One passenger noticed at Geneva airport that a valuable item was missing from his luggage. On complaining, he received a reply from Celebi Ground Handling Hungary, which handles checked baggage at Budapest Airport. The letter claimed that all checked baggage at the airport was monitored continuously from the moment passengers handed their luggage over. The airport made a similar claim when we asked them about theft at the airport. Domokos Szollar, an airport spokesperson, said all items were tracked from the check-in desk to the aeroplane. From check-in to the x-ray machines, the baggage passes through a closed tunnel, until it reaches the sorting area, which is monitored via closed-circuit television. From there on, baggage is monitored with a handheld camera by an independent security official, meaning it would be too risky for baggage handlers to remove anything from the luggage. Of course, Szollar added, some thefts might occur.

They do. Last year, 280 crimes were detected at the airport, and more than a half involved property - and 90 per cent of these crimes were cases of theft, according to Andras Turos, head of the criminal department at the Airport Police. The items stolen are mostly cash, electronic devices, jewelry and tobacco. Last November, for example, 10,000 dollars were stolen from a bag. "Few passengers report the thefts," says Turos. "If 200 thefts are reported a year, then there must be around three times as many thefts in reality." Furthermore, other airports often do not report the thefts.

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It's not hard for the thieves. As soon as the luggage is aboard the plane, they have several opportunities to steal. Before the luggage arrives at sorting, it is scanned in an x-ray room. This is done by passenger security officers. Eight years ago, eight security officers were convicted of using the x-ray machines to identify promising items in the luggage, removing any items of interest before reclosing the suitcases. "Of course, this is in the past, and there are no thefts in the x-ray room any more," Turos says. But the police are aware that some security officials give tips to the baggage handlers.

The sorting room is monitored by cameras, but this need not be a problem for thieves, since cases are often so tall that they cover the camera lenses, an airport employee told hvg.hu. Finally, it is easy to remove items from luggage once it is in an aircraft's cargo hold. It is true that an independent security officer follows the baggage handlers with a handheld camera, but, whether by accident or design, the camera frequently fails to focus on the handlers. So it is little surprise that the recordings are often useless at precisely the moment when thefts take place.

One solution would be to install cameras in the cargo holds, but this would need the cooperation of the aircraft manufacturers and the aviation authorities. Admittedly, this approach has helped catch thieves before. In 1999, British Airways installed a camera in the cargo hold of an aircraft flying from Budapest to London. Police currently have only one option: to stand there watching the handlers as they work. At the end, they have the right to search the staff and to look inside their lockers. But the airport police have only 20 investigators meaning they can only adopt this approach during crackdowns - particularly around Christmas and Easter as well as during the summer tourist season. These are the periods when most thefts are reported.

It sounds astonishing, but there have been cases of staff stealing from hand baggage. Passengers are not told at check-in that their baggage is the wrong size - an issue on small aircraft in particular.

Only at boarding time, when passengers are waiting at the air bridge, are they informed that they cannot board with their hand baggage.

Then, a baggage handler takes the package saying they will put it in the cargo hold. On arrival, however, the passenger the bag does not arrive: the passenger loses his or her money and mobile phone. This is a real problem, to the extent that police have told check-in staff always to warn passengers if their hand baggage is outsized.

"Passengers should make sure they know what kind of aircraft they are travelling on before departing and also establish the maximum permitted size of hand baggage for that aircraft," Turos advises.

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Thieves sometimes hide the stolen goods. "They put them above false ceilings or in changing lockers, especially for smaller items, like cigarettes and cameras," Turos explains. There are about 30 cases a year of items left behind on the aircraft disappearing - presumably into the pockets of cleaners. "When they find something valuable, they hide it on the aircraft - in an air conditioning vent, for example.

They note the aircraft's registration number and only retrieve it once the plane has flown to another destination and returned," Turos says.

Once thieves have removed the items from the airport, they are passed to fences in neighbourhoods near the airport. At one point, police suspected a local jeweler of buying golden jewelry by the ounce.

Cargo also vanishes four or five times a year - sometimes at a cost of tens of millions of forints. The international logistics companies are most affected. Last summer, a consignment of laptops vanished. The driver bringing the laptops from Szekesfehervar stole them, entering the airport, but not unloading. He left along with the goods. Though he was caught, he continues to deny the crime. Two years ago, a group of handlers stole a Ft40m consignment of mobile handsets, which they removed using a forged letter of receipt. Aircraft fuel has also been stolen.

"There is a security dimension to these thefts," Turos says. "The criminals are vulnerable to blackmail, and terrorist organisations could exploit this. As soon as someone becomes the subject of an investigation, we revoke his access card." But what guarantee is there that baggage handlers will not place drugs or even explosives in a passenger's luggage? If they can take things out, they can put things in as well. But the police officer doubts there is real reason for concern. "A thief's interest is in carrying on stealing," he says.

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The 15-20,000 people who work at the airport are all subject to security screenings before they start work. Prior criminal histories are inspected, but individuals' environments are not examined, meaning that criminal connections are not revealed. Tarlos says airport workers have far more opportunities to commit crimes than workers at ordinary workplaces. "The airport occupies an enormous area and employees of dozens of companies can be working here at any one time.

It's confusing - nobody knows who anybody else is," he explains.

Though the number of crimes has fallen in recent years and the police solve more than half the crimes, Turos says the statistics might get worse this year. From January, the police will be taking over the border guards' work.

"Right now, we're drawing up a crime map of the airport, showing where crimes were committed, classifying them by airline and flight. We hope this will allow us to act in a more targeted way in the future and inform airports abroad if we suspect foreign involvement," he says, adding that they are devising a crime prevention programme which would involve airport security staff as well in the hope of cutting the numbers of thefts.

András Dezső