20 Worst Airports for TSA Thefts

Caroline Morse Teel is the Managing Editor for SmarterTravel Media. Follow her on Instagram @TravelWithCaroline.

Caroline joined Boston-based SmarterTravel in 2011 after living in Ireland, London, and Manhattan. She's traveled to all seven continents, jumped out of planes, and bungeed off bridges in the pursuit of a good story. She loves exploring off-the-beaten path destinations, anything outdoorsy, and all things adventure.

Her stories have also appeared online at USA Today, Business Insider, Huffington Post, Yahoo, Boston.com, TripAdvisor, Buzzfeed, Jetsetter, Oyster, Airfarewatchdog, and others.

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Flying through one of these major airports? You might want to keep your valuables with you at all times, as a list detailing the airports with the most dishonest TSA agents has been released.

ABC News made a Freedom of Information Act request for statistics on TSA agents fired for theft, and found that America’s busiest airports are also where the TSA agents are most busy (busy stealing).

Number one on the dubious list is Miami International Airport, where 29 employees were fired for theft from 2002 through 2011. New York’s JFK International is a close second with 27, followed by Los Angeles International. Click here to see the full list on ABC.

It’s not all bad news, though! ABC News also conducted a sting at major airports, in which they purposely left behind iPads at security checkpoints, to see if any would be stolen. Out of the 10 iPads left, nine were returned to ABC, and only one was stolen. The stolen iPad was tracked to the home of the TSA officer who had been working the Orlando airport checkpoint where the device was left, and the worker was subsequently fired.

Are you surprised by which airports were (or weren’t) on the list? Tell us in the comments!

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