'US failed to identify 73 airport workers linked to terrorism'

Nearly 14 years after terrorists turned jetliners into weapons of mass destruction, gaping holes in security at US airports continue to emerge with a new report finding that authorities failed to flag 73 airport workers "linked to terrorism".
An investigation by the Inspector General of the Homeland Security Department found 73 airport employees got security clearance from the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), even though they were on a terror watch list.
The new report found that the TSA does not have access to terrorist watchlist data that would have flagged the airport workers, that includes airline employees, airport vendors and others with access to secure areas of commercial airports in the US, Fox News reported.

This comes after it emerged last week that undercover agents posing as passengers were able to sneak mock explosives or banned weapons through security checkpoints 95 per cent of the time. The test found a potential vulnerability with airport body scanners.
The results of the new audit show that -- while the agency keeps a robust system for screening commercial airport workers -- it still failed to flag 73 airport workers "linked to terrorism."
"The TSA did not identify these individuals through its vetting operations because it is not authorised to receive all terrorism-related categories under current inter-agency watch-listing policy," the Inspector General's report stated.

The agency acknowledged that individuals in these categories "represented a potential transportation security threat," according to the report.

To test the accuracy and effectiveness of TSA's terrorism vetting procedures, the National Counterterrorism Center was asked to match more than 900,000 records of active aviation workers against its Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment database.
According to the report, the TSA had been unable to find 73 individuals "linked to terrorism" because the information the TSA received from the Department of Homeland Security Watchlist Service and used for vetting did not contain the terrorism "codes" associated with the 73 individuals. In other words, TSA did not have the entire terror watchlist.

Overall, the report concluded, the vetting and re-vetting procedures that TSA used were "generally effective" in identifying workers with links to terrorism.
The report recommended that TSA "request additional watchlist data, require that airports improve verification of applicants' right to work, revoke credentials when the right to work expires, and improve the quality of vetting data.