CNN was given exclusive access to one of those, Miami International Airport, and on a recent afternoon, employees lined up at a checkpoint where they passed through a metal detector as they reported to work.
They gathered their belongings, swiped their badges and opened a door that leads down to the airport’s secure ramp area.
“One of the greatest vulnerabilities for this airport and probably any other major airport like MIA is the insider threat,” Lauren Stover, the airport’s security director told CNN.
Miami has four checkpoints for employee screening, five vehicle access gates manned by airport workers, random background checks of employees and a mandatory security awareness class for all employees among a myriad of other security measures.
The only other major airport that conducts full employee screenings is Orlando, Florida, according to interviews with aviation officials.
No federal rules for employees
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The TSA identified workers with access to secure areas of airports as one of the greatest potential threats to aviation, according to a 2009 report by the Government Accountability Office.
The report said costs for full screening of airport and airline employees could range from $5.7 billion to $14.9 billion for the first year of implementation. The entire TSA budget for 2015 is $7.3 billion.
Wayne Black, a Miami-based security expert told CNN, “We have a saying in our business: Budget driven security will always fail.
“You don’t have to be a security expert — a fifth-grader can tell you if you are checking at the top end, at the front end of the airport, you’ve got to be checking the back end of the airport,” he said.
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