[Infowarrior] - Second Movie-Plot Threat Contest Winner

[Richard Forno]

Second Movie-Plot Threat Contest Winner

On April 1, I announced the Second Annual Movie-Plot Threat Contest:

    Your goal: invent a terrorist plot to hijack or blow up an airplane with
a commonly carried item as a key component. The component should be so
critical to the plot that the TSA will have no choice but to ban the item
once the plot is uncovered. I want to see a plot horrific and ridiculous,
but just plausible enough to take seriously.

    Make the TSA ban wristwatches. Or laptop computers. Or polyester. Or
zippers over three inches long. You get the idea.

    Your entry will be judged on the common item that the TSA has no choice
but to ban, as well as the cleverness of the plot. It has to be realistic;
no science fiction, please. And the write-up is critical; last year the best
entries were the most entertaining to read.

On June 5, I posted three semi-finalists out of the 334 comments:

    * Butterflies and beverages; water must be banned.
    * Dimethylmercury; security checkpoints must be banned, but of course
they can't be. Oh, what to do!
    * Oxy-hydrogen bomb; wires -- earphones, power cables, etc. -- must be
banned. 

Well, we have a winner. I can't divulge the exact formula -- because you'll
all hack the system next year -- but it was a combination of my opinion,
popular acclaim in blog comments, the opinion of Tom Grant (the previous
year's winner), and the opinion of Kip Hawley (head of the TSA).

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http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/06/second_movieplo.html