Airport Security in New York and LA can see right through your clothes with “virtual strip searches”

Posted on Saturday, April 19th, 2008 at 7:17 am
Filed under: General Talk, Tech Talk, Why Everybody Sucks
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Imagine that airport security could see right through your clothes… Well the technology already exists and it is coming to New York and Los Angeles. Airports in New York and Los Angeles are now equipped with body scanners that allow security screeners to see concealed weapons and other items that may be hidden beneath clothes.

The machines, which are about the size of a revolving door, use low-energy electromagnetic waves to produce a computerised image of a traveller’s entire body. Passengers step in and lift their arms. The scans only take a minute, and Transportation Security Administration officials say the procedure is less invasive than a physical frisk for knives, bombs or guns. The machines are are known as “millimetre wave” scans.

The plan is that, someday, the “millimetre wave” scans might replace metal detectors. The black and white, three-dimensional scans aren’t as vivid as a photograph, but they do reveal some of the more intimate curves of the human form.

TSA officials say the system comes with privacy protections. Officers reviewing the images don’t interact with passengers, or even see them. They sit in a separate area, look at the pictures on a monitor and push a button to either clear travellers or alert security about a suspicious item. They also claim that the images taken by the scanner will not be recored or stored.

For the moment, the scans will also be voluntary. Flyers selected for a secondary screening after passing through the metal detectors will have the option of stepping into the wave scanner, rather than undergoing a physical pat-down.



The TSA said millimetre wave scanners, which cost as much as $US120,000 apiece, are already in limited use at international airports in seven countries and at a handful of courthouses and jails in five states. Their introduction to US airports is on a trial basis while authorities evaluate their effectiveness. The TSA said the devices pose no health risk and project 10,000 times less energy than a mobile phone transmission.

Source: AP
Image Source: AFP

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