Capabilities of the checkpoint security machines are still shrouded in mystery
Despite claims by the TSA that electronic body scan images "cannot be stored or recorded," some federal police agencies are in fact saving tens of thousands of images, according to a report by CNET News.
The body scanners, increasingly found in airports, courthouses and other places where security is high, use an assortment of technologies. These include millimeter wave scanners (shown below) — in which the subject is harmlessly pelted with extremely high frequency radio waves which reflect a picture back to the device — and backscatter X-ray (shown above) — which measures low-powered reflective X-rays to produce clearer body shots, shots that can reveal alarmingly precise anatomical detail.According to CNET, the U.S. Marshals Service admitted this week that it had saved thousands of images that had been recorded from a security checkpoint in a Florida courthouse.
The revelation comes at a tense time. Two weeks ago, when Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said such scanners would appear in every major airport, privacy advocates such as the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington D.C. filed a lawsuit to stop the device rollout.
The reason? Because the devices were "designed and deployed in a way that allows the images to be routinely stored and recorded," EPIC executive director Marc Rotenberg told CNET, adding that this "is exactly what the Marshals Service is doing."
As CNET's Declan McCullagh explains, it's the mystery of the devices' potential that is most unnerving: "This trickle of disclosures about the true capabilities of body scanners — and how they're being used in practice — is probably what alarms privacy advocates more than anything else," he wrote.
The TSA maintains that body scanning is "constitutional" and the CNET report notes that while the machines are built to "allow exporting of image data in real time" and provide networked "high-speed transfer of image data," the system are built with filters to "protect the identity, modesty, and privacy of the passenger."
7/17/10 New body-scanner software to show only stick figures
Boston's Logan International Airport hopes to be the first airport in the country to get new software that should eliminate privacy concerns over full-body scanners at security checkpoints.
The software would produce stick-figure images of passengers instead of the more revealing images currently viewed by operators at remote stations.
The software would detect suspicious objects on passengers that require further attention - such as possible weapons or explosives - allowing Transportation Security Administration screeners and explosive weapons specialists to hone in on them and determine whether they pose a danger.
6/29/10 Airport body scanners deliver radiation dose 20 times higher than first thought, warns expert:
June 29, 2010 Airport body scanners deliver radiation dose 20 times higher than first thought, warns expert 30 Jun 2010 Full body scanners at airports could increase your risk of skin cancer, experts warn. The X-ray machines have been brought in at Manchester, Gatwick and Heathrow. Scientists say that the low level beam does deliver a small dose of radiation to the body but because the beam concentrates on the skin - one of the most radiation-sensitive organs of the human body - that dose may be up to 20 times higher than first estimated.
1/11/10 Airport Scanners Save and Transmit Scanners, ordered by TSA
Better airport security in Israel
1/5/10 Updates re: Scanner Scam
http://www.thestar.com/iphone/news/world/article/744199---israelification-high-security-little-bother
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/01/airport-scanner-scam
1/3/10 - "Body scanner wouldn't have foiled syringe bomber, says MP who worked on new machines" Read complete article
T-Waves: A new model of the way the THz waves interact with DNA explains how the damage is done...
" Drawing on sources like The Mayo Clinic and The Radiological Society of North America as well as interviews with prominent radiologists, molecular biologists, and medical doctors, ionizing (penetrating) radiation in any dose, no matter how tiny, causes genetic mutations, which set all living cells exposed on the path to cancer. X-rays are considered ionizing radiation." Read complete article
12/29/09 - While India rejected airport sreening in the past, the Netherlands has adopted the process for flights to the US. As this happens people wonder if there is anyone in charge at TSA and/or DHS ( a department we could rightfully have done without and one that now should be abandoned - think of all the trillions we'd save ) and Obama says no one at DHS is doing thier job.
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This was originally Posted in 2006, based on 2005 reports, but seems to be current discussions, and needs to be considered by those who have concerns about their health.
10 second exposure with backscatter=2 minutes in cabin radiation exposure.
FMI: Whole Body Imaging Technology, see what the x-ray machine sees.
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from repost in 10/2008:
At the same time as the US Homeland Security Department is pushing for airport x-ray machines that expose your privacy, Germany is calling a halt to this non-sense.
Probably it is worth your consideration to consider using some protective measures and to help clear the radiation exposure effects (iodine, kelp baths, our bath salt blend for chemo/radiation patients) if you're planning to travel by air.
Germany says full-body airport scanner "nonsense"
BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany will not participate in EU proposals for airports to use full-body scanner security checks, which have raised privacy issues, its interior ministry said on Friday.
"I can tell you in all clarity that we will not take part in this nonsense," a spokeswoman for the interior ministry told a regular news conference.
The executive European Commission proposed last month to add body scanners to a list of security measures that can be used at airports in the 27-country bloc.
EU lawmakers criticized the scanners in a resolution on Thursday, saying they were equivalent to "a virtual strip search" and raised serious human rights concerns. The lawmakers called for a detailed study of the technology before it is used.
The Commission says a number of EU states including the Netherlands already use body scanners and the EU executive wanted to harmonize conditions in which they can be operated.
The scanners do not exist at German airports and have sparked vivid criticism by politicians across the political spectrum.
(Reporting by Kerstin Gehmlich; Editing by Matthew Jones)
This was posted in 2006. I've noticed a number of inquiries on the topic of airport x-rays, so I am posting it again.So you plan to take an airplane trip in the future you say. Well now that the illustrious Department of Homeland Security is going to force you to be X-rayed, what is it that they have told you about the cumulative effects of exposure to gamma radiation in their so-called 'security" screener?
How much more cancer risk do you need? And just what long term studies have been done, especially when considering frequent flyer risk.
I guess I would want more data.LOS ANGELES (Dec. 20) - A woman mistakenly put her 1-month-old grandson through an X-ray machine at Los Angeles International Airport, authorities said.
Security stations at Los Angeles International Airport Damian Dovarganes, AP
A woman mistakenly put her infant grandson through a security X-ray at Los Angeles International Airport Saturday. Doctors said the 1-month-old did not receive a dangerous dose of radiation.
A startled security worker noticed the shape of a child on the carry-on baggage screening monitor and immediately pulled him out, the Los Angeles Times reported for a story in Wednesday's editions.
The infant was taken to a local hospital, where doctors determined he did not receive a dangerous dose of radiation.
"This was an innocent mistake by an obviously inexperienced traveler," said Paul Haney, deputy executive director of airports and security for the city's airport agency.
The incident happened early Saturday, airport officials said.
Haney said in 1988, an infant in a car seat went through an X-ray machine at the Los Angeles airport.
Copyright 2006 The Associated Press.
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