February 24, 2007 11:00 AM PST

Critics: New airport X-ray is a virtual strip search

A new airport X-ray scanner makes its debut in Phoenix, peering beneath passenger clothes to search for hidden weapons and explosives.

The story "Critics: New airport X-ray is a virtual strip search" published February 24, 2007 at 11:00 AM is no longer available on CNET News.

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Oh come on... you can do better..
Just turn up the heater and make swimsuits a mandatory attire in
all your airports... plus a nuke shelter and of course, no turbans.
those are deadly.
Posted by SamoUmer (8 comments )
Reply Link Flag
Of course, cavity searches will still be required for all passengers
And anybody with a large butt, belly or breasts is going to get an ultrasound exam. God help you if you're wearing a cast.
Posted by vm019302 (85 comments )
Link Flag
On Their Best Behavior
Right now, they are only picking out select "volunteers", but, once this goes into production, they will start recording and make it mandatory. It might as well be a kiddie porn machine as children can be used to carry terrorist weapons. Do the parents in this country really want these low paid "security" workers stairing at their young childs bodies.

This country just gets more paranoid every day. Where does it end--cameras in all the bathrooms?
What ever happened to "give me liberty, or give me death".

I prescribe Valium for our nations leaders lol.
Posted by Arbitrator9000 (10 comments )
Reply Link Flag
When nothing happen, you can talk abt give me liberty, or give me death.
When things happen, you are baying for blood of the security team, at best you keep silent, i do not hear give me liberty, or give me death 5 and a half year ago.
The most loved person shall be the politicians, cos they are the one who do the things "demanded by the constituent", when things screw up, they end up with the bucket of **** though they are well paid for that ****.
Posted by pjianwei (207 comments )
Link Flag
Distort the images
With old analog coded TV, the images were presented, to unpaying subscribers, with extremely simple distortion (false color, horizontal skewing and little stability) that allowed for easy recognition of the image's content but that prevented the viewers from actually enjoying the show. It actually worked for porn, and even with undistorted audio the vast majority of people didn't stay looking at the distorted video for hours.
Lower quality video, distorted both verticlaly and horizontally in a nonlinear fashion, with better digital distorting capacity should be enough to guarantee that there's not a pervert watching the image and if there is, he or she is not getting anything from it.
Such a system would be easily and solidly implementable. Making it sure that there's no recording capability might be more difficult, but with digital, coded transmission and sealed box equipment, it would be extremely safe. Child porn is not valuable enough to spend millions on hacking extremely solid machines in highly secured areas, when it can be filmed for a few bucks in less restrictive places.
Posted by herby67 (144 comments )
Link Flag
RE: What ever happened to
"give me liberty or give me death"???

Look around and see all these brainwashed sheeple giving up [b][u]OUR[/u][/b] liberties just so they can [i]FEEL GOOD/SAFE[/i].

It looks like these cowards have chosen [i]'death'[/i] for us all!
Posted by btljooz (375 comments )
Link Flag
What is the position of the airline industry on this?
This kind of search is going to put a serious dent in their bottom line. U.S. security restrictions are already hurting the tourism industry; this will be last straw for air passengers in the U.S.
Posted by extinctone (214 comments )
Link Flag
Now That I Use Those Male Enhancement Pills
Since listening to conservative talk radio, I've ordered about a dozen different brands of male enhancement pills that are constantly advertised on stations like KSFO and KNEW. The pills work so well that I'm volunteering to be back-scattered by the new scanner machines to show off my sexy body. In fact, I'm now so "big" that TSA will need to widen the view of the beam to accomodate me.
Posted by Stating (870 comments )
Reply Link Flag
The Pills Work???
Wow... the pills work that well, huh? For a while I tried the cream, but had to quit using it when my hands grew too big to fit in my gloves.
Posted by David Arbogast (1712 comments )
Link Flag
RADIATION EXPOSURE
In response to the previous comments which find this situation amusing, will you still be laughing when your children (the most susceptible) are diagnosed with cancer? Think I?m being dramatic? Check it out on the internet (before your right to look up this information is taken away). The Nuclear Regulatory Commission, NRC, has strict maximum permissible doses, MPD, for all radiation workers (ie-X-ray technicians, just to name of few). And this group, wears lead shields and is usually not even in the same room where the x-ray is being taken-which is often a very localized part of the body-AS OPPOSED TO YOUR ENTIRE BODY! And what about OSHA (Occupational Safety & Health Administration)? THESE FEDERAL AGENCIES WERE PUT IN PLACE TO PROTECT AMERICAN WORKERS AND CONSITUTES LEGAL PRECEDENT FOR DISALLOWING SUCH AN OUTRAGEOUS HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSE.

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.nrc.gov/" target="_newWindow">http://www.nrc.gov/</a>

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.osha.gov/" target="_newWindow">http://www.osha.gov/</a>
Posted by annekauf83 (11 comments )
Reply Link Flag
Insignificant
Before you get too carried away, try to remember two things:

1. You have no guaranteed or protected right to fly on a plane without security implementations, and your government is not forcing you to get on the plane. - In other words, making you go through security procedures to get on a plane in no way violates you rights. You do it because you chose to do it. If you don't like it, take a car, bus, or train.

2. The radiation from the backscatter systems is insignificant. You are comparing it to a medical x-ray, which is entirely ignorant. The two technologies are very different. In fact, if you were concerned about xray radiation that much, you would not even get on the airplane - because spending 2 minutes at 30,000 feet exposes you to more radiation (just from being closer to the sun) than the backscatter tool.

Sorry to bunk all your arguments so easily.. there are reasons not to like this technology, but they have little to do with violating rights or increased health risk.
Posted by David Arbogast (1712 comments )
Link Flag
Got nothing to hide
Those who protest the scanning methods are a bit to critical, and those are the ones I want scanned and pat searched too. They may not be terrorists, but have something to hide, whether just a little smoke or meth, they are protesting too much about the nations methods of securing the law abiding citizens from attack.
Posted by mjd420nova (82 comments )
Reply Link Flag
Nothing to Hide... Or... DESPICABLE-COWARDICE...?
So... let me get this straight...

...being unhappy about being forced to surrender your MOST BASIC, Constitutionally-guaranteed, human-rights (such as the rights of "Freedom from unreasonable search and seizure", and "the right to travel" within the United States)... means you SHOULD lose ALL of your rights..?

By that argument... ANY time you are in public, "law-enforcement" should be allowed to stop you and request a, so-called, "voluntary personal-search", ...and these "officials" should then be allowed to FORCIBLY-IMPOSE an INVOLUNTARY SEARCH, WITHOUT ANY REAL "Probable Cause", ...if an, otherwise, INNOCENT-CITIZEN... refuses (I.E. -exercises- THEIR RIGHTS)..?

BRILLIANT... Why... youve single-handedly DESTROYED everything that FREEDOM, and AMERICA, stands for. And, youve done it without so much as touching upon why we should give up OUR MOST BASIC HUMAN-RIGHTS, ...even though this, particular, unacceptably-invasive OBSCENITY would have, IN NO WAY, protected us from the very actions that ALLEGEDLY prompted this, ongoing, WAR ON OUR BASIC CIVIL-LIBERTIES, in the first-place.

But, hey... "if youve got nothing to hide...", Right..?

On the other hand, maybe this TREASONOUS, COWARDLY, ANTI-AMERICAN, SLAVE-MENTALITY should be met with the exact same level of PATRIOTISM, and DETERMINATION that, ...FOUNDED THIS NATION.

In fact... Maybe, someone should read a history-book. Then, they might understand why, the continued expansion of, such TYRANNIES, MUST be opposed. And, why, the "...greatest threat to America" is NOT... those few POWER-MAD BUREAUCRATS that always seem to be PUSHING to extend such UNREASONABLE-CONTROL and exactly this type of, DE-HUMANIZING, ARBITRARY-AUTHORITY upon the masses.

And, maybe, a better education would also allow them to understand the WELL-ESTABLISHED FACT that, "...the greatest threat to AMERICAN-FREEDOM" has ALWAYS been those people who simply REFUSE to shoulder their CIVIL-RESPONSIBILITY and, instead, WHINE that other Americans should simply, quiet-down, and accept "the rules"... no matter how, UNETHICAL, ANTI-AMERICAN, and DESTRUCTIVE to HUMAN-DIGNITY, those ARBITRARY-IMPOSITIONS, are.

But, I think that MOST Americans are finally reaching a point of being, ABSOLUTELY, FED-UP with what is being done to the American-People, under the EXCUSE of "...security".

And, the winds ARE changing...
Posted by Had_to_be_said (385 comments )
Link Flag
You're not getting the principle here
You sound like a happy North Korean.

If the **** ever hits the fan, I know we won't be able to count you to
throw off tyranny as our (or at least my) ancestors did.
Posted by Mark Greene (163 comments )
Link Flag
Something to hide
To me, the issue of having nothing to hide or having something to hide shouldn't be an issue if the system is well implemented. Even if someone has a sex toy shoved up his ass and would be embarrassed if that became known, the system should not pose a risk to them. Having the pictures shown 50 feet away, scanned by a person that can't see and can't identify who's going through the system and with the images distorted in a way that reduces their potential sexual value and of the same sex of the person being scanned should be enough to protect even those that "have something to hide" that poses no risk to other people on the plane.
Posted by herby67 (144 comments )
Link Flag
Excellent.
The dial is turned down to 100 now, Winston.
Posted by Tomcat Adam (272 comments )
Link Flag
Re:Nothing to hide
That's not how it works.

Privacy is a right. This is how privacy is destroyed, using slow, incremental steps.

How long do you think it will be until these machines are everywhere?

Stop being a sheep. Small, criminal elements of the Government carry out terror attacks against the people to scare them into submission.

Stop being scared!!!
Posted by Jeff419 (16 comments )
Link Flag
Nothing to hide, but...
I don't want my privacy invaded! If you don't like privacy, you can give your privacy up. You have no right to take anyone else's away!
Posted by ddesy (2522 comments )
Link Flag
I have to agree
Usually, I am a very skeptical person on things like this, but I have seen and passed through these backscatter scanners, as well as seen the pictures as part of a demonstration of the system.

The pictures are not that clear, and frankly are NOTHING that anyone should be scared of or embarrassed about.

The people who are worried about this are the people who hate their own bodies for being sexual in nature, hate people looking at their bodies in any form, and even people who have something to hide, as the earlier poster said.

I'm very libertarian in nature, and don't want government interfering in my life and choices unless I am physically hurting someone else, but even I have to say that these scanners are the best way to protect the airlines from terrorists.
Posted by Leria (586 comments )
Link Flag
I have to agree
Usually, I am a very skeptical person on things like this, but I have seen and passed through these backscatter scanners, as well as seen the pictures as part of a demonstration of the system.

The pictures are not that clear, and frankly are NOTHING that anyone should be scared of or embarrassed about.

The people who are worried about this are the people who hate their own bodies for being sexual in nature, hate people looking at their bodies in any form, and even people who have something to hide, as the earlier poster said.

I'm very libertarian in nature, and don't want government interfering in my life and choices unless I am physically hurting someone else, but even I have to say that these scanners are the best way to protect the airlines from terrorists.
Posted by Leria (586 comments )
Link Flag
That's not the point
There were Germans who didn't have anyting to hide, either.

(That doesn't mean the nazis were right.)
Posted by Byronic (95 comments )
Link Flag
If you have nothing to hide
First off, you are not hiding the fact that you don't know the difference between the word too and to as is evidenced in your first sentence.

So, if you have nothing to hide, please state your name, your address, your social security number, your license number, and any and all of the rest of your private numbers as well as where you work and your hours, so that we know when you are not at home. Or, do you have that (being something) to hide. You said you have nothing to hide, so prove your point.

Your views are not the views that established this country and I find you guilty of subversion. You are an enemy of the state. Perhaps, in a future state that people like you create, you can be arrested on such pretexts without a trial as is the case established by such things as the Patriot Act that did away with the right of due process--or did you not know that out of ignorance.

You would call all of the USA's founding members criminal types with something to hide as they wrote about the right to privacy. Congratulations on that wonderful perspective.

Have you ever heard of the concept of slander? Are you aware that you arguments are slandering? Maybe you should pull your head out of your butt long enough to think about what you are saying next time. I mean, have you even considered that there are many people who's religious beliefs would run contrary to this type of "visual rape". Do you have something against people's religious beliefs. Are you Anti-Semetic? Anti-Christian?
Posted by Arbitrator9000 (10 comments )
Link Flag
Will it show a woman's implants?
Just curious..

Will it show a bomb in a woman's implant?
Posted by baswwe (299 comments )
Reply Link Flag
The real question:
when will this technology be available to the public?
Posted by fcekuahd (244 comments )
Reply Link Flag
"War on Terror" is absolute genius
and Dick Cheney knows it all too well.
Posted by Mark Greene (163 comments )
Reply Link Flag
Name a confirmed al Qaeda cell other than the 9/11 hijackers
I find it hard to believe there wouldn't be one, if not several, but
I can't think of any off hand.

For example, the charges against the "Lackawana 6" regarding
collusion with al Qaeda were dropped due to a lack of actual
evidence.

It's both implied and stated that is a global network of terrorists.
In the late 70s/ early 80s claims were made that the Soviets ran
a global terror ring. Those charges were bunk.

What real evidence do we have that a real global network of
terrorists exists?

Entertain me here.
Posted by Mark Greene (163 comments )
Reply Link Flag
you tube
stay tuned for video that breaks free.
Posted by gggg sssss (2292 comments )
Reply Link Flag
you tube
stay tuned for video that breaks free.
Posted by gggg sssss (2292 comments )
Reply Link Flag
Yes, it's just a matter of time.
After all, there's security, and them there's security.
Posted by extinctone (214 comments )
Link Flag
This is awesome!!!
Now we'll find out what's really underneath those hajibs.

But seriously, if they implement this, there is absolutely no way that I am going to take my wife and kids on a plane. I don't need those sleazy minimum wage security people whacking off while they're screening us.
Posted by vm019302 (85 comments )
Reply Link Flag
Story on this machine on WOAI.com
<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.woai.com/mediacenter/local.aspx?videoId=364486,565" target="_newWindow">http://www.woai.com/mediacenter/local.aspx?videoId=364486,565</a>

You have to stand on two footprint marks in front of a the device, and you be moving around. It doesn't scan groups of people, but rather only one at a time.

That said, I'm wondering what happens to the images afterwards. The other thing is, how well informed are the passengers before being scanned? What's the actual disclosure?

Now, want to see one that really IS intrusive? From 2002.

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3071573" target="_newWindow">http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3071573</a>
Posted by mattumanu (581 comments )
Reply Link Flag
Ironic
The ironic thing about this whole mess is that a few people have turned many cowardly Americans, including many in our government, into accepting Communist like control.

We are turning into the next Soviet Union and people are actually stupid enough to cheer it on. Perhaps they would find China more to their liking, because they don't have the backbone to deal with freedom.

The funny thing is, these cowards don't even see the incremental steps that we are taking towards a police state. If safety at any cost was more important then freedom, then a provision in the constitution would have been added in the beginning to allow the government to do what they want, whenever people are afraid.

It only took 230 years to turn a nation built on courage and wisdom to turn into a state full of cowards screaming that they will give up anything just to feel safe.

It is pathetic and shameful, that so many millions fought and died just so you cowards can **** on their memory and sacrifices.
Posted by qwerty75 (1164 comments )
Reply Link Flag
Ironic
The beatles had it right 40 years ago......


Back in the USSR..
Posted by somedude~ (2 comments )
Link Flag
Unfortunate
to worry about extensive psychological testing to choose non-
pervs to view our bodies without getting all sweaty at the
content.

But for relatively low pay will there be a waiting line to be the
employee to watch the nudie show?

Aren't the big majority of bodies imperfect enough to make
watching them a real downer? Will wannabee gynecologists
need a few drinks after work to calm down from sexual tension
on top of general job tension?
Posted by NM_Bill (59 comments )
Reply Link Flag
For all the Naysayers..
For all of you who think that the US government is NOT involved in any of this BS, why dont you get in line for your RFID implant.

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.google.com/search?hl=xx-hacker&#38;q=rfid+implant&#38;btnG=Google+s3a%7C2ch" target="_newWindow">http://www.google.com/search?hl=xx-hacker&#38;q=rfid+implant&#38;btnG=Google+s3a%7C2ch</a>
Posted by somedude~ (2 comments )
Reply Link Flag
TSA is the worst agency
Can anyone say anything good about the TSA? Have they actually ever provided any real security? I guess having everyone Xray their shoes, take off suit coats, remove belts, remove wedding rings, ect doesn't degrade travelers enough. Now the TSA gets to look at nude pictures of us. Great way to make flying more dignified.
Posted by feliusrex (48 comments )
Reply Link Flag
MARK OF THE BEAST FINDS NEW HOME INSIDE SECURITIES & EXCHANGE COMMISSION
For those of you who do not have the eyes to see, or the ears to hear;

1. Keep listening to mainstream media.
2. Be good little consumers &#38; buy Verichip stock.
3. Derive satisfaction from personally attacking those who disagree with you.
4. Keep telling yourself the government is protecting you from the terrorists.


<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.spychips.com/press-releases/verichip-ipo-omits-risks.html#" target="_newWindow">http://www.spychips.com/press-releases/verichip-ipo-omits-risks.html#</a>

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1347022/000119312507024937/ds1a.htm" target="_newWindow">http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1347022/000119312507024937/ds1a.htm</a>

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.spychips.com/alec-big-brother-barcode-article.html" target="_newWindow">http://www.spychips.com/alec-big-brother-barcode-article.html</a>

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.conspiracyplanet.com/channel.cfm?channelid=74&#38;contentid=4058" target="_newWindow">http://www.conspiracyplanet.com/channel.cfm?channelid=74&#38;contentid=4058</a>
Posted by annekauf83 (11 comments )
Reply Link Flag
 

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