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Full Body Scanners Installed In 10 US Airports
Lapzilla brings word that airports around the US are beginning to use a new type of body-scanning machine which records pictures of travelers underneath their clothing. The process takes roughly 30 seconds, and the person viewing the pictures is located in a separate room. We've discussed similar scanners in the past. From USAToday:
"[Barry Steinhardt, head of the ACLU technology project] 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-sized signs are posted around the checkpoint explaining the scanners, but passengers said they did not notice them."
Even worse: They want to see our children naked!
Please will someone (aside from the TSA and pedophiles) please think of the children!
Would the recorded images of people under 18 be considered child porn?
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
Wouldn't this fall under the auspices of unreasonable search and seizure? It seems to me this manner of search invades personal privacy for no other reason than everyone is a criminal in the eyes of the TSA.
I would hope that this matter gets brought up in SCOTUS
Mind you, El Al has tested these sort of scanners before, and gave up on the idea because Israeli privacy laws currently forbid it.
Just saying.
I get searched manually all the time. The wankers see the scars and can't figure out that I'm not going to rip weapons from the body. I guess they think I'm a T-101 or some crazy s**t like that. Heck, it's not like I'm wearing concealing clothing either, standard shorts and tank top. I figure it's easier for them to wand me when the TSA boy's and girls can see the f**king scars. Winter obviously makes this harder.
I was in a bike accident a little ways back. I have enough surgical steel in me to beep many place, but it has taught me a couple of things. The first being that many airports obviously turn down the sensitivity during busy times. I've had detectors that I've gone through and set off, not go off. Now if I, with 62 screws, 5 plates, and two pins don't set it off then WTF does? I doubt it's because they remembered me six months later at some busy hub.
Still, you gave up your freedoms and privacy to be safe, right? I'd feel safer guarded by girl scouts at this point.
Hell, even after a week of working in a strip club filled with hotties... you pretty much cease to notice it.