TSA has learned that an outdated version of our Standard Operating Procedures document had been improperly posted to the Federal Business Opportunities Web site. TSA took swift action to remove the document when this was discovered.
The version of the document that was posted was neither implemented nor issued to the workforce. In fact, there have been six newer versions of the document since this version was drafted. Standard Operating Procedures change regularly as intelligence provides information on new threats and we find better ways improve security.
A full review is now underway to ensure proper procedures are followed in the future.
TSA has many layers of security in place to keep the traveling public safe, and we are confident that the screening procedures we currently have put in place remain strong.
Blogger Bob
TSA Blog Team
82 comments:
Perhaps this will be of help:
http://www.adobe.com/designcenter/acrobat/articles/acr8at_redact_print.html
When is the TSA going to post a copy of the new policy about passengers with large sums of money? Or is it SSI.
"In fact, there have been six newer versions of the document since this version was drafted."
Which would indicate you should be doing constant and significant retraining of your front line staff.
The Brittany ice incident, shoes "optional" and several other issues indicate otherwise...
Bob said:
"TSA has many layers of security in place"
Layers are effective if procedures are effectively implemented, regardless if they are known to the public.
Unless of course you are trying to say that the TSA has different SOP manuals and different TSO's get trained on different procedures..
So if it was so outdated, why the need for "swift action"?
1) What policies are you putting in place to ensure that sensitive information is never leaked again? This time it was only some stupid governmentese manual...next time personal information about travelers?
2) What are you doing now that potential evildoers can easily get ahold of information you had hoped to keep secret, such as the places that "test objects" are put on a person's body to calibrate the metal detectors?
3) Come on, really now, you claim that the document has evolved 6 times, but really how much as changed. Yeah, not much, I bet.
How about posting a full list of rules passengers must follow in order to go through the checkpoint??
"TSA has many layers of security in place to keep the traveling public safe"
Recently most of these layers have been diverted to shoring up the public relations department.
Fixed for you....
I appreciate that this particular version was never implemented.
Assuming that fact, however, how do you explain that this version was used to define the means under which contractors were to bid on a fixed-fee contract to perform work for you? Certainly the document had to be substantially accurate for that to work, right? Or are you hoping that the winning bidder simply will ignore the fact that what they bid to do and what they were actualy are required to do are substantially different?
Something still doesn't pass the sniff test on this one.
Keep reading more as I continue to ferret out the details of this debacle!
Are we supposed to not be concerned that the TSA issued an RFP and a contract based off invalid documents?
Where's the Britney LA tape, Bob?
The document does, however, explain a lot of the way TSOs think and act. If it's no longer accurate, why the rush to make it disappear? Perhaps that it's just that there are still many parts of it that are still accurate, and you think security by obscurity actually works?
Then again, given that your whole operation is nothing but security theater anyway, I guess I shouldn't be surprised that you claim it's both critically sensitive and inaccurate...
Hey Blogger Bob, pull this leg it jingles.
"The version of the document that was posted was neither implemented nor issued to the workforce." is a lie, either that or the TSA is breaking the law by issuing false documents for FOIA requests.
Is this document released to papersplease.org fraudulent?
Notice the Title, Revision number, Date, and Implementation date is the same as the badly redacted "never implemented" SOP. (sorry the TSA won't allow the link to the leaked SOP)
So which is it. Did the TSA surrender a false document in response to a FOIA request or is the TSA lying now by saying this document was never implemented?
Seth said...
I appreciate that this particular version was never implemented.
Assuming that fact, however, how do you explain that this version was used to define the means under which contractors were to bid on a fixed-fee contract to perform work for you? Certainly the document had to be substantially accurate for that to work, right? Or are you hoping that the winning bidder simply will ignore the fact that what they bid to do and what they were actualy are required to do are substantially different?
Something still doesn't pass the sniff test on this one.
Keep reading more as I continue to ferret out the details of this debacle!
Of course it smells, if this document was never implemented then the TSA issued a fraudulent document in response to a FOIA request made by papersplease.org.
Bob,
Why is this still online?
I found it with 2 clicks. Oh, by the way, it's un-redacted!
TSM
Please, Bob, do you expect any person with even half a brain to believe the TSA's explanation? I'd be willing to bet that deep in your heart, you don't believe your employer either.
Now while we're talking about TSA saying things that are not truthful, how about this that was posted about a trip through MCO:
"My husbands' hands were swabbed after he went through the metal detector gate. They said it was testing for swine flu. Also they hand searched my daughters Nintendo DS because they said her chip sent off a silent alarm.... "
Swine flu? Silent alarms?
Surely the screeners can do better than that.
God bless www.flyertalk.com! Thanks to them for uncovering this. It should never have been SSI in the first place.
"In fact, there have been six newer versions of the document since this version was drafted."
Always be specific when you lie.
Could you do an entry on passengers with prosthetics? I have had my left hip replaced. I always declare this up front. I expect to be waned and without fail the wane beeps when it comes near my left hip. It does not beep at any other part of my body. Why, then, must I be patted down from head to toe? I have told TSA about my hip. The wand has told TSA about my hip. What's with the full body patting? Could you address this please? Also, when I explain that I will need special attention and willingly walk into the glass cage it would be nice if someone would take my belongings and place them somewhere safe. Anyone could walk off with them while I am trying to be a good passenger and play by the rules. Thank you.
Trollkiller said...
Hey Blogger Bob, pull this leg it jingles.
"The version of the document that was posted was neither implemented nor issued to the workforce." is a lie, either that or the TSA is breaking the law by issuing false documents for FOIA requests.
Is this document released to papersplease.org fraudulent?
Notice the Title, Revision number, Date, and Implementation date is the same as the badly redacted "never implemented" SOP. (sorry the TSA won't allow the link to the leaked SOP)
So which is it. Did the TSA surrender a false document in response to a FOIA request or is the TSA lying now by saying this document was never implemented?
December 8, 2009 1:29 PM
Good work TK, seems you have direct evidence of TSA via Blogger Bobs offerings of violating Federal Law.
@Anonymous (with the metal hip) I agree the TA should do something to stream line the process for people who have metal implants and alarm every time. I'm to the point where I'm not sure why I bother to tell the TSO I will alarm, it does ZERO good.
It might me more fun to play completely dumb and perplexed. Which in my case (with a metal plate in my head) could be interesting. Plus I don't think I am in anyway compelled to offer personal medical information up front to a TSO.
Bob, have you considered changing your name to Pinocchio?
Oh Lord, what a calamity! Now everyone has information that was formerly only available to thousands of entry-level employees!
"My husbands' hands were swabbed after he went through the metal detector gate. They said it was testing for swine flu. Also they hand searched my daughters Nintendo DS because they said her chip sent off a silent alarm.... "
**************************
TSOs had better be careful about testing for swine flu. They might find themselves in court for practicing medicine without a license. As to the Nintendo search, how much effort does it take to tell the truth?
I guess we'll have to wait a bit longer for the really stupid mistake that gets the current TSA management tossed into the unemployment line. Judging from the host of recent errors, though, it might be just days or weeks away.
"TSA Response to Leaked Standard Operating Procedures"
...................
Bob if TSA placed the SOP on the web how can that be called a leak?
Seems it was intentional to me.
"Also, when I explain that I will need special attention and willingly walk into the glass cage it would be nice if someone would take my belongings and place them somewhere safe. Anyone could walk off with them while I am trying to be a good passenger and play by the rules."
TSA does not care if your property is lost or stolen or damaged. The sooner you realize this the better.
Bob, if this wasn't a 'released' SOP then why is everyone running around doing full damage control?
How much is this little slip up costing your agency?
How does this effect TSA's ability to function as a security agency?
Who was the manager who failed to properly secure this document?
Why was this left in the public domain for nine months?
Why should the traveling public trust anything TSA either says or does?
Merry Christmas and a happy New Year.
Aren't the puppy posts supposed to come out on Fridays?
Bob ... I'll try to ask this with as little snark as possible ...
If, as you state above, TSA is confident that the current screening procedures in place remain strong, even with the release of this document, why shouldn't the current SOP be released as well?
There's a contradiction here I can't resolve. If the document was "outdated", why did TSA take "swift action" to remove it? The only reason I can think of is that the posted document was too similar to current procedures. In that case, it seems to me that there's little additional harm in releasing the current procedures to the public, because the damage has already been done.
To anonymous with the replacement hip:
Don't fly, take Amtrak or a boat...
I don't know how much you think you know about the internet, but once something is posted, there's no getting rid of it. Copies are mirrored around the world instantly, and no matter how hard you try you can't erase it from everywhere it was leaked.
Just so you know.
I was expecting the inadequately redacted "SSI" bits to be really juicy, after all the questions that have been deflected here with the claim of "SSI." Instead, they're mostly pretty boring and in many cases pretty obvious.
Which makes me wonder what other things you're hiding behind that SSI designation when they could easily be shared with passengers instead.
Sandra said:
Now while we're talking about TSA saying things that are not truthful, how about this that was posted about a trip through MCO:
"My husbands' hands were swabbed after he went through the metal detector gate. They said it was testing for swine flu. Also they hand searched my daughters Nintendo DS because they said her chip sent off a silent alarm.... "
Swine flu? Silent alarms?
Surely the screeners can do better than that.
__________________
A TV station in MCO must have had a science fiction marathon the week before. (And I'm not sure the screeners CAN do better than that...)
Or maybe the swine flu checks are the first implementation of government health care?
"While the document does demonstrate the complexities of checkpoint security, it does not contain information related to the specifics of everyday checkpoint screening procedures," the TSA said Tuesday. "The traveling public should be assured that appropriate measures have been put in place to ensure the continued implementation of a strong security screening program,"
Wrong! This is a complete disaster for TSA; I can't believe your agency is even trying to minimize this.
The sensitive information that is now clearing in the public domain--absolutely frightening! Heads better roll over this one, and I mean big heads. What is wrong with the DHS! Lax White House security and now this!!! Unbelievable!
Get Workshare protect, easy, inexpensive fix. Seriously this problem has been know for years!
Ah, so, when your "secret" document is released and the absurdity of your internal procedures is made evident, the response is to call your scribblings "outdated." Good to know.
Now if only you would consider all your other absurdities to be outdated, such as the war on water or the virtual strip searches. Those are absurd, so call them dated.
Please remove the below link to the SSI information.
Thanks.
"Is this document released to papersplease.org fraudulent?"- trollkiller
Come on this agency should be shut down and a new one in its place.
That out dated doc tells how to by pass many security stops.
The size of wire that they can detect.What chemicals they can detect etc.
Only 20% of check baggage is hand checked. Basically tells any bad people how to make security badges and get by our airport security.
Someone must be accountable.
"TSA has many layers of security in place."
Layer One: Keep Security Manuals off internet
Layer Two: Lie About Security Manuals some idiot posts on internet
Layer Three: Explain that Security Manuals aren't actually read or used by TSA employees anyway
Layer Four: Explain that accidentally released Security Manuals are out of date
Layer Five: Do investigation of accidentally released non-used, non-read, out-of-date non-secure Security Manuals
Oh, come on now guys. Why do we need to check people with Cuban passports so thoroughly? They had the decency to let us keep Guantanomo in their backyard, after all. This isn't the Cold War anymore.
I don´t see why the news stations are fussing so much about the document. Having read it, it does not add much to what I already know about how you work.
Imagine TSA breaking their own policy of SSI....Go figure......TSA needs their own interal affairs department to see the rest of the corruption thats happening internally.........what a waste of the tax payers money
So much for TSA getting collective bargaining rights now...this is a planned way to sabatoge to officers from exceling in their pay bands......Way to go TSA management!!!
Hey Blogger Bob, don't forget to add this to the "Week at a Glance"
1 Huge security breach by the TSA.
After all fair is fair.
Here's the kicker in the manual for me: The TSA says that it does not discriminate against travelers by age, race, religion, etc, and NATIONAL ORIGIN. But the manual specifies that people of specific national origins get extra screening 100% of the time.
Argue what you want about the necessity of the screening, but it doesn't change the fact that publicly the TSA states that no discrimination takes place while by the book discrimination is mandated. That would be a lie to the public, which makes me wonder what else is going on.
Public trust in the TSA is about to hit an all time low, and I suspect that there will be a lawsuit very very shortly.
The screenplay for a continually asinine performance of security theatre.
What about adding additional screening for Saudi nationals, 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers were Saudis!
If you think this is the worst=Yhink again. The bad guys don't need this to do harm. TSA is a joke, they watch the good guys while the bad guys go in the back door.
Oh the sweet double standards of life, if anyone else had made such an error they wuld be sleeping in jail. The whole TSA security program is to prevent civil suits anyways.
Man that document is older then my current career at TSA. We do video SOP now lol. Obviously it was taken away because some small things in that SOP may have carried over to the newer ones but also because its a smart thing to do. Don't want passengers thinking that old outdated relic is the new rules for security or anything. So finally, after almost a decade of operation the TSA let one outdated relic of a document escape into the public, yeah like government agencies havn't had that happen to them before. Seriously not a big deal and if you guys are considering this ammo for TSA flaming I think you should probably reconsider. Our SOP has gained tons of new procedures and tactics that have adapted to confront consant changes to bad guy tactics. The more crafty ideas we block the craftier the bad guys get. 6 revisions?! thats like a whole nother SOP on top of that one in changes.
Aw snap, I think we broke this thing.... hello, hello, is this thing on?????
You could have a fake hip AND a gun, knife, etc... got to make sure its only a hip making it beep.
"Could you do an entry on passengers with prosthetics? I have had my left hip replaced. I always declare this up front. I expect to be waned and without fail the wane beeps when it comes near my left hip. It does not beep at any other part of my body. Why, then, must I be patted down from head to toe? I have told TSA about my hip. The wand has told TSA about my hip. What's with the full body patting? Could you address this please? "
Sooo...they're supposed to just believe whatever you say? "Oh never mind the beeping...this guys got a prosthetic." Whose to say you're not strapped? You've just raised my confidence in TSA by a centimeter.
Anonymous said...
How about posting a full list of rules passengers must follow in order to go through the checkpoint??
----------------------------------
Maybe you missed the fact that the Standard Operating Procedures were leaked to the public. You can now learn this by reading the very manual they train their workers with. It's spread all over the internet now and is easily accessible.
Funny thing is that people with hip replacements and wheelchair bound people, get the worst of the worst as far as screening. They are assumed to be bomb toting terrorists bent on destroying the aircraft.
Recently TSA in Hawaii dropped a terminal cancer patient on the floor in an attempt to set off the bomb the terminal cancer patient had artfully concealed. OOps, sorry about that. The terminal cancer patient wasn't carrying a bomb.
Any embarrassment experienced at the airport should be immediately reported to the news media since TSA is unresponsive to anything but public embarrassment.
MediaCurves.com conducted a study among 665 Americans viewing a news clip featuring the leak of the TSA (Transportation Security Administration) security manual on the Internet. Results found that the percentage of viewers who reported feeling “not at all safe” with air travel drastically increased after viewing the news clip about the leak. The percentage of viewers who reported feeling “safe” in an airport decreased from 47% to 28% after viewing the video and the percentage of viewers who reported that the government does an adequate job of maintaining air travel safety fell from 70% to 42% after viewing the video. More in depth results can be seen at:
http://www.mediacurves.com/NationalMediaFocus/J7673-AirportScreeningManual/Index.cfm
Thanks,
Ben
Hey everyone, I think we are in luck...people don't even read the signs posted in the airports explaining the screening procedures so they definitely won't read a 90+ page SOP. Whew, dodged a bullet there.
"people don't even read the signs posted in the airports explaining the screening procedures"
You mean the deliberately inaccurate signs? Those signs? Why should anyone bother looking at TSA's signs when its policy is to put incorrect information on them?
Good. I hope this happens every single time you revise it. I personally swear that should I ever come into posession of such a document, the first place it will go is wikileaks.
I urge every patriotic american to do the same.
-Steve
Ben
I think you hit exactly the problem. People, for some reason, think that security theater has an actual effect on real security.
The simple numbers bear out the point... there is no reason for ANYONE to EVER feel unsafe in an airport.
Airports and air travel are safer than car travel. So the question becomes, what can we do to make people care less about airport security? Once we have done that, we will all be in a better place.
-Steve
Looks as though one of your layers developed some leaks there Bob.
Any idea of when the questions we continue to ask will get answered or do we have to wait until another outdated non document gets posted to the web by a DHS/TSA employee?
John said:
Maybe you missed the fact that the Standard Operating Procedures were leaked to the public. You can now learn this by reading the very manual they train their workers with. It's spread all over the internet now and is easily accessible.
No John. The manual you refer to was the SOP (or not) for supervisors, not the screeners. I read the thing and was left unimpressed.
The '# of comments" is stuck at 17 yet there are way more than that. Can't even get that straight!
TSA response to this?
When in trouble when in doubt,
Run in circles scream and shout.
The '# of comments" is stuck at 17 yet there are way more than that. Can't even get that straight!
________________________________
Haha to that. Hopefully the TSA doesn't just think that their procedures stand fair ground but know it. Because layers are only effective if the according procedures are effectively implemented.
TSA is a joke. Every time some new policy is enforced, someone figures a way around it. Just lock the cabin doors in flight and train the pilots. If you are flying, you take that rick even from domestic peoples. We are America and every day we get closer to being Nazi Germany.
I read it first at wired.com and was quite surprised.
I just wonder how secure all the newer versions really are. If a copy can be posted on a website, how many copies have walked out the front door?
I have complete faith in the TSA. This was just a confusion.
I'm not saying that I think that it is unsafe to fly, but to have complete faith in anything government run is just asking for disappointment.
Its stuck between a rock an a hard place. I hate the government running things because there are so inefficient but private enterprise would just cut too many corners.
What are we to do?
I have faith in the TSA but nothing they can possibly create will be infallible. Everyone at every stage of the cycle needs to be vigilant, and that includes passengers.
Its so annoying that the rules seem to be different at each airport. some are shoes off, some are shoes on.. its got to be standardized people
Sensititive data should be treated like jewelry, in my opinion. But as soon as data is placed on an usb stick, it's value seems to evaporate. Government policy should be to encrypt everything, and even that is no garantee.
Couldn't agree more with Don. All these different practices are creating confusion among visitors passing through the airport.
If it really was outdated? so why the used it for swift action? or they don`t ? any answer?
Why can't the policies be published? What's wrong with having rules that are well known? Drives me crazy.
Well if it was such an old version, why did they need to take such swift action to remove it.
Do all employees get fully trained on all the updated versions if they occur so frequently?
It's odd that this was allowed to happen surely there must be very strict measures in place to avoid this kind of situation?
Surely the six old version of the procedure should be somehow marked electronically as "outdated" or "unavailable" to be used, except as a reference. As we are all human and sometimes make mistakes, there need to be process in place to prevent such mistake from occurring. As long as we learn from our mistakes, the same as we learned about marine safety after Titanic went down and there was not enough life boats because they "obstructed the view" from the deck.
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