.

1993

Feb. 26, New York City: bomb exploded in basement garage of World Trade Center, killing 6 and injuring at least 1,040 others. In 1995, militant Islamist Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and 9 others were convicted of conspiracy charges, and in 1998, Ramzi Yousef, believed to have been the mastermind, was convicted of the bombing. Al-Qaeda involvement is suspected.

1995

Nov. 13, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: car bomb exploded at U.S. military headquarters, killing five U.S. military servicemen. Al-Qaeda is blamed for the attacks.

1996

June 25, Dhahran, Saudi Arabia: truck bomb exploded outside Khobar Towers military complex, killing 19 American servicemen and injuring hundreds of others. Thirteen Saudis and a Lebanese, all alleged members of Islamic militant group Hezbollah, were indicted on charges relating to the attack in June 2001.

1998

Aug. 7, Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania: truck bombs exploded almost simultaneously near 2 U.S. embassies, killing 224 (213 in Kenya and 11 in Tanzania) and injuring about 4,500. Four men connected with al-Qaeda two of whom had received training at al-Qaeda camps inside Afghanistan, were convicted of the killings in May 2001 and later sentenced to life in prison. A federal grand jury had indicted 22 men in connection with the attacks, including Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden, who remained at large.

2000

Oct. 12, Aden, Yemen: U.S. Navy destroyer USS Cole heavily damaged when a small boat loaded with explosives blew up alongside it. Seventeen sailors killed. Linked to Osama bin Laden, or members of al-Qaeda terrorist network.

2001

Sept. 11, New York City, Arlington, Va., and Shanksville, Pa.: hijackers crashed two commercial jets into twin towers of World Trade Center; two more hijacked jets were crashed into the Pentagon and a field in rural Pa. Total dead and missing numbered 2,9921: 2,749 in New York City, 184 at the Pentagon, 40 in Pa., and 19 hijackers. Islamic al-Qaeda terrorist group blamed.
June 14, Karachi, Pakistan: bomb exploded outside American consulate in Karachi, Pakistan, killing 12. Linked to al-Qaeda.

[b\]2003

May 12, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: suicide bombers killed 34, including eight Americans, at housing compounds for Westerners. Al-Qaeda suspected.

2004

May 29–31, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: terrorists attack the offices of a Saudi oil company in Khobar, Saudi Arabia, take foreign oil workers hostage in a nearby residential compound, leaving 22 people dead including one American. AbdulAziz al-Moqrin, believed to lead al-Qaida operations, was labeled the mastermind.
June 11–19, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: terrorists kidnap and execute Paul Johnson Jr., an American, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Islamic terrorists responsible.
Dec. 6, Jiddah, Saudi Arabia: Al Qaeda militants storm the U.S. consulate killing 5 before being subdued by Saudi security who killed five of the militants.


Add it up. Who's doing the majority of terrorism? There's almost 200 islamic terrorist attacks listed here. These aren't all of them. Might want to add this info in before compiling a small list of non-muslim/Islamic terrorist acts and thusly declaring racial profiling ludicrous. With all these attacks listed above, how does racial profiling, while being very un-PC and downright incovenient for some people, make no sense? I agree it sucks for all the thousands of innocent Arab people out there. But, there's just no getting around it. Racial profiling makes sense, even if it's very un-pc.

[sundevil777 102]

If old blue haired grannies were doing it, then I would want them to be profiled at airports, etc.

But they are not. It is not just race that is part of the profile, it is age, gender, and other factors. Tough luck for those that fall into the profile.

People are sick and tired of being told that ordinary and decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired. I’m certainly not, and I’m sick and tired of being told that I am

[billvon 3,120]

>If old blue haired grannies were doing it, then I would want them to
> be profiled at airports, etc.

And if you started profiling them, the next 9/11 terrorists would be 21 year old punk rockers.

In 2001, a terrorist attack killed ~3000 people in the US. What fools we would be to start profiling, and thus make it easier for certain groups to pull off the next 9/11. Why make it easier for terrorists?

[sundevil777 102]

Quote

And if you started profiling them, the next 9/11 terrorists would be 21 year old punk rockers.

In 2001, a terrorist attack killed ~3000 people in the US. What fools we would be to start profiling, and thus make it easier for certain groups to pull off the next 9/11. Why make it easier for terrorists?

It seems that you think it is better to ignore the current situation because they might be able to change their look sometime in the future? We would be fools to ignore the current situation. Your position would make it easier for the next group to do it again with guys fitting the same profile, because you intentionally choose to ignore the profile that fits now. I want them to have to go to the trouble of recruiting punk rockers to do their acts, anything to delay and slow them down while we hunt them down and take them out. The fact is that they continue to do it with guys that fit the same profile.

Good intentions and political correctness has completely taken over with this sort of view.

People are sick and tired of being told that ordinary and decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired. I’m certainly not, and I’m sick and tired of being told that I am

[waltappel 1]

Quote

It seems that you think it is better to ignore the current situation because they might be able to change their look sometime in the future? We would be fools to ignore the current situation. Your position would make it easier for the next group to do it again with guys fitting the same profile, because you intentionally choose to ignore the profile that fits now. I want them to have to go to the trouble of recruiting punk rockers to do their acts, anything to delay and slow them down while we hunt them down and take them out. The fact is that they continue to do it with guys that fit the same profile.

Good intentions and political correctness has completely taken over with this sort of view.

Not many would accuse me of political correctness and I can see his point as well as yours. I think his point is that a narrow profile could result in a false sense of security and could breed complacency, even though there is a very strong need to keep our eyes very wide open.

Walt

[billvon 3,120]

>It seems that you think it is better to ignore the current situation . . .

??? I'm not the one suggesting relaxing security for non-Arabs.

Want to improve the security situation? Imagine what sort of screening you would apply to the shiftiest looking arab, then apply that screening to EVERYONE. Don't allow people who look a certain way to avoid security. Don't intentionally cripple the system.

>I want them to have to go to the trouble of recruiting punk rockers
>to do their acts, anything to delay and slow them down while we hunt
>them down and take them out.

And I want to stop them, not just cause them some trouble. And that goes whether they are punk rockers, women, black, arab, or little old men on roller skates. I suppose this is where we differ in our approaches.

[ViperPilot 0]

Bill, what you're trying to argue is narrow profiling will screw us over. Yes, it can, but only if we relax on other groups. No one's suggesting that we relax security at all, just that we be a bit more warry of young, arab males. It sucks for all the innocent Arabs, especially the younger male population, but it needs to be done. They're the ones who have committed the majority of terrorism, that's why we need to watch them closer. That does not mean we let up on other groups. I agree, if we did that, we'd be shooting ourselves in the foot. That's why we don't let up, just keep a closer watch on certain groups.

[billvon 3,120]

>Yes, it can, but only if we relax on other groups.

I agree there. But if you _don't_ relax it for special groups, you're not profiling, so there's no problem to begin with.

>No one's suggesting that we relax security at all, just that we be a bit
>more warry of young, arab males.

And all I'm saying is that whatever "be more wary" means, do it for _everyone_; don't give any groups an easier opportunity to sneak explosives onto aircraft, even if you're sure they're not a threat.

A year ago, two women brought down two Russian airliners with carry-on bombs. At least one was not searched at all. Hey, all terrorists are 18-40 year old Islamic males, right? We should concentrate on them and not bother those two women. That sort of thinking leads to downed airliners.

[AlexCrowley 0]

I think the whole point of the article can be summed up thusly:

"The trick here is to make sure perceptions of risk match the actual risks. If those responsible for security profile based on superstition and wrong-headed intuition, or by blindly following a computerized profiling system, profiling won’t work at all. And even worse, it actually can reduce security by blinding people to the real threats. Institutionalized profiling can ossify a mind, and a person’s mind is the most important security countermeasure we have. " - From the article.

The main issue is that there is so much blind superstition and wrong-headed intuition going on by people is the danger.

Lets look at some facts:

Terrorist: n One that engages in acts or an act of terrorism.

Terrorism: adj characteristic of someone who employs terrorism (especially as a political weapon); "terrorist activity"; "terrorist state" n : a radical who employs terror as a political weapon; usually organizes with other terrorists in small cells; often uses religion as a cover for terrorist activities

The Terror scorecard:

Muslim extremist attacks on american soil: 9/11, WTC bombing 1993, USS Cole, US embassy bombings (3) in 98. Please add to this list, but I make that 6 attacks.

American Terrorist acts on American soil: Oklahoma, Olympic, Unabomber (23 bombs )(http://www.rotten.com/library/bio/crime/serial-killers/unabomer/), over 213 arsons or bombings of abortion clinics, 10 fatal shootings of abortion doctors.

so, it would seem to me that white guys, especailly christians would be worth profiling.

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[waltappel 1]

It is well known among people in the US these days that EVERYTHING is whitey's fault, so of course whitey should be profiled!

Walt

[AlexCrowley 0]

I was echoing your 'narrow profiling' statement and just used numbers.

My point isnt about bodycount, it's about maintaining awareness and accurate risk assessment. There's way too much anti-arab hysteria that too many people feel is justified. The problem is that the numbers do not add up.

Racism is never justified, no matter how emotionally charged the topic may be. In the end it does nothing but hurt us, and give the terrorists exactly what they want - which is a clear battle line of muslim vs christian, white vs arab.

Personally I like knowing that the extremists are a small fraction of a percentage of the entire Muslim population.

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[ViperPilot 0]

Quote

Hey, all terrorists are 18-40 year old Islamic males, right? We should concentrate on them and not bother those two women

No, I didn't say all were, but a vast majority, yes. And now, we should not just soley concentrate on them and not bother women, white men, christians, etc. I agree mostly with you on this, I just think that when, for instance, you're on a flight and 8 young, Arab males get on, and all take suspcious turns going into the front lavatory...yeah, I'd be very suspicious, and that's racial profiling. I don't think it's racist, just a logical thought process based on past experiences. That's not saying I wouldn't be suspicious if a group of punk rockers did the same thing (example used earlier), but just that when a group of arabs do what I described in the scenario above, there's great reason to be concerned.

[AlexCrowley 0]

"I just think that when, for instance, you're on a flight and 8 young, Arab males get on, and all take suspcious turns going into the front lavatory...yeah, I'd be very suspicious, and that's racial profiling."

Which seems very different than:

"It sucks for all the innocent Arabs, especially the younger male population, but it needs to be done. They're the ones who have committed the majority of terrorism, that's why we need to watch them closer."

Your most recent example is a perfect example of when profiling is warranted. But I think you're clouding the issue:

8 [insert commonality] using the bathroom in turn and acting suspiciously is damn good reason to pay attention, arab or not.

But thats different than you're initial statement which doesnt bear resemblence to the reality.

Lets use the State Departments list instead of a Jewish organizations:

http://www.globalspecialoperations.com/terchron.html

Not so cut and dried.

The whole 'majority of terrorism' is BULLSHIT. No matter how many ways you cut it it is not the majority of terrorism historically, or even in the modern day. Unless you only define terrorism as 'violent acts committed by Muslim extremists'.

Just because the media has consistently pushed evil as a sweaty bearded muslim screaming 'praise to allah' it doesnt make it true.

In this, or any recent conversation regarding Islamic terrorism there has not been one person who is able to quantify Islamic terrorism vs any other form of terrorism anywhere else in the world. There is not one person who has looked at the various terrorism reports compiled by the CIA and other intelligence agencies around the world to provide any real info on the numbers of Islamic terrorists in the world, or even the number of groups considered 'extreme'.

No one has challenged the following numbers rationally:

Al Quaida is considered officially active as a terrorist group from 1998. Which is when the numbers I quoted above started.

From http://www.prochoice.org/about_abortion/violence/history_extreme.asp...

There are over 40 cases of domestic terrorism on Abortion clinics and providers since January of 1998.

Thats just one issue, nothing about racist motivated attacks and murders, nothing about homophobic attacks (even church burnings because they accept gay congregations...check for a link in a previous thread). Remember, the FBI classifies hate crimes and hate groups as Domestic terrorism.

Feel free to attack me all you want, or how you perceive my politics, but the numbers do not add up if you are trying to prove that terrorism is mostly performed by extremist arab muslims.

Although I'm sure that Bin Laden would thank you for helping his cause.

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[Ron 10]

Quote

And if you started profiling them, the next 9/11 terrorists would be 21 year old punk rockers.

In 2001, a terrorist attack killed ~3000 people in the US. What fools we would be to start profiling, and thus make it easier for certain groups to pull off the next 9/11. Why make it easier for terrorists?

Ignoring a race to prevent an "incident" and being accused of profiling is even dumber.

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334

[billvon 3,120]

>I just think that when, for instance, you're on a flight and 8 young,
>Arab males get on, and all take suspcious turns going into the front
>lavatory...yeah, I'd be very suspicious, and that's racial profiling.

No it's not! It's using your head. If 8 black, or japanese, or russian guys got on the plane and did exactly the same thing, it would be smart to be suspicious as well. It would be silly to ignore them and say "Hey, he's not an arab male; he's fine."

There is nothing wrong with using your head to prevent terrorism. The only problem comes about when you have a fixed policy to give certain groups more attention than others, because it means you are intentionally and willfully giving other groups _less_ attention. And that's foolish.

[ViperPilot 0]

Well, what about the "extra" security check that you could "randomly" get at the airport. A bit inconvenient, but not terrible. What's wrong with sending the Arab guy through there and not the grandma?

Infact, I personally had an experience where I was funneled through this "extra" check line IN UNIFORM. Are you kidding me? I have my mil ID, in uniform, I'm obviously not f*cking with them. But no, I get checked while two Arab guys behind me go through just fine. Now, not saying they're terrorists, but out of the three of us, it would make much more sense to suspect them and not me, thus putting them through the special screening if anybody goes. It sucks for them being innocent (I assume), but based on past lessons in history, it numerically makes sense to check them and not the guy in the military, or at least check all three of us.

[billvon 3,120]

>What's wrong with sending the Arab guy through there and not the grandma?

Because then you miss the Chechen woman, who then blows up the aircraft. What's wrong with sending EVERYONE through the extra check? Then no one gets a chance to blow up the airplane.

>Infact, I personally had an experience where I was funneled
>through this "extra" check line IN UNIFORM.

The security people may have sensed something wrong - perhaps they just didn't see military people very often. You may have been flagged because you bought a ticket at the last minute, or you bought a one-way ticket. Or it may have been completely random. Surely more security is a good thing if it makes your flight safer - even if it inconveniences you.

>or at least check all three of us.

I agree there. That makes the most sense.

[ViperPilot 0]

Quote

What's wrong with sending EVERYONE through the extra check?

Agreed. I'm only saying with the current way of doing things, it would make more sense to profile. I completely agree with you and think all the extra crap should be done for everyone, but if that's not the way it's being done, then for now, we should profile until the better system can be implemented. That's all.

Quote

You may have been flagged because you bought a ticket at the last minute, or you bought a one-way ticket.

Bought a round trip ticket and showed my mil id at checkin too. It was random, I know. But at the time with the current system, it just made sense to "randomly" pick the other guys or at least all three of us.

[AlexCrowley 0]

When I'm approached to secure a business my answer to 'can you make us totally secure?' is 'sure, with an unlimited budget and unlimited resources'.

Security is always a series of tradeoffs. As security specialists in any field we collect data, and like the insurance guys, we come up with numerical models that fit previous known behavior. We draw that info from as wide a source as possible, and then tailor it to fit the customer.

The level of security I can provide for $5k is very different when dealing with a customer who has in-house systems people and a real security budget.

If security could check all 3 of them (viper and two arabs) then you're checking everyone - something you can't afford to do. Checking every 3rd passenger obviously makes for an easy system to compromise.

Perhaps that day they had a tip about white surpremacists plotting an attacks that day and were looking for white guys with buzzcuts who had a military bearing.

I know in the UK the security teams have a quota plus a specific profile each day, sometimes based on intelligence, sometimes based on random luck (redhaired men over 6' travelling with children).

My simple point being: hysteria about arabs is both racist and totally myopic. The idea of security is to secure against ALL threats, not just ones on the late night news.



Imagine me as the twinkie terrorist, just one guy. I decide that I am going to release Twinkies on a plane and cause hypoglycemia to the passengers in an uneffective terror attack. The following is just me, no additional funds, no help except whats stated.

1. Bribe or become one of the cleaning crew - where doesnt matter, I just want to twinkie a commercial plane. Place twinkies behind fire extinguisher and in medical kit, under chairs etc. (traditional method of getting weaponry on board commercial aircraft). ($20 in twinkies, paid back by cleaning crew pay)

2. Using what I already know: 'borrow' someones identity (trivial, identity set up in 2 months w/SSN and Drivers license.) (free, it's stupidly easy to steal someones identity)

3. Gain mil ID, forge it - not so trivial as I dont have these skills, but have enough contacts to generate something that would pass most visual checks, would take a month or so and moderate cash investment. ($5 - $10k for solid forgery)

4. http://bdu.com/ (or elsewhere) gets me uniform. ($200?)

5. Get on plane. half way through flight forcefeed twinkies to cabin staff and passengers. (price of flight)



My point being, its so easy to do this stuff that educated security crews will not take anyone at face value.

The pissed off looking Military guy with the buzzcut may not be a military guy at all and just some psycho who wants to feed everyone twinkies.

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.