If you’ve traveled enough, it’s probably happened to you. You’ve been on the TSA security queue, put your stuff on the conveyor belt to be scanned, and have walked through the metal detector (if you have PreCheck) or full-body scanners (if you don’t have PreCheck). You’re waiting for your bag to be released from the scanner when a TSA officer (TSAO) asks, “Whose bag is this?” And it’s yours.
The TSAO explains they saw something on the scanner and have to do a secondary screening of the bag, and it will be done “right over there.” You wrack your brain, trying to figure out what the scanner picked up – if you knew, or even suspected, maybe you could tell the TSAO where to look to finish this faster. But no, you stand there while they remove item after item from your bag. You’re allowed to watch, but you can’t touch the bag at all. They even get kind of bristly when you even point at it. And you can’t look at the screen of the scanner, either.
Why can’t you touch the bag? Why can’t you look at the screen? And for cryin’ out loud, why doesn’t the TSA tell you what they’re looking for? Or at least tell you what they THINK they see, so you can explain that potential “magazine of 9mm ammunition” is actually just a harmonica.
It turns out there are a few reasons:
Why Can’t You Just Help Them Look?
The TSA works under the assumption that every bag check could potentially yield a weapon. If the TSAO is looking for an object that looks like a knife, or a round of bullets, or a grenade, the last thing they want is for you to reach into your bag and grab it.
Of course, YOU know you’re not carrying a grenade – it’s just an empty Coke bottle you got in Star Wars Land. But the TSAO doesn’t know that and even if you guess what they’re looking for (cuz they won’t tell you) and tell them it’s just a Coke bottle, they’re not going to believe you and will remain with the assumption that it’s a grenade. So nope, you can’t touch it.
TSA’s Security Secrets: No Peeking at the Screen
Apparently, that’s SSI – Super Secret Info. Actually, it stands for Sensitive Security Information. According to the TSA, SSI is “…a category of sensitive information that must be protected because it is information that, if publicly released, would be detrimental to the security of transportation. In other words, SSI is information that could be used by our adversaries to bypass or defeat transportation security measures.”
Because just as they assume every bag could have a weapon, they also assume that every person on the queue is a potential “bad guy.” If you were a bad guy, you might have certain items purposely placed in your bag as a way to test the accuracy and capabilities of the scanner. If they show you the screen, you’ll know if you succeeded or failed. AND you might get some new information for the next item you want to try to sneak through.
If you were a bad guy and kept practicing with this item – and it got flagged every time – that would be a great excuse to have them let you see the screen. And then you, as a bad guy, could mentally figure out how much of your other stuff it really sees based on material, thickness, overlap, etc.
If you ever watch Contraband: Seized at the Border (I do; it’s a guilty pleasure of mine), that’s also why they always blur out the screen the CBP officers see when they’re scanning a vehicle – so the cartels don’t learn too much about the inner workings of CBP.
They Won’t Say What They’re Looking For
Mainly because they really don’t know what they’re looking for. They know it’s something that looked like contraband on the screen (which you can’t look at), but they’re not going to say, “I’m looking for something that looks like a magazine/grenade.”
Don’t Try to Guess — It Won’t Help
Most of the time, it turns out that’s not what they’re looking for. You might think they’re focusing on the bags of PJ’s Coffee you have in your carry on (that was me when we left New Orleans a coupla years ago), but they’re focused on that magazine that turns out to be a harmonica.
And now you know 🙂
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This post first appeared on Your Mileage May Vary
1 comment
Very interesting. Plus now I know never to travel with a harmonica.