Max_cont...
Great Questions...nail on the head.
Pilots being removed from the front are strictly a cost saving measure. Nothing more. It does nothing to improve safety. It does nothing to improve security on airliners. And do you think that the average person wants to be transported across any ocean at 35000 feet with no driver? Before we see this happening, and I am not saying it won't, we will see a pilotless USAF that has operated these pilotless aircraft for many years, in all areas from combat missions, to routine supply flights on A/C like the C-17, or the C-5, (I am sure these birds will be long retired, and replaced with newer A/C), before it is applied to civilian transport.
As for this anti terrorist system? At what cost? And, as automation has proven, over and over again, (Airbus), systems are flawed, prone to error, and cannot be relied upon, without the Human brain Mk. 1 sitting in the front seat.
One more thing, the human brain thinks at around 500 wpm, and we speak at around 150 wpm. A computer thinks at millions of words a minute and speaks at around the same, millions of words a minute. Who won the race, the tortoise or the hare.
Slowly does it every time.