Airport baggage security system in question

Ever farewelled your suitcase at a dodgy airport in a Third World country with little hope of seeing it again? We've always known that our bags are vulnerable to be rifled through, get damaged, or disappear between the time we heave them onto the weighing machine at one airport and pick them up at another.

But now a new threat has emerged close to home. In Australia police have busted what they say is a drug-smuggling ring involving baggage handlers at Sydney Airport and 15 people were arrested. Brisbane baggage handlers have also been accused of drug smuggling.

What's to stop your bags from being tampered with in New Zealand?

Not much, says Peter O'Shea, a private investigator for Auckland Investigations, which last year busted a ring of Menzies Aviation baggage handlers stealing from bags at Auckland Airport.

"If you get guys who can smuggle a laptop out of the hold of the aircraft, it's just as easy to smuggle something on - drugs, or even worse, explosives."

While passengers are subjected to several security checks before they get to the plane, ground crew face only one check of their identification cards.

They are vetted for police and criminal records before they get their ID cards, but their belongings don't get x-rayed while they're on the job, they're not subject to metal detectors or customs checks and they're not always monitored by security cameras.

The lawyers for Australian woman Schapelle Corby, accused of importing 4.1kg of marijuana into Bali, are trying to capitalise on this. Corby, 27, says the drug had to have been planted in her unlocked body board bag at Brisbane airport, possibly by baggage handlers involved in a domestic drug-running operation. Her seemingly flimsy case had gained weight.

Police say corrupt baggage handlers have been paid to smuggle drugs out of the country for years.

Australian authorities and Qantas now plan to monitor baggage handlers with hidden cameras, subject them to tighter screening, and further restrict access to airports.

Customs spokeswoman Jules Lovelock says the service is not aware of any incidents here of the gravity of those being investigated in Australia.

Aside from last year's Auckland baggage handlers theft ring, police at New Zealand's main airports are not aware of recent instances of baggage handlers being involved in airport crime.

Inspector Ian Manawaiti, police manager of border security planning, said there had been reports of theft, but mainly by the public, and there was nothing to indicate that the perpetrators were baggage handlers or other ground staff.

IAG New Zealand, which underwrites companies that include NZI, Westpac, The Warehouse, State, BNZ and the PSIS, deals with many claims of lost or stolen baggage.

Of a random sample of 68 claims - of bags disappearing, arriving damaged, or with items missing - received in the past 12 months, almost a third involved airlines.

Mark Everett, general manager of Aviation Security Service (Avsec), says New Zealand authorities are confident there is no organised crime in New Zealand airports, although there has been. "That could change, and we have intelligence systems that would tell us that."

O'Shea says it would be easy for what is allegedly happening in Australia to happen here. "A guy can turn up for work, park his car in the carpark, walk into his area of work and then two seconds later or whatever he's on the aircraft handling areas.

"There are no checks or anything in between that these guys aren't bringing anything on or bringing anything off. It would be easy to get something onto an aircraft." O'Shea, formerly of the London Metropolitan Police, says the security gap is the same in airports worldwide because it's difficult and expensive to plug.

Low-paid baggage handlers are vulnerable to approaches from gangs offering money to stash on planes items such as drugs, explosives and weapons. "And that goes for baggage handlers, it goes for the aircraft cleaners, it goes for the people who take the food onto the aircraft. I wouldn't imagine any of those guys would go through any screening.

"And you can imagine that you might be able to do bag searches, you might be able to do x-rays, but for drugs you really need to bring in strip searches because there are so many places people can hide drugs. Which company's going to say, 'We're going to strip-search our staff'?"

Captain David Morgan, general manager of operations, standards and safety at Air New Zealand, says the airline does not comment on specific matters relating to security. "Measures are in place to screen the backgrounds of staff working in safety sensitive areas. Likewise, robust systems and processes are in place to ensure the security of passenger baggage."

Although Everitt believes there is no organised crime at New Zealand airports, he is aware of spasmodic crime, such as the case of the Air New Zealand staff under investigation for allegedly taking newspapers.

"There's been a significant improvement since I've been around in this business. I couldn't have said to you in the early 1990s that we didn't have organised crime in terms of theft and stealing from freight forwarders at New Zealand airports. I think it was pretty prolific."

But he says security measures were put in place, including fencing airports and placing staff carparks nowhere near workplaces. "And I think there's been a pretty good vetting process of the criminal fraternity who were present in the baggage handling systems of some airports in New Zealand, those people have got old, and they've now gone.

"It's taken time. We've still got spasmodic crime, I'm not saying it's squeaky clean. We don't have the same issues [as Australia]."

The general manager of operations for Auckland Airport, David Hansen, says there is fairly extensive closed-circuit television coverage in the terminal. It's there mainly to keep an eye on passenger flow but does record other activity.

Since September 11, the level of awareness of security has heightened and the main access point to the tarmac, dubbed Checkpoint Charlie, has been made more secure. People are allowed to go airside only for specific employment-related tasks. "They're not allowed to go out there to meet an arriving friend, for instance," Hansen says.

Worldwide, security at airports is getting tighter and more rules are being introduced. "Security is a work in progress. It's like the police fighting crime.

"I guess the people who want to beat the system are looking for new ways to do it, and the people that are wanting to prevent it are always looking for new ways to stop this from happening," Hansen says.

Everett says Avsec has covert tools, which he won't name, that it can activate if it hears of crime at airports. "We might activate that at Wellington today for a couple of days because we think we've got a threat, and then we'll close it down again. We may do it New Zealand-wide. But we don't make a big issue about it."

Everitt gets annoyed when people conclude that security in New Zealand is lax because they don't see gun-toting guards "walking around like stormtroopers at airports and guns and tanks outside". Security goes much further than what is apparent. "Aviation security is about managing a big risk and there's lots of agreed protocols and procedures. We have as sophisticated procedures as MAF would have to deal with foot and mouth."

Security is enhanced or relaxed to meet the perceived level of threat at the time. Everitt says that threat level "has got to be" higher in America and Australia. "We're a totally different type of society in the way we feel about security and so therefore, as a practitioner of that, I have to be very mindful that security matches the culture of the country.

"I'm a believer in minimum intervention. I'm a believer in not taking knitting needles off little old ladies. We screen nearly 9 million people a year, that's twice the population of New Zealand."

With that volume of work, "you're not always going to get it right. Any system that you have is only as good as the people that work in it. I've realised after being in Avsec - and I was in the police for a long time before this - you can't please all the people all the time and you're not always going to get it right."

Protecting your luggage

1. Take valuables and fragile items as hand luggage. They're less likely to be stolen, lost or damaged. Air New Zealand says the following items should not be packed in checked baggage: cash; valuable documents; jewellery; antiques; fragile items; electrical or electronic equipment, including computers; tickets; passports; keys, wallets; medication; and cameras.
2. Tag/label luggage distinctively, inside and out.
3. Secure luggage with a combination lock or have it wrapped in plastic at the airport. Baggage Services, a shop on the ground floor of the Auckland Airport terminal offers a polythene-wrapping service. (Some destinations, including the United States, require that luggage is not locked.)
4. Keep a close eye - and hand - on your property at all times, especially in terminals where there are lots of people. Travel insurance does not cover you for loss of unattended property.
5. Check your luggage for damage/evidence of tampering while you're still at the airport, and lodge a claim immediately with the baggage services department if you find anything. It is extremely difficult to follow up missing items once you have left the airport. Airlines will not accept any liability for claims made after seven days.
6. Take out travel insurance, as airlines do not always accept liability for the full value of the passenger's claim.
* Tips from insurance underwriter IAG New Zealand, Air New Zealand and Auckland Airport