What Do You Think?

[loosebelly]

For that much money to be pulled out and for the devices to have been miraculously developed, built and ready for deployment right after a botched attack. It sort of makes a person wonder if the government has suddenly gotten very effecent with what it does or if something else is going on to make some people in government very rich.

copied from:
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/03/11-more-us-airports-get-body-scanners/


11 More U.S. Airports Get Body Scanners

“By accelerating the deployment of this technology, we are enhancing our capability to detect and disrupt threats of terrorism across the nation,” Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said in a statement.

Despite concerns of privacy and their effectiveness, the 11 airports are to get the 150 machines beginning Monday at Boston’s Logan International Airport, and one at the O’Hare International Airport in Chicago. In all, 30 U.S. airports will employ the scanning devices.

Fliers declining to submit to the machines that create X-ray-like virtual images of the body may get intense pat-downs from Transportation Security Administration authorities. The combined 150 imaging machines are being bought, in part, by $1 billion the government set aside from its $787 billion federal bailout bill.

The American Civil Liberties Union has decried the scanners as “virtual strip searchs.” The Electronic Privacy Information Center, in a Freedom of Information Act request, said the machines are capable of storing and transmitting images of passengers despite the government’s claim to the contrary.

A test-image shown to reporters Friday at Logan International “showed the blurry outline of a female volunteer. None of her clothing was visible, nor were her genitals, but the broad contours of her chest and buttocks were. Her face also was blurred,” The Associated Press said. “The image included the shadow of a cellphone purposely left on her belt, as well as the metal buttons on her pants. But overall, it looked like the outline of a ghost.”

The Amsterdam airport where suspected underwear bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab boarded a Detroit-bound Christmas flight had the scanning machines. But they were not used to check the Nigerian.

The machines also cannot detect so-called “booty bombs” in which an explosive is inserted into the body.

By summer, TSA expects the units, made by California-based Rapiscan, to be deployed at airports in Fort Lauderdale, Florida; San Jose, San Diego, Los Angeles and Oakland, California; Columbus, Ohio; Charlotte, North Carolina; Cincinnati; and Kansas City.