JFK, LAX To Test Millimeter-Wave Scanners 235
Narrative Fallacy writes "The Transportation Security Administration has announced that it's beginning pilot tests of millimeter wave scanning technology at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) and John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) that allow TSA personnel to see concealed weapons and other items that may be hidden beneath clothes. TSA Administrator Kip Hawley says that that the potentially revealing body scans (YouTube) would not be stored and that 90% of passengers subject to secondary screening opt for a millimeter wave scan over a pat-down. The agency added that security officers viewing the scans would do so remotely, where they will not be able to recognize passengers but will be able to trigger an alarm if needed. The agency also said that a blurring algorithm is applied to passengers' faces in scanned images as an additional privacy protection."
Just a Matter of Time... (Score:5, Insightful)
bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
How many of those people actually were aware of the pat-down option? I bet it was not 100%. Also, given the fact that even Medical information cannot be reliably kept confidential in most cases, I sincerely doubt this data will. Unless there are strong prison sentences for any employee convicted of disseminating this information, I am not impressed with their statements of security, confidentiality, or purported privacy.
Uh huh. I feel so much better that the pervert checking out my junk is out of sight. Yeah, much better. Ohhh, but I do agree that the blurred faces give additional illusions of privacy. I am certain that all the women feel better that we men aren't looking at their faces.
Re:bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
Really, what is the paranoia of the human body? Who gives a shit if someone see's my penis, if its a guy they have one of similar design in their pants too...
Re:Option to opt-out (Score:5, Insightful)
People are often afraid of challenging any sort of authority these days - for fear of reprisal. That's unacceptable. You shouldn't be afraid to ask questions, and shouldn't be labeled a terrorist for doing so either!
MadCow.
Think of the children... (Score:2, Insightful)
Tell me next time when there is kiddie porn leaked from the video feed of scanner like this.
I'm looking for blurs... (Score:2, Insightful)
Good thing I remember
Re:Option to opt-out (Score:1, Insightful)
Sounds expensive (Score:3, Insightful)
The homeland security folks have had a blank cheque to pay for whatever cool toys they want for far too long.
Air travel is expensive enough as it is, and considering just how rarely I do it, the taxpayer subsidies are sickening as well.
Re:bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
My neighbor has a a beautiful wife with the same similar design as my wife.. or even my mother. Does that mean that she (or her husband for that matter!) would feel comfortable showing her details to others? (nudists are considered an exception here).
Or what about the idea of your wonderful teenage daughter being selected for a scan time after time again?!? Would you 'give a shit' in that case?
It's not even directly a Puritan thing I guess.. more just a sense of 'personal privacy' that you just don't want to give away easily.
Adding to that: there's a difference between taking of your clothes for ones general practitioner, who is under OATH to keep things secret, and getting naked for some random security dude.
The later group is faarrr more like to e.g. video tape things and put it on YouTube. They did not have to study for many, many years for a job.
Heck, if they screw up, they can just continue elsewhere. If a GP messes up, he can basically forget ever doing that work again.
Re:Boarding pass check (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Option to opt-out (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
Considering I, like most people...
A) Don't collect Social Security, and have made alternative plans for retirement since SS will be gone by the time I'm 67 (my full-SS retirement age, a whole 42 years from now).
B) Don't utilize government healthcare. Medicare is a farse that will not last until I'm old and gray.
C) I purchased my own house with money I collected working a job, something a growing number of people seem unwilling to do. I also purchase my food with the same money.
D) I went to a private elementary and middle school, then sat bored through 3 years of high school before finally receiving something resembling new material. I went to a local community college for college (where I now work), and will have my BS from a private university early next month.
No, I will NOT trust the government. Trust, like respect, is EARNED, not given. The government, in its current form, has done nothing to earn my trust in any way. In fact, Bush and his cronies have done everything in their power to undermine any trust I may have had prior to the start of his dictat...errr...Presidency.
The TSA has proven, time and again, its incompetence and inability to utilize oversight on its employees and practices. I see no reason to trust them that privacy will be maintained in this instance either.
That being said, I'd still rather be screened visually then have some gay porn star feeling me up in an open glass tube. That may work for some people, but I'm not that kind of a person.
Re:Option to opt-out (Score:3, Insightful)
Everyone needs to be making MUCH more fuss. This has got to stop. Even if you believe in the terrorists under the bed nonsense, you have to understand that by allowing security checks etc like this then the terrorists have won without lifting a single finger.
It's probably already too late to reverse most of the harm done by the Bush and Blair/Brown regimes, however that doesn't mean that every thinking person should not be trying to do just that. It's got to stop.
Metal implants still require a pat down (Score:2, Insightful)
Personally I have to question then how is this an improvement oveer the current magnetometers from a user perspective.
Also I do not for a minute buy the government's assertion this is safe. Plain and simple there isn't enough long term data for them to make that claim.
Re:Option to opt-out (Score:3, Insightful)
Of course, you have no such right because the law makes no provision for one. If you do not wish to submit to being scanned/searched/whatever, you can take a bus, a cab, or your own personal transportation. No one is restricting your ability to get from point A to point B, there are no traffic control points with Gestapo'd brownshirts saying "papers please." You're making a mountain out of a molehill because it suits your agenda. The bare facts are this: if you wish to travel via air, you are traveling in a collective manner, and the safety of everyone on board -- include your thin-skinned self -- outweighs your individual right to be a paranoid, the-government-is-out-to-get-me-all-the-time passenger. If the above security measures offend you so much, put your moral fortitude where your mouth is and don't travel by air. Or, if you must, charter your own flight and skip security altogether. Yes, it's expensive, or time consuming, or annoying depending upon what alternate mode of travel you chose, but if you're so terrified of losing your "right to privacy," it's a small price to pay...right?
I don't trust the government any further than I can throw it, but I don't trust you either. That's why I'm happy as hell people are screened before they get on a plane with me, and I wish like hell they'd scan more of them and more thoroughly.
who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Insightful)
I submit that if a TSA screener should be entitled to such a scan, that I should be entitled to see them do the same. Unfortunately, given the appearance and physical fitness of your average screener, I think I'm getting the short end of the stick even in that case.
In all seriousness, though, these sorts of violations by our governments upon the governed is the intent of terrorism. Civilians are the indirect target. By making them afraid, the government is pressured or motivated to enact increasingly restrictive laws and methods of enforcement to assuage that fear and protect the populace. The terrorists know that full protection is impossible, so they continue until the loss of freedom becomes so intolerable that the people overthrow the government. The politicians and so-called elected officials know this, but play into their hands anyway--in the short term, the power grab is irresistible.
The entire focus on security (and technology to improve such security) is wrongheaded, and is a convenient diversion from the real issue, which is why people become terrorists in the first place. People don't explode themselves for no reason whatsoever. No amount of technology, legislation, or vigilance will ever address the root cause that incites an individual to such fervor that they are willing to DIE to achieve their aims.
But again, the politicians know this--so one must call into question their own motivation for pushing these measures on the public. When I have the ability to subject each and every last one of our elected officials, corporate officers, and whomever is telling me I'm supposed to be OK with being scanned and exposed in such a humiliating fashion, to the exact same treatment, then and only then would I consider accepting such a practice. When I can see Dick Cheney's ugly-ass flaps of man-tits hanging over his oversized belly obscuring his undersized privates (mind you, not that I would ever risk the subsequent psychological scarring), I might reconsider. And if even one scan ever gets leaked or misused in any way, I'd like to see the scans of each and every one of those people involved in promoting this technology released all over the internet for everyone to laugh at as punishment. Otherwise, their promises and reassurances mean nothing.
It is not a question of trust, freedom, modesty, or security. It is a question of accountability; because without that, everything else is meaningless. To the extent that those that watch us do not desire to be watched by us is the precise extent to which we are not a free and just society.
Re:puritian influences (Score:4, Insightful)
Of COURSE they will be stored. (Score:3, Insightful)
The scans have to be stored for criminal prosecution and accident/incident investigation.
Re:Just a Matter of Time... (Score:3, Insightful)
Forcing me to submit to scans that can "strip" off my clothes is a violation of that right. (Just as surely as forcing someone to carry a fetus to birth is a violation of their bodily rights.)
Re:bullshit (Score:2, Insightful)
I made my comment in jest, because I find it funny to hear people say on one hand, "We can't trust the government to scan our bodies & erase the images," and yet a few hours later wax eloquently about how "I trust the government to provide my healthcare and retirement and education, and will vote for politicians who agree with me."
It's contradictory.
Either you trust the government, or you don't. (I'm one of those who does not, and would like government to remove itself from the education and healthcare system, and instead let us handle our own money.)
Clearing up confusion... (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Option to opt-out (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, It's an unreasonable infringement of privacy, because it's useless and gives an unreasonable amount of power to airport "cops", with apparently no counterpower.
And explain to me how it is constitutional that "eastern looking" people systematicaly spend twice the time boarding their plane (when they can).
Re:puritian influences (Score:2, Insightful)
Not very graphic... (Score:2, Insightful)
If that's what it really looks like, then I don't understand how there is any real controversy here. You'd have to be a desperate fella to get aroused by that. Any of these technologies, I assume, are going to be very abstract representations of the human body, hardly something comparable to an actual naked photo of you.
In the end, people will always be able to see you naked the old fashioned way: using their imagination. Get over your vanity, honestly.
Re:who watches the watchers? (Score:3, Insightful)
1) Suicide bombers are not poor, nor do they tend to be uneducated.
2) Suicide bombers are often not Muslim (e.g. Tamil Tigers, the Christian suicide bombers who operated under Hezbollah)
3) They are not more likely to be from areas known to foster Muslim extremists. In fact the presence of US troops in their home country is a better indicator by a factor of ten.
4) Suicide terrorists are not an extension of 'normal' terrorism, they develop from guerrilla campaigns.
5) The religion of a population is not a significant indicator, but the *difference* in religion between a people and a foreign occupier is.
Pape's _Dying to Win_ has a very good analysis of these statistics. Once you look at actual facts, you realize the question is a lot more complicated.