TSA screeners are instructed to keep their eyes peeled for people who are "very arrogant and expresses contempt against airport passenger procedures," according to the TSA's list of roughly 70 "behavioral indicators" obtained by CNN. In an interesting think-piece on American security theater, CNN finds that—shocker—some of the TSA's methods are unsound. Like the one where they expect the bad guys to call attention to themselves by acting like boorish jerks who hate the very screeners they're trying to tiptoe past.
The reasoning behind this approach stems from 9/11, when the alleged 20th hijacker, Mohammed al-Qahtani, "became visibly upset and arrogantly pointed his finger in the agent's face when asked why he did not have an airline ticket for a return flight." So now the TSA is looking for that exact same kind of behavior, which hasn't been spotted in a known terrorist... yet! "I think the idea that they would try to draw attention to themselves by being arrogant at airport security, it fails the common sense test," says CNN National Security Analyst Peter Bergen. "And it also fails what we know about their behaviors in the past."
Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion International Airport is widely regarded as one of the world's most secure, and a former director of security there tells CNN "an arrogant complaint about security is a legitimate factor to consider. But officials also should be suspicious of effusive praise. The other end of the spectrum is almost as bad, although it is maybe less offensive." So there you go, terrorists: don't be too contemptuous of the TSA screeners, nor too obsequious. In other words, be inconspicuous. Way to hand Al Qaeda our security secrets on a silver platter, CNN!
