(via Bruce Schneier’s blog)
More about the security problem (hint: mostly, people are the problem). Humorous and sad at the same time.
Qantas chairman Margaret Jackson revealed at a Beijing Conference this week that she was briefly suspected of being a terrorist by a TSA screener during a visit last year to the United States.
. . .
See, Jackson is a woman — which, according to the wunderkind who screened her baggage and found detailed plans of new aircraft, makes it hard to believe she is also chairman of a major international airline.
“The guy said ‘Why have you got all of this?’,” Jackson told the conference, speaking of the screener’s discovery of seating diagrams in her baggage. “And I said, ‘I’m the chairman of an airline, I’m the chairman of Qantas’. “And this black guy, who was like eight foot tall, said, ‘but you’re a woman.'”
Jackson finally proved her identity to the guard… in part, by writing a note to him on her Qantas letterhead stating “Dear Bill, this is from the chairman of Qantas, who is a woman.”
See – everybody profiles. It’s not a bad thing, although sometimes it’s done poorly.
[tags]Quantas, Security, Oops[/tags]