From: Michael Motyka <mmotyka@lsil.com>
Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 14:25:22 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Chemical Analysis of Laptop strap.
In-Reply-To: <199809190501.HAA12423@replay.com>
Message-ID: <3606A678.40A4@lsil.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Anonymous wrote:
> So I fly home Friday from San Jose.  Probably because I was
> in a hurry, after walking through the magnetometer and x-raying
> my stuff, a security dude grabbed my laptop and said he wanted
> to 'analyze' it.  Yeah sure whatever, I decided not to protest
> I was late for my flight.
> 
> This analysis, it turned out, was wiping a coffee filter over the strap
> of its bag, and sticking the coffee filter into a slot on a machine.
> No solvent even.  The machine had columns labelled TNT RDX NITRO PETN HMX.
> I recognized the first four as high explosives.  Later, I wondered
> if people with angina (who take nitro orally) ever set this off.
> Most of them, of course, are not bearded eastern-european/semetic
> guys in their 30's who look worried and in a hurry.
> 
> Anyway, that was it, and I made my flight.  Didn't even open
> the laptop's case.
> 
> The machine name was ION-something; I wonder whether it sucked vapors
> from the fiber disk or whether it was a neutron-spectrometer (?) device.
> 
> (Had this been a UK Customs 'inspection' of the contents of the disk, I
> might have had to explain the half-gig of "noise" I have on the disk.
> Only, it really is noise. Really.)
> 
> Anyway, the moral of the story:
> 
> Don't store your laptop with your explosives :-)
> 
> 
Just wait until you've had a cavity search and been grilled for four
hours because you fed Miracle-Gro to your prize peonies just before
leaving on your trip. It's pretend security. Feel-good stuff. Better to
do NMR of any large-volume object although the magnetic field migh fuck
up your drive.