>>>
up.
>>>
we want to begin this morning with a sweeping review of
airline security
after a man tried to blow up a detroit-bound plane. after he managed to sneak explosives on to that flight. nbc's justice correspondent,
pete williams
, is at the
department of homeland security
, pete, good morning.
>>
reporter: as much as
airline security
has been tightened since 9/11, the latest attempt to bring explosives to try to bomb a plane bound for the u.s. demonstrates that determined terrorists are constantly looking for gaps to exploit. the obama administration is reviewing how a nigerian student, umar farouk abdulmutallab, got a explosives in his underwear on a christmas day flight.
>>
what we are looking at is literally how he got on the plane to make sure that security procedures were followed. and if they were follow, whether they need to be changed.
>>
the material made popping noises and caught fire, even burning a spot on the plane's inside wall. but it did not explode. widely-used walk-through screening devices cannot detect explosives. machines that use puffs of air can. but both are expensive and are deployed at only a few airports.
>>
while we've had many improvements in
airport security
,
explosive detection
is still a challenge. in this instance, the individual was able to hide the explosives in a way that evaded detection by
standard procedures
.
>>
the nigerian was also among a million names in a u.s. terrorism database after his father warned that the son was becoming radicalized. but the information was considered too vague to put him on the smaller, no-fly list. also being looked at, why it did not trigger greater concern that he apparently paid cash for his ticket and did not check any luggage, behavior that's often a
red flag
. over the weekend, police in london searched this highs-priced apartment where umar farouk abdulmutallab, who is 23, lived as a
college student
. he was a child of privilege, who attended private schools, but eventually went on his own to yemen. federal agents say he has told american authorities that radical extremists there prepared him for the airline bombing mission, a claim the u.s. has so far been unable to corroborate. and among new security measures, is this -- the government is now asking airlines on flights coming into the u.s., to stop showing those in-flight progress maps and individual tv screens seats, so that passengers will not be able to tell exactly where they are. meredith?
>>
pete williams
, thank you very much. there was a second
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