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posted by on Thursday March 09 2017, @11:20AM   Printer-friendly
from the the-word-alleged-sure-is-used-often dept.

Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956

Federal lawmakers are investigating how a former Iraqi insurgent fighter was able to lie about his identity and still get through America's 'extreme' vetting process.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee has asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions to find out why the terror suspect's pending arrest was allegedly spiked just over a week before the election. Trump had run on a tough-on-terror platform and had been critical of President Obama's refugee policy.

"When [Joint Terrorism Task Force] and the U.S. Attorney's office for the Western District of Texas sought to prosecute this refugee, the local law enforcement and prosecutors allegedly 'met resistance' from officials within the National Security Division's Counter Terrorism section in Washington DC," Committee chairman Ron Johnson, R-Wis., said in a March 6 letter to U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

Source: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/03/08/iraqi-insurgent-fighter-allegedly-lied-about-identity-got-through-extreme-vetting.html


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  • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday March 09 2017, @03:39PM (3 children)

    by Grishnakh (2831) on Thursday March 09 2017, @03:39PM (#476982)

    3. Ban all international trade, because nobody wants to spend the money to really investigate cargo shipping containers and a bad guy could easily sneak into the country by hiding in a shipping crate.

    This is technically incorrect. It would be pretty simple to use X-ray machines to scan all incoming shipping crates and look for humans, and given the level of X-ray radiation required to penetrate steel shipping crates, it probably wouldn't be good for any humans hiding inside either. There's already such scanners in use.

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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Thursday March 09 2017, @04:22PM (2 children)

    by Thexalon (636) on Thursday March 09 2017, @04:22PM (#477000)

    Given the level of X-ray radiation required to penetrate steel shipping crates, it probably wouldn't be good for any humans hiding inside either. There's already such scanners in use.

    They're in use, but they don't scan all cargo (they passed a law saying that they were supposed to, but then they decided that was too expensive). And you can solve the x-ray problem with lead shielding. I didn't say this was going to be a pleasant trip, mind you, just that it was possible to make it.

    --
    The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
    • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday March 09 2017, @04:36PM (1 child)

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Thursday March 09 2017, @04:36PM (#477008)

      Two things with lead shielding: 1) you can just boost the X-ray power and penetrate that, or 2) since lead shielding isn't likely to be commonly used in containers, any that do can be flagged for manual inspection, at additional cost to the shipper or receiver. As for the expense of scanning, how expensive can it be once you have the machine in place? The only ongoing costs will be 1) electricity for the machine, 2) labor (having humans sit there and look at the images, which shouldn't take more than 1 minute per container I'm guessing; they certainly don't take anywhere near that long to look at the images of your luggage at the airport), and 3) maintenance costs for the machine.

      I'm just pointing out that technical solutions can be employed to completely prevent people from sneaking into the country in shipping containers.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 09 2017, @05:18PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 09 2017, @05:18PM (#477018)

        No matter how strict your guidelines, you are always at risk of one or more of them being accidentally overlooked. There is always a chance to get through.