That is what a UK counter-terrorism expert thinks:

Police should not focus on skin colour or religion when profiling for stop-and-searches as there is ‘no single terrorist profile’, a senior counter-terrorism officer said today.

John Yates, Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner for Specialist Operations, said police need to take a ‘flexible and dynamic’ approach to profiling in order to stop suspected terrorists

He warned that al Qaida regularly changed tactics to keep a step ahead and called for security staff to use their experience to apply stop-and-search powers ‘sensitively’.

He said the failed Detroit plane plot at Christmas had reopened the debate on ‘profiling’, which he labelled an ‘ugly’ word.

Yates goes on to recommend a quota system for airport searches: for every bearded Muslim questioned, three white little old ladies must be strip-searched. In this way, the world will be kept safe from the horror of ugly words.