The Domestic Intelligence Gap, Essay Example

The airline industry and the Federal government have implemented many “improvements’ to address safety and security since 9/11. Have these efforts made difference?

Homeland security events, before 9/11,  establishing many of the security protocols used today. While 9/11 served as the spark for emergency response agencies to recognize vulnerabilities. It can be argued that many of the changes that were put in place, especially in regards to the safety of the airline industry have drastically enhanced the safety of passengers. The problem is proof of this is often credited by the fact that there hasn’t been a successful terrorist attack since 9/11. The recent thwarting of the “underwear bomber”, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, in 2009 is often used as proof there is a still a threat to commercial air travel, while simultaneously being used as proof the airline industry is more secure than ti was in 2001. The question really is open to interpretation.

Do the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and Transportation Security Administration (TSA) have the necessary authorities and resources to make mandatory or necessary security changes quickly?

How much personal information should individuals provide to TSA for purposes of comparing their profiles with those of potential terrorists?

This is a touchy subject as any amount of personal information, beyond what might be considered standard, borders on invasion of privacy. There is also the issue of safety and concern for the welfare of others. I believe the level of the threat should dictate the level of screening and personal interrogation.

Should the FAA/TSA ban all cargo on civilian passenger flights? Does cargo give terrorists an attack vector to defeat the passenger security inspections?

Cargo bombs pose a real threat. And there have been numerous cases recently of un-screened cargo making it onto commercial airlines, largely due to minimal staff. In addition to this the number of travelers is only increasing. As  Nicolas Sunderland and Gong Zhang note, “The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) projects that domestic passenger traffic will increase at an average annual rate of about 3% from 2010 to 2020 and international passenger traffic will increase at a rate of approximately 4.5% per year. Based on these projections, passenger volume at screening checkpoints is expected to increase by more than 25% over the next ten years”  (Sunderland and Zhang, 2012). The authors go on to note that this has lead the FAA to be significantly concerned about necessary measures to screen the influx in passengers that will occur of the next 10 years.  This substantial increase in passengers will result in a high

probability of under-staffing and one way to reduce this issue could be from banning cargo. It is a viable option that will be considered down the road eventually.

US ports are operated by local and state authorities. In order to protect this component of the critical infrastructure, should the Federal government have a larger role?

The Federal government already plays a substantial role in the form of the CDC and federal regulations enabling the Federal government to quarantine and isolate citizens and international visitors from state to state or on the borders, so I do believe the Federal government should take a more hands on role port-side as well, similar to what is already established with the airlines.

Do you believe that the current security processes of the transportation industry would interdict a WMD hidden in a cargo container?

I want to hope so, but there are recent instances that suggest the cargo could potentially go un-screened.

Transportation Information Fusion Centers are becoming a possible solution to deal with security and safety issues. Are they an effective solution? What are some of the challenges to make them successful?

The development of state and local fusion centers resulted in the collaboration of all intelligence efforts by a wide range of government agencies and it was a direct byproduct of 9/11. Burch notes that “the growth of state and local fusion centers, however, is not a federal phenomenon or one initiated by national strategy. These centers grew in response to state and local initiatives as a result of the 9/11 attacks” (Burch, 2008). In addition to the fusion centers which  empowered law enforcement efforts across departments in national security cases, Burch also points out that, the most important impact of 9/11 was all of the national organizations that formed from the fusion process. Organizations like “the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Director for National Intelligence (DNI), the National Counter Terrorism Center (NCTC)” (Burch, 2008) would not have been formed without the terrorist attacks. Despite all of this one aspect that can challenge these centers from being effective is the inter-agency and outer-agency bureaucracy, specifically in regards to the differences in how different departments investigate and gather information and in turn, exchange that information between one another. The integrity of that information can be jeopardized if any one aspect of the fused unit has been compromised by an outside operative (ie., terrorist spy).

Are there enough checks in place for the CDC to prevent persons with highly contagious diseases (e.g. certain strains of TB, Avian Flu, Swine Flu,Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MES), Ebola etc.) from airline travel, cruise ships, and border crossings? Should TSA use remote temperature sensors to scan passengers for potential health issues? What changes are needed? What’s a reasonable approach?

The authority for quarantine or isolation is held by the federal government and it’s derived from the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution.  Section 361 of the Public Health Service Act, authorizes the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human services to take necessary precautions and measures required for the prevention of the spread of communicable diseases. This is specifically in regards to the transfer of these communicable diseases from outside the U.S. To inside the U.S. Or between states. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention is the authority through which handling these duties are delegated on a daily basis. Despite the CDA having this authority, a large-scale isolation and quarantine hasn’t been enforced since 1918-1919 when the “Spanish Flu” pandemic. Currently, the main CDC checks are in the form of color coded notices and alerts as to where people should and should not travel due to disease scares. While this may be considered liberal in nature, it should be noted that the CDC has ample authority to launch nationwide quarantines and isolation initiatives.

Most research currently available can’t completely assess all the risks and benefits of TSA using remote temperature sensors to scan passengers for potential health issues, as one of the most noted concerns would be the possible health issues that could be created in passengers on whom such a method might be used.(Mowery et al., 2014). The most significant way to make this method effective would be to invest more money research to assess it s efficacy.

References

Burch, J. (2008). The domestic intelligence gap: Progress since 9/11?. Homeland Security Affairs Journal, Retrieved from http://www.hsaj.org/?special:fullarticle=0.2.2

Mowery, K., Wustrow, E., Wypych, T., Singleton, C., Comfort, C., Rescorla, E., … & Shacham, H. (2014, August). Security analysis of a full-body scanner. In23rd USENIX Security Symposium (USENIX Security 14).

Sunderland, N., & Zhang, G. Battling Inefficient Airport Checkpoints.

Rashid, H. S. J., Place, C. S., & Braithwaite, G. R. (2013). Investigating the investigations: a retrospective study in the aviation maintenance error causation.Cognition, technology & work, 15(2), 171-188.