Airport Security, Tablets and Laptops: The Electronics Ban and Lessons in Futility

‘Security measures are often exercises in futility. Resembling placebos, they are the reassurance authorities make as acts of intrusive inconvenience. Queues are increased at airports in the vain hope that an elusive gel carrier will be nabbed before the next detonating device is activated on a flight. Shoes are checked to see if they pass muster. Devices are scrutinised.
Now, depending on certain routes, an electronics ban on carry on items has been imposed, most notably directed by the United States and United Kingdom. This latest exercise in Anglo-American futility has again done its bit to cause disruptions in the name of the questionable. A security “source” claimed that the ban was occasioned by a plot that would have involved the use of a fake iPad, amongst other factors.
The argument for such measures never changes: they might happen because of one incident that was an exception proving the rule. Such a case took place on a Somali plane in February 2016, involving a bomb possibly concealed in a laptop. It hardly justifies such electronic measures across eight countries in North Africa and the Middle East.’
Read more: Airport Security, Tablets and Laptops: The Electronics Ban and Lessons in Futility