Security scare: According to leaked reports, security at a number of U.S. airports has been frequently breached
The effectiveness of security at U.S. ports is being questioned after a businessman accidentally travelled on a flight with a loaded handgun in his luggage.
Iranian-American Farid Seif was screened by Trasport Security Administration officials at Houston airport in Texas. His hand luggage was also X-rayed before he took off on his international flight.
It wasn't until Mr Seif arrived at his hotel several hours later that he realised that he had forgotten to unpack a loaded snub nose Glock pistol from his luggage before he embarked on his journey.
Haisong Jiang was released in the early hours of Saturday
A man held for breaching security at Newark airport near New York, sparking the closure of a busy terminal, was kissing his girlfriend goodbye.
Haisong Jiang, 28, a Chinese-born student, was arrested late on Friday night and will be charged with defiant trespass, the Port Authority said.
He is due in court next week and could face a fine of up to $500 (£312).
Flights were grounded and passengers evacuated from the secure side of the terminal after the incident.
A surveillance video shows a man in a light-coloured jacket slipping underneath a security cordon at the airport, shortly after being told by an official to move away.
'Not some prank'
After the security official steps away, a man believed to be Mr Jiang is seen ducking underneath the security cordon and kissing a woman in a long white coat, before walking away with her, arm-in-arm toward the boarding area.
According to Mr Jiang's flatmate, his girlfriend is a recent graduate from Rutgers university who lives in Los Angeles. She was visiting New York for the holidays, AP reported.
The incident took place just hours after tougher screening rules for air passengers were unveiled following the alleged Christmas Day bomb plot against a US plane.
Authorities had to scour the city to track down Mr Jiang, who is studying for a doctoral degree in molecular biosciences at Rutgers university, after he left the airport.
New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg expressed anger that he could only face a fine.
"It wasn't some prank that didn't do any harm - it did a lot of harm because it sent out an alert that people can get away with something like this," he said.
He said he had committed a "terrible injustice" to the thousands who had faced disrupted travel after flights were cancelled.
Demonstration of a full body scan at Manchester airport
An armed police officer at the busy international London airport stands guard near the counters of a U.S. carrier.
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The radiation risk from full-body scanners used to improve airport security is low and unlikely to raise an individual's risk of cancer, U.S. experts said on Wednesday.
Airports in Britain, the Netherlands and Canada have said they plan to use full-body scanners to foil future terror attempts like the Christmas Day attempt to blow up a Detroit-bound flight.
The United States has tested 40 whole-body scanners as part of a pilot program started after the September 11 attacks, and this past October ordered 150 more.
There are two types of machines -- millimeter wavelength imaging and backscatter X-ray scanners. Both are used to see under clothes and identify unusual objects.
Only one -- backscatter X-ray machines -- expose individuals to ionizing radiation such as that used in common medical X-rays.
But the radiation levels are well below the threshold that could be considered a risk to an individual's health, said Dr. James Thrall of the American College of Radiology and chief of radiology at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
"All of the concerns that we have about the medical use of X-rays really don't apply to these devices," Thrall said in a telephone interview.
"The exposure is extremely low and the energy of the X-rays is also very, very low," he said.
"When X-rays are used for medical imaging purposes, they have to be energetic enough to get through the human body. The X-rays used in the backscatter machines in airports have such low energy that they literally bounce off the skin. That is what backscatter implies," Thrall said.
WAVE SCANNERS AROUND THE U.S.
The United States has 40 millimeter wave scanners now in use in 19 U.S. airports. Six machines are used for primary screening at six airports, and 34 machines are used for secondary, or random screening, as an alternative to a pat down at 13 airports.
Millimeter wave scanners beam radio waves over the body to create a three-dimensional image.
Backscatter-type machines, which cost between $150,000 and $180,000, use low-level radiation to create a two-sided image.
Such scanners only become somewhat worrisome when they are used as the primary method of scanning passengers, said David Brenner, director of the Center for Radiological Research at Columbia University Medical Center.
"From an individual's point of view, the risks are going to be small," Brenner said in a phone interview.
"If very large numbers of people would be exposed to a small risk, then you've got a population problem."
As for the actual radiation dose, he said the typical backscatter machines deliver about 0.1 microsevert of radiation. The average chest X-ray, by comparison, delivers 100 microseverts of radiation, and a chest computed tomography or CT scan delivers 10,000 microseverts.
According to the Transportation Security Administration website, the radiation dose from a single scan on a backscatter machine is the equivalent of two minutes of flying on an airplane.
Brenner said that as with medical scans, the benefits of the scan need to outweigh the risks. "If the benefit means we're safer, then that probably outweighs the potential risk," he said.
Full body Scan may break Anti Child porn law.
The government said Tuesday it was working to allay fears that body scanners being introduced at airports would break laws against creating indecent images of children.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown said this week Heathrow and other airports will introduce body scanners, as part of efforts by countries to tighten security following the failed US airliner bomb plot on Christmas Day.
Privacy campaigners told the Guardian that the images created by the machines were so graphic they amounted to "virtual strip searching" and have called for safeguards to protect the privacy of passengers involved.
Terri Dowty, of civil rights group Action On Rights For Children, said the scanners could breach child protection laws, which made it illegal to create an indecent image or a "pseudo-image" of a child.
"They do not have the legal power to use full body scanners in this way," she told the newspaper in comments published Tuesday.
A Department for Transport spokesman said a code of practice was being drawn up for airport staff who will use the scanners.
"We understand the concerns expressed about privacy in relation to the deployment of body scanners," he said.
"It is vital staff are properly trained and we are developing a code of practice to ensure these concerns are properly taken into account.
"Existing safeguards also mean those operating scanners are separated from the device, so unable to see the person to whom the image relates, and these anonymous images are deleted immediately," he added.
Some countries, led by the United States, have announced additional security measures at airports since a Nigerian man was charged with trying to blow up a US-bound jet on December 25.
It was foiled when explosives allegedly sewn into the man's underwear failed to detonate, and passengers jumped on him.
Deputy National Security Adviser John Brennan arrives for President Obama's security meeting at the White House, January 5, 2010
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CIA Director Leon Panetta arrives for President Obama's security meeting at the White House, January 5, 2010\
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates arrives for President Obama's security meeting at the White House, January 5, 2010
President Obama announces a series of reforms aimed at helping to thwart future attacks like the attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day following a security meeting at the White House,
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President Obama arrives to announce outlines a series of reforms aimed at helping to thwart future attacks like the attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day following a security meeting at the White House, January 5, 2010
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U.S. President Barack Obama is "not patient" and is demanding immediate changes in airline security, the top U.S. military officer said on Wednesday, as a grand jury indicted a Nigerian man for trying to blow up a Detroit-bound plane on Christmas Day.
Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said there was concern that potential extremists could be inspired by the bombing attempt blamed on 23-year-old Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.
Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has claimed responsibility for the attempt, one of the most serious U.S. security breaches and intelligence breakdowns since the September 11 attacks.
"Certainly there is the concern that this would bring more, generate more support from young males who might be on the fence about what to do with their lives," Mullen said.
A grand jury in Michigan indicted Abdulmutallab on six counts, including attempted murder of the other 289 passengers and crew on board the plane, and attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction. He faces life in prison, if convicted.
The bomb, which Abdulmutallab has told investigators was given to him by al Qaeda in Yemen, contained the highly explosive ingredients Pentaerythritol Tetranitrate, or PETN, and Triacetone Triperoxide, or TATP, the indictment said.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder held out the possibility of others being charged, saying, "Anyone we find responsible for this alleged attack will be brought to justice using every tool -- military or judicial -- available to our government."
Jitters have gripped the U.S. travel industry in the aftermath of the bombing attempt. In the latest security scare, an unruly passenger on a Hawaii-bound airliner on Wednesday prompted the pilot to return the plane to Portland, Oregon, escorted by two military fighter jets.
Obama called the Detroit incident a potentially disastrous "screw-up" by the intelligence community during a two-hour meeting with his national security team on Tuesday.
"The president -- he's not patient about this at all. These changes have to be made immediately," Mullen told university students at a seminar in Washington.
Obama will address the issue again in a public statement on Thursday, when the White House will release a review that will make recommendations on plugging holes in security, including changes in passenger screening and terrorism watch lists.
"The review will simply identify and make recommendations as to what was lacking and what needs to be strengthened," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said, adding it would be "comprehensive."
INTELLIGENCE SHARING
U.S. spy agencies and the State Department had information about Abdulmutallab but they never pieced it together to put him on a no-fly list. Instead, passengers and crew subdued the Nigerian bomb suspect as he tried to detonate the device.
Mullen said part of the problem was intelligence sharing and filtering through the extraordinary amount of data collected by U.S. spy agencies.
"It does have to do with sharing information and it does have to do with huge bureaucracies. And we collect an extraordinary amount of data," Mullen said.
Obama has been lambasted by Republicans who accuse his Democratic administration of being weak on terrorism and unable to fix intelligence gaps that have lingered since the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States involving hijacked planes.
Senior Republican lawmakers on Wednesday called on Obama to take more concrete steps to improve security and challenged the decision to try Abdulmutallab in federal court.
"All jihadist attackers should be charged as enemy combatants, taken into military custody, interrogated for vital intelligence, and tried in military courts under the laws of armed conflict," they said in a letter to Obama.
Since the Christmas bombing attempt, there has been finger- pointing within the U.S. intelligence community, including at the National Counterterrorism Center, created in 2004 to serve as the main repository for counterterrorism intelligence.
Asked whether people might lose their jobs over the incident, Gibbs said, "I don't know what the final outcome in terms of hiring and firing will be."
"This is a failure that touches across the full waterfront of our intelligence agencies," he said.
Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell did not rule out the possibility the review could affect the Defense Department, but added he did not see any readily apparent failings "within this department as to how we should have responded."
More counterterrorism news tomorrow: Release of a declassified version of the report on how intelligence agencies "screwed up" -- President Obama's words -- before the attempted bombing of Flight 253 over Detroit on Christmas Day.
"The review will simply identify and make recommendations as to what was lacking and what needs to be strengthened," said White House spokesman Robert Gibbs.
President Obama is expected to issue a statement on the review, Gibbs said. Counterterrorism adviser John Brennan and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano will probably discuss it before the television cameras.
Obama has received preliminary results of the report and discussed it with agency heads at Tuesday's big national security meeting. Gibbs said that the report deals with holes in airport security as well as problems within the various intelligence agencies and that Obama plans to follow up on proposed improvements in the weeks and months ahead.
Gibbs said he doesn't expect to see any personnel changes tomorrow.
"It was not the falling down of one agency, one department or one person," Gibbs said. "This, as the president has described, was a systemic failure. Each of those agencies and departments yesterday took responsibility, and as I've said, outlined plans for filling the gaps that they've found."
Terror suspect: Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab in 2002 at his year 11 graduation ceremony
The explosive would have been picked up on a full-body scanner like this one at Ronald Reagan Airport in Washington DC
A TSA officer screens an airline passenger in Terminal C at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. Pre-flight screenings were stepped up after Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was accused of trying to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight
The explosive device used by the would-be Detroit bomber contained a widely available - and easily detected - chemical that has a long history of terrorist use, according to experts.
The chemical - PETN - is small, powerful and appealing to terrorists.
The Saudi government said it was used in an assassination attempt on the country's counterterrorism operations chief in August.
It was also a component of the explosive that Richard Reid, the convicted 'shoe bomber,' used in his 2001 attempt to down an airliner.
PETN was widely used in the plastic explosives terrorists used to blow up airplanes in the 1970s and 1980s.
Investigators say Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab hid an explosive device on his body when he traveled from Amsterdam to Detroit.
They say PETN was hidden in a condom or condom-like bag just below his torso.
Abdulmutallab also had a syringe filled with liquid.
One law enforcement official said the second part of the explosive concoction used in the Christmas Day incident is still being tested but appears to be a glycol-based liquid explosive.
PETN is the primary ingredient in detonating cords used for industrial explosions and can be collected by scraping the insides of the wire, said James Crippin, a Colorado explosives expert.
It is also used in military devices and found in blasting caps. PETN is the high explosive of choice because it is stable and safe to handle, but it requires a primary explosive to detonate it.
Crippin and law enforcement officials said modern airport screening machines could have detected the chemical.
Airport 'puffer' machines - the devices that blow air on to a passenger to collect and analyse residues - would probably have detected the powder, as would bomb-sniffing dogs or a hands-on search using a swab.However, most passengers in airports only go through magnetometers, which detect metal rather than explosives.
Hidden in Abdulmutallab's clothing, the explosive might have also been detected by the full-body imaging scanners now making their way into airports. But Abdulmutallab did not go through full-body imaging machines in Nigeria or Amsterdam, said U.S. Rep. Peter King, the top Republican on the Homeland Security Committee.
Both airports have body scanners.
The Amsterdam airport has had a long reputation for good security, King said, while Nigeria's airports have been more of a concern. The U.S. provided full-body scanners to all four international airports in Nigeria, according to the State Department.
The scanners were installed in March, May and June of 2008.
Abdulmutallab was on a broad U.S. terrorist watch list but he was not designated for special screening measures or placed on a no-fly list because of a dearth of specific information about his activities, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said.
She added that he was properly screened before getting on the aircraft in Amsterdam.
Abdulmutallab has claimed to law enforcement officials that he received training and instructions from al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen.
The Saudi Arabia assassination attempt was carried out by a Saudi who was on the country's list of 85 most wanted terrorists.
The bomber was believed to have traveled to Yemen to connect with the al-Qaeda group there.
He died in the explosion and is believed to have attached the explosives to his groin or inserted them inside himself.
President Obama emphasised cybersecurity while campaigning
The White House has appointed its cyber tsar, following a seven month search.
Howard Schmidt, a former eBay and Microsoft executive who advised President Bush, was appointed after others turned down the job.
Mr Schmidt has been set the task of uniting various disparate agencies and organisations to shore up the country's defence against cyber attack.
In May this year, President Obama pledged to personally appoint someone to the post.
In a letter posted on the White House website, John Brennan, assistant to the President for homeland security and counterterrorism said that protecting the internet was "critical to our national security, public safety and our personal privacy and civil liberties".
"It's also vital to President Obama's efforts to strengthen our country, from the modernisation of our health care system to the high-tech job creation central to our economic recovery."
Mr Schmidt would have "regular access to the President and serve as a key member of his National Security Staff", he said.
The White House's acting cyber-security head, Melissa Hathaway, stood down in August after complaining that the post did not allow her to implement necessary changes.
An aerial view of the scene where raids took place in New York is shown.
These are two of three buildings raided in Flushing, Queens by cops looking for bombs.
Sen. Charles Schumer, D-New York, said the raids were "preventive" but not related to the president's visit. He chair the Home Security Committee for Senate.
Federal law enforcement agents and New York police raided several locations in New York City as part of a joint terrorism investigation, a police department spokesman said.
Searches took place in the borough of Queens, according to a law enforcement official with knowledge of the matter who added that investigators had suspects under surveillance. Dave Cardona, special agent in charge of the FBI’s criminal division in New York, confirmed the investigation. New York police are assisting in the matter, the department said.
Federal agents helped by local police began executing search warrants on residences in the borough of Queens on Sunday night.
Unnamed sources were quoted by US media as saying the raids were linked to an undercover surveillance operation.
Federal agents are reportedly due to brief senior members of Congress about the case.
New York Police Department spokesman Paul Browne confirmed to the Associated Press that searches were conducted by agents of a joint terrorism task force.
The New York Times quoted an anonymous senior law enforcement official as saying the authorities had not detected a specific plot, but were suspicious of the activities of a small group of people who "espoused a militant ideology aligned with al-Qaeda".
New York Senator Charles Schumer, who was briefed by FBI officials, said he could not discuss much of the case because many of the details were still classified.
"There was nothing imminent, and they are very good now at tracking potentially dangerous actions and this was preventive," he was quoted by the Associated Press as saying.
Previous convictions
In June, four men were indicted for allegedly plotting to set off explosives outside a New York City synagogue and shoot down military planes with Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, U.S. prosecutors said.
The charges against the men, residents of Newburgh, New York, include conspiracy and attempt to use weapons of mass destruction within the U.S., conspiracy and attempt to acquire and use anti-aircraft missiles, and conspiracy and attempt to kill officers and employees of the U.S, according to the indictment.
The men were arrested in May after attempting to detonate explosives near a synagogue and Jewish community center in the Riverdale section of the Bronx, in New York City, according to the indictment. The four also plotted to shoot down military planes at the New York Air National Guard Base at Stewart Airport in Newburgh, prosecutors said.
The defendants, James Cromitie, David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen, have all pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial in federal court in White Plains, New York.
In July, Campbell’s office said that a New York man who pleaded guilty to launching a rocket attack on a U.S. military base in Afghanistan also said he provided information to al- Qaeda leaders about New York City’s transit system for a bomb attack.
The man, Bryant Neal Vinas, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to murder U.S. citizens, providing material support to a terrorist organization and receiving military-type training from a terrorist group on Jan. 28, according to court records unsealed in July in federal court in Brooklyn.
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Law enforcement agents have raided residences in New York City as part of a terrorism investigation, and are preparing to brief Congress about the investigation.
