The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) does not have valid evidence to support the effectiveness of its list of behavioral indicators for individuals who may post a threat to aviation security, according to a recent report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO).
Throughout the past decade, TSA has employed thousands of individuals trained to identify passengers exhibiting behaviors that are indicative of stress, fear, or deception at airport screening checkpoints.
According to TSA, specific verbal and nonverbal cues, such as swallowing or the degree to which an individual’s eyes are open, can indicate a potentially dangerous action and provide a means for the agency to identify passengers who pose a risk to aviation security.
In a 2013 report to Congress, GAO found that available evidence did not support whether behavioral indicators could be used to identify potentially dangerous persons, which led to a GAO recommendation that funding for behavioral indicators be limited until TSA could provide scientifically-validated evidence that they were effective.
In its new report, GAO found that 175 out of 178, or 98 percent, of TSA’s evidence sources did not provide scientifically-valid evidence as being effective at identifying potentially dangerous persons who pose a threat to the public.
Specifically, 77 percent of the sources TSA provided in support of its new list emanated from news articles, opinion pieces, law enforcement presentations, and screen shots of medical websites — all of which did not meet GAO’s definition of valid evidence.
Additionally, 12 percent of the sources contained information journal articles, books reviewing existing literature, and publications that referenced original works. While those sources could be reviewed separately, they could not be accepted by GAO for its report.
The report did find that 11 percent, or 20 out of 178, of the sources were from original research papers that used original data and methods. However, five of them did not meet generally-accepted research standards. Of the 15 sources that did meet generally-accepted research standards, 12 did not present information that were applicable to specific behavioral indicators that TSA cited as support.
Only three of the 178 total sources cited could be used as valid evidence to support just eight of the 36 behavioral indicators in TSA’s revised list.
Unlike its 2013 report, GAO opted to make no recommendations for TSA at this time.