The first techno-savvy air travelers to carry with them Apple's new MacBook Air laptop learned the hard way that new and innocuous technology can trigger alarms and fears on the part of technologically uninformed Transportation Security Administration (TSA) screeners.

CNet News.com asked, if "MacBook Air puzzles TSA, what might be next?"

Flyers carrying the new MacBook recently found some TSA screeners who were unaware of the ultra-thin computer found it threatening.

Programmer Michael Nygard said on his blog that he was held up as security staff gathered around his MacBook Air, one of whom allegedly remarked that its lack of standard features was cause for alarm.

In response to the growing complaints, a veteran, seasoned TSA supervisor at the Cincinnati-Northern Kentucky International Airport put the MacBook Air through an X-ray scanner and found that it “does look completely different than your typical laptop or DVD player. I can't get into specifics of course, but there were a couple of areas on the X-ray that could pique some interest for Transportation Security Officers,” he said.

Consequently, a memo about Apple’s new manilla envelope-size laptop was distributed to TSA’s screener and training workforce.

Responding to the memo, one reader commented that “the bigger question remains, however: Why would a screener make a passenger miss his flight simply because of something they hadn't seen before? Wouldn't a simple explosives residue test put the issue to rest?

“It's absurd to make a passenger turn a device on - it doesn't prove a device isn’t explosive ....

“The problem here isn't the Macbook Air - it's the notion that anything unexpected is perceived as a threat … Are we expected to know which computer models TSA screeners have received x-rays of before we fly?”

To TSA's credit, it moved quickly to notify screeners that the MacBook Air is not a security threat. Nevertheless, the problem highlights future potential problems the likes of which CNet News.com raised questions about. And that is, new and unusual technologies carried by flyers which screeners are not familiar with will likely continue to set off alarms - sometimes no doubt deservedly. But how will such incidents be resolved quickly with security in mind and without unduly delaying flyers?

For example, would Transportation Security Officers let Dr. Maurice Goldman fly with sales samples of Inferno, the next-generation sound alarm his company manufactures. The device looks like a small surround-sound stereo speaker but will stop cold anyone within range by bombarding them with a deafening, unbearable sound – I know, I heard it. And all it takes to activate is a small 12-volt Ni-MH battery and a key-chain remote control.

But in the hands of someone bent on evil-doing, how would screeners know the device isn't a stereo speaker? 

Clearly, TSA is faced with a conundrum. The MacBook Air situation has raised an obvious but relatively overlooked security problem that will, undoubtedly as time goes on, require well thought out policies, procedures, and training.