Profiling and Airport Security Operations

Airport security is a broad term that can encompass activities as disparate as the prevention of petty theft to the minimization of to potential for the occurrence of terrorist incidents with a wide variety of important activities that fall between these polar extremes (Ghobrial & Irvin, 2004). Along this of continuum of significant aspects of airport security, the minimization of the potential for terrorist incidents is the most significant of all airport security activities (Turney, Bishop, & Fitzgerald, 2004; Karber, 2002).

There are many tools which have been incorporated into airport security operations or which have been proposed for such incorporation. Perhaps the most controversial of these tools is the process of profiling air travel passengers (Rice & Mullen, 2003). Strong arguments exist on each side of the issue of the use profiling as one of the tools of an airport security strategy (Reddick, 2004; Lund, 2003).

There are many different approaches to applying the profiling concept to identify persons of interest. A behavioral approach to profiling attempts to predict future behavior or behavioral intent based on (a) past actions, (b) current behavior (nervousness or furtiveness at an airport security checkpoint, as an example), or (c) a combination of the two. Profiling also can focus on traits to assess the probability that an individ

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blic consciousness. It requires only one act of domestic terrorism to change public consciousness. Airport Security and Screening Airport security is a phennmenon with which most Americans are familiar today. The Department of Transportation is responsible for this security. What most people do not realize, however, is that airport security designed to thwart terrorism was implemented before the 11 September 2001. The terrorist attacks of September 2001 revealed, however, that the earlier security measures were not effective. It is likely a mistake to assume that today's airport security measures are effective, because the general assessment was that the earlier security measures were effective until the assessments were proved faulty by the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 (Szyliowicz, 2004). Since 1985, the United States government and United States flag-carriers have matched passengers with bags, searched and guarded of aircraft, screened those persons servicing aircraft, and interviewed of each passenger in an attempt to ferret out those intent on causing harm for American carriers at international locations. In the wake of the Pan Am Flight 103 disaster over Lockerbie, Scotland, former President Bush appointed
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Approximate Pages = 16 (250 words per page)