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Terrorism crackdown to crimp e-book usage on international flights?
December 27, 2009 | 12:15 pm
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By David Rothman
Kindles, Nooks and Sony Readers, along with other e-book gizmos, might not be usable on some international flights to the U.S. At least that’s the case if we extrapolate from a Gizmodo post discussing the new terrorism crackdown. For six hours aloft, will you have to suffer airline magazines and other “diversions” in place of a Project Gutenberg classic or the latest bestsellers in E?
What do you think, gang? How much danger is here of a bomb hidden in a gizmo like an e-book reader? I’ll not take sides here. I’m just curious. Another issue is whether the feds may be more tempted to crack down on some kinds of electronics than others. Will iPhones get off if the bans don’t cover cell phones? And will the airlines try to gouge passengers by renting them “safe” e-readers? Finally, how about paper books as hideaways for bombs?
Detail for Walt’s benefit: Most but not all of my book-reading these days is electronic (with a preference for nonDRMed titles), and many of our TeleRead community members just don’t read paper books. More power to airline passengers who want to curl up with p-books. I like both E and P. Have added “in E” to the first graph.
Elsewhere on the terrorism/gadget question: Techmeme roundup.
A related issue: I’m curious what the current airline policies would be toward the e-readers’ wireless, and whether it’s a threat to navigation equipment.
Technorati Tags: terrorism,terrorism crackdown
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Comments:
Actually, the whole change in rules is really a farce. All it is going to do is upset 99.9% of travelers and potentially bankrupt the airlines. Seriously, if you have kids or are taking a vacation, you will probably re-evaluate whether you can either change your destination or get there by some other means. The use of e-ink readers on long trips or vacations is one of their best benefits that is now directly opposed by the crazy rules thrown out in air travel now.
The explosive involved in the most recent attempt amounted to 80 grams. (less than 3 ounces)
So, technically-speaking, it is quite possible to build extremely small explosive devices and hide them inside a still-functional gadget. Not looking to give ideas to the idiots but it is not particularly hard to blow up an aircraft; even a small explosion near the wing or belly-mounted fuel tanks will do it.
Lucky thing those terrorists will never think to blow up the plane before the last hour of flight.
So they’ll cease to allow us to bring our gadgets onto the plane. Then someone will hide some explosive in their underwear, and we’ll all have to fly ‘commando’. Then someone will conceal a tiny incendiary device in a jacket lining. No more jackets.
Before you know it, we’ll all be flying naked, carrying nothing. We’ll have to UPS our stuff to our destination. Until someone sends an incendiary device via UPS. Then we won’t be allowed to ship objects any longer either.
People already have trouble with Kindles during takeoff and landing; or not. That depends on which flight attendant sees you with it.
Now it sounds like all passengers are going to have to remain seated and belted in for the duration of their flight. Under that scenario, would the fellow who subdued the would-be plane-blower-upper be subject to prosecution?
The airline safety folks simply do not know what they’re doing. Like DRM, they are at their most thorough when they are treating actual customers like criminals; and at their least thorough and most incompetent when trying to thwart the actual bad guys.
But what if the Swedish Bikini Team to turn into Terrorists and hide explosives in their silicon breast implants; when they rub their nipples together, it will cause the chemicals to ignite, and KABOOM!
But seriously, if there is a crackdown, it will be on all gizmos like iPhones, iPods, DVD-Players, and laptops; it will not be limited to ereaders. Unless you want to believe a conspiracy theory of airport booksellers who want people to buy more Dan Brown books that have been gathering dust at their kiosks.
Whenever I fly, I always bring an emergency backup paperback. So far, I haven’t needed it, but if, for some reason, my Kindle suddenly didn’t work mid-flight, I’d might go stir crazy, and I wouldn’t want to have to explain the situation to the TSA afterwards.
The most likely outcome is that airports will have to buy the full-body scannners they’ve been resisting because of cost.
Main thing to remember is that any restrictions will be limted to *some* international flights and will be a function of the quality of security at the departure airport. Flights originating in Tel Aviv will likely have less restrictions than flights originating in Pakistan.
Pretty, no?
Beats fiddling while Rome burns, though.
Main thing is not to overestimate the intelligence of the terrorists or underestimate their determination. They *will* keep trying until they succeed but we can and should be able to stay a half-step ahead.
Their success is not mandated.
This ‘crackdown’ is a typical knee-jerk reaction by the government. The only thing this will accomplish is to piss travelers off even more and make flying more stressful than it already is (if that’s even possible).
At the rate we’re going, by the end of the next decade we’ll all have to fly naked, handcuffed to our seats with armed guards in the aisles.
As Greg says, if they crack down on eReaders then they also have to crack down on phones and MP3 players; I’d like to see peoples reaction when they can’t listen to their music.
I don’t believe it would be possible to put explosive in an eReader as these things are pretty compact as it is.
Anyway, an easy way round the problem is to make the user switch it on and then weigh the thing. If my Sony Touch Edition weighs more than 286g…
The comment about breast implants, though intended to be humorous, may in fact be a serious possibility. A suicide bomber with implants would think nothing of cutting open his/her chest in order to access two chemicals that combined will produce a powerful explosion. One can only hope that every possible combination of two chemicals that when combined will produce an explosion or toxic fumes can and will be detected. It’s not just in the dictionary that the proximity from boob to bomb is small.