John Tierney writes in today’s Times about a pilot screening program at Dulles Airport (sorry, TimesSelect only). Rather than bog everyone down in long lines, screeners at Dulles speed everyone through while looking at individuals for “unusual behavior like sweating, rigid posture, clenched fists.” The results?
The screeners were looking for telltale body language of someone trying too hard to act natural. When they spotted it, they singled out that person for interrogation, a pat-down and a luggage search. The screeners caught no terrorists, but they consistently found people with something to hide, often a forged visa, a stolen airline ticket, drugs or other smuggled goods.
Tierney points out that workable solutions such as this should be examined (they aren’t), and despite my predilection for technology, I’m inclined to agree. There are machines like a “puffer” which may be able to detect trace explosives, but these and other machines are expensive, prone to error, and somewhat violating of personal privacy. Wouldn’t it be amazing if the answer to our problems of secure air travel was right under our nose: people who are trained in watching people (not their stuff).
Giving individual people such power may present some troubling issues along the lines of profiling, but it’s an option that’s at least worth a try.