Researcher Evan Booth: How To Weaponize Tax-Free Airport Goods 288
New submitter MickeyF71 writes "At the Hack in the Box security conference security expert Evan Booth shares the results of his two year research on the effectiveness of airport security. He demonstrates how easy it is to produce lethal weapons from goods easily bought from the tax-free section at most airports."
Google's translation of the Dutch in that link isn't ideal. For those who prefer English to Dutch, Booth's presentation at CarolinaCon 2013 (YouTube video) may be a better bet.
Over thinking it (Score:5, Interesting)
That guy is over thinking it. A wine bottle and a roll of duct tape can be used to make a good knife - and on international flights they serve wine in glass bottles. Credit cards can have their edges honed to the point of being as sharp as box cutters.
About the only thing worthwhile is using a remote controlled toy to trigger something.
Why work so hard? (Score:4, Interesting)
While cute, this is really overthinking the problem.
If you want to kill lots of people in an aviation related way, send a suicide bomber to the security checkpoint at Thanksgiving.
If you want to get weapons onto the plane, infiltrate someone into the cleaning staff or maybe the caterers. There are lots of people and vehicles who enter the airport without being rigorously searched. Have them leave a weapon for you in the airplane's bathroom or taped under your seat.
Re:Ruining it for everyone (Score:5, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:They needed research for this? (Score:5, Interesting)
You've watched too many action movies.
When someone splashes alcohol in your face and lights it, the very last
thing you will be thinking about is beating them up. You WILL be thinking
about you face being on fire.
I think it's you that's watched too many movies--booze does not burn all that well. While splashing alcohol in 1 person's face and lighting it might, possibly, incapacitate that person, it is not any way to incapacitate the entire flight crew and all the other passengers. The end result would be an attacker struggling to not suffocate, because it is actually very hard to breathe when hog-tied, and especially with one or more knees in your back.
Oh, by the way--you do realize there's fire extinguishers on board, and the flight attendants know where they are and how to use them? Right? So what do you think they're going to do with the fire extinguisher after they empty it? ;-)
What this tells us about the scope of the problem. (Score:4, Interesting)
This ought to teach us just how disorganized and scarce these "Al Quaeda" suicidal terrorists are. If there were that many of them, they'd have figured out how to make airplane assault weapons long before this guy's ideas made it into print.
We are being sold a bill of goods by contractors who want the government to buy their overpriced "anti-terrorist" product-of-the-month.
Every damn politician is now afraid of being perceived as "soft on terrorism," and we now have an Antiterrorism Industry intent on perpetuating itself.
This is getting REALLY stupid . . . almost as stupid as the internet bubble.
Re:WTH does tax-free have to do with the subject o (Score:5, Interesting)
Heh, the *boom* will be when you try to compress acetylene above 15psi.
A few liters of acet-oxy mix makes a nice boom but little damage, I've had a quart sandwich bag of mix go off in my hands, not even a tingle.
30 gal trashbag with a nice lean mix will audibly echo in the hudson valley for at least 190 seconds, assuming your ears were plugged for the boom.
Re: WTH does tax-free have to do with the subject (Score:3, Interesting)
I wanna hang out with this guy..