Institute For Counter-Terrorism Identifies The Threats

A newly-published report by the Israel-based Institute for Counter Terrorism (ICT) identifies UAVs, lasers, and radicalized airport employees who remain unidentified by law enforcement as the biggest terrorism threats to aviation.

The 21-page report written by three authors published on August 10 identifies multiple potential terrorism threats, but it particularly focuses on remotely-piloted aircraft (drones) as one of the newest technologies that terrorists believe can be used to create aviation terrorism. The report's authors say that terrorist organizations "do not hide their motivation to make use of this technology.”

The drones could be used to carry explosives to attack an aircraft, and have already been used in an intelligence-gathering capacity by terrorist organizations.

The report says that while there has not bet been any "real damage" caused by laser attacks on aircraft, "possibility cannot be ignored that terrorist organization will use laser beams against pilots in order to carry out a terror attack. This issue becomes even more significant in light of the fact that … particularly powerful laser devices … can be found in the possession of terrorist organizations.”

In discussing radicalized employees, a 2015 conducted study by ICT found Facebook profiles "that belonged to employees of airports throughout Europe who had access to secure areas of commercial and cargo flights and who had posted Islamic-jihadist content."

And even with airports beefing up security, "there has been an increase in the number of incidents in which deficiencies in the employment process were found."

The authors conclude that a comprehensive approach is needed "which integrates the promotion of capabilities at various security layers, from the individual level to the implementation of advanced technologies."

FMI: Full Report,  H/T Runwaygirl