4um: Is Star Simpson's "fake bomb" just an art jacket?

Star Simpson, a 19-year-old MIT student, was arrested at gunpoint Friday morning at Boston's Logan Airport when officers suspected that a circuit board and battery she had pinned to her sweatshirt was a bomb. Indeed, every news outlet is now referring to the thing as a "fake bomb," and Simpson has been charged with possessing a "hoax device."

But pictures of the sweatshirt that officials are putting out show something quite less scary -- I have no idea what a real bomb looks like, but I don't think it's a plastic board with a 9-volt battery on it. Simpson's explanation is that the jacket was a wearable-art project she made so she could stand out at her school's career day (the plastic board lights up). All information now streaming in supports that view, and suggests that the affair could have been a misunderstanding, one that very nearly turned tragic.

This is my speculation only, but it seems quite possible that rather than intending to deliberately walk into Logan with a fake bomb, Simpson might instead have rolled out of bed with an art jacket she often wore around campus and slipped it on in a rush on her way to pick up a friend -- forgetting that she was heading into the all-fear-all-the-time black hole that is U.S. aviation.

What's the evidence for this? For one thing, as Xeni Jardin points out in Boing Boing's marvelous roundup on the story, Simpson is much into making cool, out-there techie stuff, things like a jacket that lights up. Her own Web site is currently offline -- click here later -- but you can check out some of Simpson's handiwork at her Instructables profile and look here for one of her recent school projects.

In a sentence, I'm an inventor, artist, engineer, and student, I love to build things and I love crazy ideas.

In a paragraph; I'm currently studying computers and how they work at MIT. I play at a student-run machine shop called MITERS. Before that, I lived for a long time in Hawaii, while traveling the world and saving the planet from evil villains with my delivered-just-in-time gadgets.

A woman from http://Instructables.com who knows Simpson tells Boing Boing that Simpson's friends at MIT "say she wears the hoodie on a regular basis -- it's just unfortunate that she had it on while trying to pick a friend up at the airport. MIT students don't really do mornings, or worry about what they're wearing, so I can't imagine she'd even think about her clothes before heading out to pick up a friend at the airport before 8 a.m."

Cops are pointing darkly to strange text scrawled on the jacket -- "Socket To Me / COURSE VI." Guess what, "Course VI" is a reference to MIT's electrical engineering course, not an al-Qaida code name.

WBZ-TV has posted a video of Simpson being arraigned this morning. The student looks in good spirits despite what must have been a nightmare of a morning. She pleaded not guilty and was let free on $750 bail, but if convicted of the charges she could face up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

It could have been much, much worse. In a press conference state police Maj. Scott Pare said that Simpson is "extremely lucky she followed the instructions or deadly force would have been used. She's lucky to be in a cell as opposed to the morgue."

Damn. Had it not been for the six years we've already lived through irrational, useless, annoying, psychologically defeating overeager airport security -- put in place to prevent an event that could have been solved by a single measure, locking the cockpit doors -- the prospect of a promising young student being killed by cops for wearing a battery on her back might come as a shock.

But now it elicits almost no surprise. What, police at a major airport were about to kill someone for the crime of wearing a circuit board? Yeah, what else is new.

Short version: it wasn't a "fake bomb" at all, it was a wearable tech jacket on the body of a friendly young technologist who would have been *way* better off wearing something else to the airport today. Authorities in Massachussetts who've been accused of overreacting to tech art misunderstandings before -- remember the Mooninite Menace? -- are throwing the book at her.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

A 19 year old female M.I.T. student was arrested at gunpoint after entering Boston's Logan International Airport with what authorities claim was "a fake bomb" strapped to her chest, according to wire reports. The device is said to have been some kind of computer circuit board with Play-Doh and wires attached, strapped over her black hoodie. Link to AP report on her arrest.

The young woman is identified as Star Simpson, shown in the image above left, and she is a sophomore from Hawaii.

Here is her MIT website, here's her homepage, here's one of her recent projects. She has a user account on Instructables.

Snip from her vanity site:

In a sentence, I'm an inventor, artist, engineer, and student, I love to build things and I love crazy ideas.

In a paragraph; I'm currently studying computers and how they work at MIT. I play at a student-run machine shop called MITERS. Before that, I lived for a long time in Hawaii, while traveling the world and saving the planet from evil villains with my delivered-just-in-time gadgets.

This being Boston, I'll be interested to learn whether this was a legitimate threat or a misunderstanding/overreaction by authorities, combined with poor fashion judgement on the young lady's part.

Here's a happy-fun quote from the AP item:

She's extremely lucky she followed the instructions or deadly force would have been used," Pare told The Associated Press. "And she's lucky to be in a cell as opposed to the morgue."

Image of the lovely and talented (seriously!) Ms. Simpson on a better day, with torch and mirror, from this photoset of MIT tinkerers at the MITERS student-run machine shop, shot by George Lange.

Update: Law enforcement spokesperson at press conference being broadcast on CNN right now -- "She said it was a piece of art, and wanted to stand out on career day. I'm not sure why she had the Play Doh on her hands. She couldn't explain that.... there were wires attached to a battery that actually lit up... I'm shocked and appalled that somebody would wear such a device to the airport. We had someone with a submachine gun at the airport go right to the scene."

Update 2: Deja duh: Boston Globe referring to this incident as "Logan Hoax Arrest." And here's a photo of that gun.

Update 3: They're showing the LED hoodie on CNN right now (screengrab from a local TV report below).

Looks like the "improvised electronic device" consisted of a circuit board and a common battery that caused her sweatshirt, which had painted writing on it, to light up. Authorities referred to the paint as "putty."

The hoodie reads "Socket To Me / COURSE VI." A BB commenter familiar with MIT stuff says, "Course VI means she majors in Electrical Engineering / Computer Science."

Sheesh! Someone needs to not let these hyperintelligent hacker chirren out of the house wearing this kind of stuff when they're headed to airports in Boston. {shakes head}. Poor thing.

Update 4: She's being charged with "posession of a hoax device" (again with the hoax devices!) and disorderly conduct. But on the plus side, she's not dead.

Update 5: BB Discussions moderator Teresa Nielsen Hayden puts it in context. And the winner of the comment thread is BB reader Rob Cockerham:

I can't believe NBC is promoting Bionic Woman like this. What a terrible idea.

Update 6: Christy from http://Instructables.com (Simpson is a regular participant on the site) says:

Star was an intern at Squid Labs this summer, and is an all-around awesome geek who loves to build things. FYI, friends at MIT say she wears the hoodie on a regular basis- it's just unfortunate that she had it on while trying to pick a friend up at the airport. MIT students don't really do mornings, or worry about what they're wearing, so I can't imagine she'd even think about her clothes before heading out to pick up a friend at the airport before 8am.
When Star gets out we'll have her do an Instructable on
1) how to get arrested at the airport without being shot, and
2) how to package your homemade electronics to look purchased.

Maybe BB and Instructables should start handing out some official-looking stickers and plastic covers to make breadboards look more commercial -- it will keep our readers away from automatic weapons.
I just put up a forum post on Instructables asking for design suggestions. If BB readers have any suggestions, just send them over and we'll print them up asap!

Update 7: Christy from http://Instructables.com says (1125am PT),

I talked to Star briefly -- she's out on bail, is just fine, and thinks the whole thing is crazy.

Of course, they've impounded her sweatshirt, so she's got to do something else for Career Day.

Update 8: Bruce Schneier: "Definitely stupid police overreaction. Refuse to be terrorized, people!"

And Chris Anderson, who, apart from being Editor in Chief at Wired Magazine is also a total UAV nerd, says:

Sorry to be late chiming in with support for Star, but I can confirm that she's a world-class geek and otherwise cool person. While she was at SquidLabs this summer, she helped with our UAV testing. Cracked one of the imaging problems, too. Really sorry to see the lapse of judgment that led to this arrest, but I'm sure she's got a glorious career ahead of her regardless.

Update 9: BB reader Sujal Shah says,

One clarification: Simpson did answer the original information desk staffer's question about what the art was. That there's no step between an answer that wasn't believed and guns drawn is a big issue to me. Innocent people will get killed this way.

Here's the post I left on Schneiers blog:

Just so we're all clear on this, she DID ANSWER the desk staffer who asked her what the contraption on her sweatshirt was. She responded that it was art. Link to local TV account. The employee had to repeat the question before she got an answer. This bit of info was missing in the original AP version, which made it sound like she refused to answer what the device was.

I don't know. I think Boston cops don't like art students for some reason. My local patriotism has nothing to do with local government, which I despise almost as much as I do the feds.

I am so sick of this shit. We've become a nation of goose-stepping WIMPS. Like a terrorist is going to go through security with a visible bomb.

A LONG time ago, I wrote an article that some obscure publication published about the great peaking wave of stupidity that was washing over our nation. At that time, I pointed to a presidential candidate, knowing photographers were stalking him, sailing off with his bimbo to an island tryst on a boat named MONKEY BUSINESS. And letting his picture be taken.

Gary Hart has evidently recovered some of the sense that he was born with, but the country is getting dumber and dumber. A bunch of fanatics get lucky, kill 3,000 people, and we just drop-kick our constitution into the ocean because we're sooooooo afraaaaaid. Buncha stupid Nazi-food, that's our population.

"First they ignore you. Then they ridicule you. Then they fight you. Then you win." --Mahatma Gandhi

I'm shocked at the number of citizens who think she was at fault, and if she'd been shot, well, that's what you get for wearing something to an airport that someone - anyone - can think is a bomb.

Yeah. Three thousand people get killed, and a bunch of fanatics in caves get blamed for it, THEN the constitution is used as toilet paper by the government.

I don't do airports. I'll drive across country in my Chevy Cavalier before I ever get on a plane again.

"He is a very shallow critic who cannot see an eternal rebel in the heart of a conservative." - G.K. Chesterton

To reason, indeed, he was not in the habit of attending. His mode of arguing, if it is to be so called, was one not uncommon among dull and stubborn persons, who are accustomed to be surrounded by their inferiors. He asserted a proposition; and, as often as wiser people ventured respectfully to show that it was erroneous, he asserted it again, in exactly the same words, and conceived that, by doing so, he at once disposed of all objections. - Macaulay, "History of England," Vol. 1, Chapter 6, on James II.