| > They've been looking at the x-rays of laptops for twenty years, and now they suddenly start worrying about bombs being built into one? Batteries on laptops and cell phones look like a big opaque block on x-rays[0]. And 6 grams of PETN can do a lot of damage[1]. New intelligence indicates that the AQAP bombmaker responsible for the underwear bomber and the printer bomber has figured out how to replace the battery with a bomb. It's not visible on x-ray, and it's sealed so it won't trigger the explosive trace detection equipment[2] either. > And why aren't they worried about the cargo baggage which also contains electronic devices that are potentially uncharged? Presumably these devices would need to be held directly against the fuselage as the underwear bomber failed to do[3], so they'd need to be carried by a passenger instead of in a random location in the baggage compartment. And it's not about whether the battery is charged, it's about whether the device has power at all. Naturally TSA countermeasures are trivially circumvented. Replace the optical drive with a second battery, it still powers on even if the first battery has been replaced with a bomb. Some reports say they're looking to surgically implant a device under the skin[4]. How do you screen for that? [0] http://www.petergof.com/x-ray/images/profiler.jpg [1] http://edition.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/world/2009/12/28... (video) [2] http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/img/photos/2012/08/11/8d/... [3] http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/20... [4] http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/world/418791/spotlight-on-qa... |
