Addressing Security Concerns

All of you probably already know that security guards in front of malls inspecting your bags, a national ID system, arming the barangay tanod as well as the recent ban of liquids on aircrafts are all ridiculous ways to prevent terrorist acts from happening.

This essay by far articulates it best.

Excerpts,

It's easy to defend against what the terrorists planned last time, but it's shortsighted. If we spend billions fielding liquid-analysis machines in airports and the terrorists use solid explosives, we've wasted our money. If they target shopping malls, we've wasted our money. Focusing on tactics simply forces the terrorists to make a minor modification in their plans. There are too many targets -- stadiums, schools, theaters, churches, the long line of densely packed people before airport security -- and too many ways to kill people.

Security measures that require us to guess correctly don't work, because invariably we will guess wrong. It's not security, it's security theater: measures designed to make us feel safer but not actually safer.

Security theater. Best packaging of it yet.

Also, the concrete repercussions of such policies in airports.