Laptop bombs have become a serious global security threat to the aviation industry, forcing nations such as the U.S., and UK to impose bans on large electronics into aircraft cabins. Laptop bombs are hard to be identified and go undetected even through the airport's X-ray scanners, making them easy to smuggle into an aircraft.
This leaves a major security loophole, which the head of UN's counter-terrorism committee recently warned is a question of "when" and not "if" terrorists will use laptops as a way to smuggle bombs on to aircrafts. Currently, the United States bans all electronics larger than a smartphone into the passenger cabin, affecting nine inbound airlines flying out of 10 airports in the Middle East and Northern Africa.
As it now appears, the U.S. might ban laptops on all airlines flying in and out of the country. While speaking on Fox News Sunday, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary John Kelly, said that he's been considering banning laptops from being boarded onto the passenger cabins of all international flights to and from the U.S.
"That's the thing that they are obsessed with, the terrorists, the idea of knocking down an airplane in flight, particularly if it's a U.S. carrier, particularly if it's full of U.S. people," Kelly was quoted as saying, according to Reuters.
There's no definite timeline to expand the ban, but it is in due process, Kelly said.
"We are still following the intelligence," he said, "and are in the process of defining this, but we're going to raise the bar generally speaking for aviation much higher than it is now."
By keeping the airlines industry in the loop the DHS is not blindsiding them, like President Donald Trump's executive order – to ban entry to citizens from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, for 90 days – did in January.
Both Delta Air Lines and United Airlines are kept in close loop in the development of tightening airlines security.
"To the administrations' great credit, they have given us a heads up. We've had constant updates on the subject. We know more than most. And again, if there's a credible threat out there, we need to make sure we take the appropriate measures," Oscar Munoz, chief executive officer of United Airlines, said at the company's annual meet last week.
