Lite Brite Bombs in Boston
By now, most everyone has heard about the "bomb scare" that crippled Boston last week. After finding out that I was the only person in my entire family that knew who the "Mooninites" were, I can understand people being confused by the LED-based signs that were placed all around Boston and nine other cities two weeks before. What I can't understand is why these signs ended up causing the police to shut down major portions of the city for an extended period of time. Reportedly, there was something that looked like an actual pipe bomb at New England Medical Center, which supposedly triggered the dramatic response from the Boston police force. Even given that more authentic bomb scare, we learned a few things about Boston's first response force.
The Boston police did not show the ability to distinguish between an authentic threat and a non-threat. There are plenty of people who have said, "Well if the signs ended up being bombs, you would have crucified the cops if they didn't take the response that they did."
These people ignore that we should not celebrate a false positive response from our threat detection system. Especially when that false positive costs the city millions of dollars. Boston's public officials have spent a good deal of time blaming Turner Broadcasting and the marketing firm responsible for the signs for the disturbance to the city. They should, however, be wondering why these lite brite installations were:
1) Mistaken for possible bombs. 2) Mistaken for possible bombs two weeks after they were installed.
So the threat detection system was not only defective in detecting an actual threat, it was tardy in detecting anything.
This becomes a problem when a situation occurs with multiple non-threats and multiple threats. If the police force can't distinguish between a clear non-threat (and I really challenge anyone to look at the actual signs and say they resemble bombs in any way) and a credible threat, they put themselves in a position where they could be easily used to not only stop traffic in the city, but also concentrate large amounts of people into small spaces (think subway stations) where a real threat could do even more damage.
Now, I'll grant that someone could create authentic looking decoys to create the same situation, but I'd feel a bit better if our enemies at least needed to create a decoy that looks like it might be an explosive device. Why would we want our first response units to jump at shadows? And if I hear one more person say, "this is a different world post-9/11," I will scream.
This world isn't different than it was on 9/10/2001, except in one way: We now use that event to justify making irrational arguments about the proper way to deal with threats against our country and the people in it. Arresting people without cause, spying on an entire populace, passing draconian legislation, and wildly overreacting to non-existent threats will not make anyone safer. Those things will waste a lot of time and money, though.
For more reading about this event and other security related matters, please check out Bruce Schneier's excellent blog.
Posted by Mr. Eff on 02/04/2007 || link
