Insider Threat

 

Whenever Aviation Security comes to mind, insider threat is always at the forefront. This is one of the biggest threats to the Aviation Industry, and if presented with the opportunity to execute their plans could be disastrous to the industry, the facility, the safety of customers and other employees. With just the showing or the swiping of a badge, employees have access to almost all of the facility. A good example of an airport employee having this kind of access is the 2018 Sea-Tac Airport worker Richard Russell, a baggage handler at the airport who just showed his ID and walked through security, stole a Horizon Airplane at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. He later intentionally crashed the plane on a small island and killed himself. How does this even happen? How did the system fail this bad? Another case of an employee using their access to attempt to cause harm is the 2019 American Airlines incident where a mechanic in Miami was charged with sabotaging a plane’s navigation system. These two situations could have been extremely detrimental to Aviation and the livelihoods of the immediate personnel surrounding the incidents.

How do we mitigate this?

With the implementing of TSA’s 20 Layers of U.S. Aviation Security, effective safeguards have been put into place to catch personnel before any harm is done. A few of the layers that help ward off insider threat are Intelligence, Crew Vetting, Canine, Behavior Detection, Checkpoints and Random Employee Screening. The intelligence layer encompasses all the others. Indicators could be behavioral, physical, or finances can expose potential malicious insiders. Information gathered in the vetting process, behavior detection and random employee screening is put together to create profiles which are constantly monitored for changes.

Employees must be trained to identify some signs to look out for while going about the daily requirements of their duties, and if any signs are seen, report them. Recurrent vetting of employees, including background checks and random psychological evaluations would help improve security against insider threat. Evaluations along with recurrent vetting would help detect changes in employees and allow someone to step in before someone gets hurt or equipment gets damaged.

 References

Inside Look: TSA Layers of Security. (2017, August). Transportation Security Administration.                  https://www.tsa.gov/blog/2017/08/01/inside-look-tsa-layers-security

Insider Threat Roadmap 2020. (2020). Transportation Security Administration.                                                   https://www.tsa.gov/sites/default/files/3597_layout_insider_threat_roadmap_0424.pdf

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