Journal Article

Risk-Based Policies for Airport Security Checkpoint Screening

Jacobson, Sheldon H., Lee, Adrian J., McLay, Laura A.

2010

Overview

Passenger screening is an important component of aviation security that incorporates real-time passenger screening strategies designed to maximize effectiveness in identifying potential terrorist attacks. This paper identifies a methodology that can be used to sequentially and optimally assign passengers to aviation security resources. An automated prescreening system determines passengers' perceived risk levels, which become known as passengers check in. The levels are available for determining security class assignments sequentially as passengers enter security screening. A passenger is then assigned to one of several available security classes, each of which corresponds to a particular set of screening devices. The objective is to use the passengers' perceived risk levels to determine the optimal policy for passenger screening assignments that maximize the expected total security, subject to capacity and assignment constraints. The sequential passenger assignment problem is formulated as a Markov decision process, and an optimal policy is found using dynamic programming. The general result from the sequential stochastic assignment problem is adapted to provide a heuristic for assigning passengers to security classes in real time. A condition is provided under which this heuristic yields the optimal policy. The model is illustrated with an example that incorporates data extracted from the Official Airline Guide (Official Airline Guide. 1998. OAG Business Travel Planner: North American Edition . Official Airline Guides, Bedfordshire, UK).

• Publisher: INFORMS,Transportation Science & Logistic Society of the Institute for Operations Research and Management Sciences,Transportation Science Section, Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences,Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences
• Subject: Aeronautics / Air transport / Air transportation and traffic / Air transportation facilities / Air travel / Airline passengers / Airline security / Airport security / Airports / Applied sciences / Assessed values / Assignment / Assignment problem / Aviation / Aviation safety / aviation security / Baggage screening / Buildings / Buildings. Public works / Business travel / Dynamic programming / Dynamische Optimierung / Exact sciences and technology / Ground, air and sea transportation, marine construction / Heuristic / Luftverkehrssicherheit / Luggage / Management / Markov analysis / Markov decision processes / Markov-Kette / Markovian processes / Optimal policy / Organizational effectiveness / Passenger screening / Passengers / Policy making / Prevention / Public facilities (municipal, law court, etc.) / Risk / Risk perception / Safety / Safety and security measures / Security / Security systems / sequential assignment problem / Sequentielle Entscheidung / Stochastic processes / Studies / Terrorism / Terrorists / Tests / Types of buildings