10 airports install body scanners

[Raineyrocks]

I'm not sure if this was already posted, sorry if it was.



http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20080606/a_bodyscan06.art.htm


10 airports install body scanners
Devices can peer under passengers' clothes

By Thomas Frank
USA TODAY

BALTIMORE — Body-scanning machines that show images of people underneath their clothing are being installed in 10 of the nation's busiest airports in one of the biggest public uses of security devices that reveal intimate body parts.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) recently started using body scans on randomly chosen passengers in Los Angeles, Baltimore, Denver, Albuquerque and at New York's Kennedy airport.

Airports in Dallas, Detroit, Las Vegas and Miami will be added this month. Reagan National Airport in Washington starts using a body scanner today. A total of 38 machines will be in use within weeks.

"It's the wave of the future," said James Schear, the TSA security director at Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, where two body scanners are in use at one checkpoint.

Schear said the scanners could eventually replace metal detectors at the nation's 2,000 airport checkpoints and the pat-downs done on passengers who need extra screening. "We're just scratching the surface of what we can do with whole-body imaging," Schear said.

The TSA effort could encourage scanners' use in rail stations, arenas and office buildings, the American Civil Liberties Union said. "This may well set a precedent that others will follow," said Barry Steinhardt, head of the ACLU technology project.

Scanners are used in a few courthouses, jails and U.S. embassies, as well as overseas border crossings, military checkpoints and some foreign airports such as Amsterdam's Schiphol.

The scanners bounce harmless "millimeter waves" off passengers who are selected to stand inside a portal with arms raised after clearing the metal detector. A TSA screener in a nearby room views the black-and-white image and looks for objects on a screen that are shaded differently from the body. Finding a suspicious object, a screener radios a colleague at the checkpoint to search the passenger.

The TSA says it protects privacy by blurring passengers' faces and deleting images right after viewing. Yet the images are detailed, clearly showing a person's gender. "You can actually see the sweat on someone's back," Schear said.

The scanners aim to strengthen airport security by spotting plastic and ceramic weapons and explosives that evade metal detectors and are the biggest threat to aviation. Government audits have found that screeners miss a large number of weapons, bombs and bomb parts such as wires and timers that agents sneak through checkpoints.

"I'm delighted by this development," said Clark Kent Ervin, the former Homeland Security inspector general whose reports urged the use of body scanners. "This really is the ultimate answer to increasing screeners' ability to spot concealed weapons."

The scanners do a good job seeing under clothing but cannot see through plastic or rubber materials that resemble skin, said Peter Siegel, a senior scientist at the California Institute of Technology.

"You probably could find very common materials that you could wrap around you that would effectively obscure things," Siegel said.

Passengers who went through a scanner at the Baltimore airport last week were intrigued, reassured and occasionally wary. The process took about 30 seconds on average.

Stepping into the 9-foot-tall glass booth, Eileen Reardon of Baltimore looked startled when an electronic glass door slid around the outside of the machine to create the image of her body. "Some of this stuff seems a little crazy," Reardon said, "but in this day and age, you have to go along with it."

Scott Shafer of Phoenix didn't mind a screener looking at him underneath his shorts and polo shirt from a nearby room. The door is kept shut and blocked with floor screens. "I don't know that person back there. I'll never seem them," Shafer said. "Everything personal is taken out of the equation."

Steinhardt of the ACLU said passengers would be alarmed if they saw the image of their body. "It all seems very clinical and non-threatening — you go through this portal and don't have any idea what's at the other end," he said.

Passengers scanned in Baltimore said they did not know what the scanner did and were not told why they were directed into the booth.

Magazine-size signs are posted around the checkpoint explaining the scanners, but passengers said they did not notice them.

Darin Scott of Miami was annoyed by the process.

"If you don't ask questions, they don't tell you anything," Scott said. When he asked a screener technical questions about the scanner, "he could not answer," Scott said.

TSA spokeswoman Sterling Payne said the agency is studying passenger reaction and could "get more creative" about informing passengers. "If passengers have questions," she said, "they need to ask the questions."

Passengers can decline to go through a scanner, but they will face a pat-down.

Schear, the Baltimore security director, said only 4% of passengers decline.

In Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, where scanners have been tested since last year as an alternative to pat-downs, 90% of passengers choose to be scanned, the TSA says.

"Most passengers don't think it's any big deal," Schear said. "They think it's a piece of security they're willing to do."
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[K. Darien Freeheart]

This has been discussed. I don't post this to correct you, but on the other thread I linked an image of what the body scans look like.

http://nhunderground.com/forum/index.php?topic=14334.0

Put bluntly, as a male semi-nudist the issue I have with the body scanning is that it's government. If this was opted for by the airline to protect their customers and planes, I'd personally have no problem going through them. It's a government mandate that upsets me pertaining to myself.

As a married man, who's wife isn't a semi-nudist, it upsets the hell out of me. My wife is flying out of Reagen tomorrow and I think Reagan has those.

[JJ]

Stepping into the 9-foot-tall glass booth, Eileen Reardon of Baltimore looked startled when an electronic glass door slid around the outside of the machine to create the image of her body. "Some of this stuff seems a little crazy," Reardon said, "but in this day and age, you have to go along with it."

"Most passengers don't think it's any big deal," Schear said. "They think it's a piece of security they're willing to do."

Gaze upon the root of this geographical land mass' (a.k.a. nation) problems.  Not government, not politicians, not the obligatory use of force but rather the speed at which people will capitulate and the overall lack of a backbone regarding intrusive regulations.  The root of the problem lies within the residents of this land.

[K. Darien Freeheart]

The root of the problem lies within the residents of this land.

I can't agree more. I was chatting with someone I considered a friend about why I don't like flying. She's pretty open minded, of the liberal persuasion (as I used to be) and has for the past, say, 5 months getting involved in discussions of liberty and personal empowerment. I mentioned that as of June 21st, the ability to fly as a selectee was eliminated.

She was confused.

When I explained to her that as of the 21st everybody on a plane must identify themselves, she actually began crying. She didn't realize that between 9/11/01 and 6/2/08 it was possible to get on a plane without ID. The idea that this could happen literally scared her to tears.

This launched a decent discussion about personal choice, competition in the marketplace and a bunch of related topics, including TSA abuses like the holocaust survivor being attacked, detainments for wearing iPods or having a modern laptop. I then read off a list of things that the TSA was allowed to do and closed it with the ominous "other measures" and left a very stong implication of cavity searches.

This is the point where she kind of snapped. I'm honestly still kind of coping with this, because I truly did consider this person an open minded friend and now I'm not sure I want to associate with her and I'm sure she's not open minded.

"I understand that I'm unlikely to be harmed in a terrorist attack. I understand that flying is one of the safest ways to travel. It's not about being safe, it's about feeling safe. I understand I am safe when I fly, but I FEEL safe when I walk through a scanner. I even understand that there are people being abused, even raped by the TSA during those checks, but as you say, those are statistical blips. Knowing all of this, I still would rather have that we have today because it makes me feel safe."

She wouldn't answer at what point would be too big of a cost. I explained that for me, if ANYONE is allowed to be butt plugged during a screening, it means it CAN be done to me, so it's too far. That's why I object to those things, because "it's not me" isn't enough. I even tossed that out and even with the possible answer "When it happens to me" she couldn't answer when it would be enough for her.

I'm not sure if it's my "sales technique" for lack of a better term, or if the number of people actually WILLING to use violence to shape their world is that larger, but it's frightening and depressing and makes it more damn evident that I need to get the hell out of here.

[Russell Kanning]

very sad that people feel that way
she FEELS safer ... and abuses are blips
when the next "terrorist attack" happens ... I guess she will put up with more abuse.

[kola]

I wonder about safety (rad exposure) issues, especially for the folks who fly quite often.

Kola

[Russell Kanning]

this might lead to another airport sign along with dada's
"report tsa abuses here" sign

how about a sign with one of those bodyscan pictures on it with a good caption?