Airport “Body Scanners” – Tests, Criticism and Bans
The AFP has an interesting article on the testing, criticism and potential ban of the so-called “body scanners”, “naked scanners” etc. that have been tested in Eurpoean airports over the last year or so.
We’ve said many times that the passive scanners aren’t (seriously, it’s impossible) a threat to your personal health, but the active scanners that use x-rays in order to peek under your clothes is a whole different matter. Those are the ones that might possibly be ready for the town dump, according to this article.
BERLIN — Body scanners being tested at Germany’s Hamburg airport have had a thumbs down from the police, who say they trigger an alarm unnecessarily in seven out of 10 cases, a newspaper said Saturday.
The weekly Welt am Sonntag, quoting a police report, said 35 percent of the 730,000 passengers checked by the scanners set off the alarm more than once despite being innocent.
The report said the machines were confused by several layers of clothing, boots, zip fasteners and even pleats, while in 10 percent of cases the passenger’s posture set them off.
The police has also called for making the scanners less sensitive to movement, and some scanner have even been reported to be too sensitive to sweat stains on the clothing. From Australia:
So it was at Australia’s Sydney Airport yesterday, where the well-meaning authorities launched a shiny new full-body scanner that would not only ensure that you are not armed, but could also tell what you had for lunch last Tuesday. (That’s merely a slight exaggeration, of course.)
News.com.au sniffed out a certain snafu, however, in the scanner’s nervous system. For it seemed to have an unreasonable sensitivity to sweaty armpits.
Oh… and our favorite, BS, has also made one of his usual, insightful and useful 3-word comments. (Yes, that was irony.)
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The other interesting point about body scanners is simply there implementation.
When we look at history of terrorist attacks on aircraft, I believe we’ll find that the majority of the attacks have come from the ‘belly” of the plane and not the passenger compartment.
I’m not saying that attacks haven’t come from the passenger compartment, the majority are from under your feet.
So we increased passenger screening in airports around the world, but to my understanding have not really increased luggage and especially have not increased parcel or postal screening. I don’t think many passengers know that sometimes airlines deliver packages and mail in the “belly” along with the luggage and that those parcels have either gone through really no screening to less screening than they did and their luggage.
The intent I think is good, maybe all of our efforts can be slightly redirected and tweaked just a little.
Hi Michael.
Are you sure that that is accurate? Attacks on airplanes from the “belly” has obviously happened, but in most cases, that is not an effective means to an end. If you place a bomb in an aircraft, you’ll obviously harm or kill quite a few people, especially if the plane comes down, but the motivation and effect is (and has been) potentially much greater with a hijacking. Political/religious motivations and goals are far better promoted with a huge hostage taking than just a bomb, something that has been seen over and over again.
We agree, however. Tweaking today’s security systems is what we should do, constantly. Threat levels and threat situations change all the time, and unfortunately, security usually lags behind.