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Skeletal Identification
Bruce Schneier noted a story today over at his blog about a new Skeletal Identification System being developed at Wright State. Of course this is just another biometric detection system, but one that would be pretty tough to disguise.
I imagine there may be some issues with irradiating people to identify them. This isn't something on the surface you can just get with backscatter terahertz. Imaging bones means X-ray, and a fair bit of it for a full-body image. They might be able to get it down to the equivilent exposure of one plane flight - but add up all the airports, ports, theme parks and places adults may encouter children each year. That's a potential legal risk, if nothing else.
On the other hand, if someone suggested imposing manditory x-ray exposure as a means to identify pedophiles, most people would probably suggest positive results be given an extra-high-intensity scan just to confirm it with a clearer image.
Oh come on. This is easier to avoid than using glitter to fool mass face recognition.
That is, to have much value, working "at 50 meters," this is a mass detection system. You have to analyze hundreds if not thousands of targets, to known profiles. How do you fool it? Calcium is cheap, real cheap.
This article reads like a parody. Some guy is (supposedly) worried about sex offenders in the neighborhood - I know, let's X Ray everyone everyday ! That will surely keep people safe, until they all die of cancer.
Seriously, are these guys stuck in the 1950's ? Penetrating radiation for bone scans ? On a daily basis ? I can remember when children's shoe stores had X ray machines, so Mom could view how the shoe fit, but such common uses of X Rays were stopped for a reason, and as a screening device this has no chance.
From the article : Depending on the selected technology, a skeletal scan would only expose a person to radiation that is the approximate equivalent of taking one cross-country airline flight
From the World Health Organization, INFORMATION SHEET Nov. 2005, on Cosmic Radiation and Air Travel :
Aircrew are now recognized in many countries as occupationally exposed to radiation, and radiation protection limits for aircrew are similar to those established for nuclear workers.
If you work through the numbers (and I read the above to mean that, at best, radiation exposure would be similar to air travel, so this is a lower bound), a daily scan would thus amount to 2 to 5 milliSievert (mSv) of radiation each year, substantially exceeding the ICRP guideline of no more than 1 mSv exposure to any fetus during pregnancy, and coming close to or exceeding the guideline of 4 mSv exposure for ordinary workers.
This would, at a minimum, mean that anyone at risk of pregnancy should not be scanned, and radiation workers should not be scanned (as they are typically close to their limits). There is thus just no chance that this would be adopted for regular screening of the general population.