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Scientists Question Safety of New Airport Scanners
An anonymous reader sends this quote from a story at NPR about the accelerated deployment of new scanning machines at airports:
"Fifty-two of these state-of-the-art machines are already scanning passengers at 23 US airports. By the end of 2011, there will be 1,000 machines and two out of every three passengers will be asked to step into one of the new machines for a six-second head-to-toe scan before boarding. About half of these machines will be so-called X-ray back-scatter scanners. They use low-energy X-rays to peer beneath passengers' clothing. That has some scientists worried. ... The San Francisco group thinks both the machine's manufacturer, Rapiscan, and government officials have miscalculated the dose that the X-ray scanners deliver to the skin — where nearly all the radiation is concentrated. The stated dose — about .02 microsieverts, a medical unit of radiation — is averaged over the whole body, members of the UCSF group said in interviews. But they maintain that if the dose is calculated as what gets deposited in the skin, the number would be higher, though how much higher is unclear."
As someone who has done a fair share of work in airports (digital signage) and has been badged in a couple of term, I can say this from observation and from talking to people in the airports and the TSA, the issue is not the passengers, it's the workers. The passengers are checked to ridiculous measures, but if you work at an airport your protocols are entirely different. All the tarmac entrances and any "employee only" entrance isn't guarded by the TSA, but rather independent security companies hired by the airports themselves, so every airports strictness at these points are anywhere from stricter or far more lax, especially if you're a regular employee that they recognize. I have had to throw gear into the back of an electricians truck many many a time and driven it onto the tarmac without them opening or even swabbing the boxes. At that point I am less then 30ft away from a 767.
All this extra effort at the checkpoints is to keep up what most people here already know what it is. The illusion of absolute safety in a system where it can never be guaranteed 100%.
Technically you have a choice, but given the monkeys that work for security today, they probably don't know that. They will insist vehemently that you HAVE to be scanned, just as they held-up this guy for carrying a lot of cash (not an illegal act): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0SXuclz47Y
People in authority often make-up laws ("You must comply") right on the spot even when the actual law says otherwise.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall