Body scanners can store, send images, group says

TSA has been caught red handed this time....

The TSA specified in 2008 documents that the machines must have image storage and sending abilities, the Washington-based Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) said.

In the documents, obtained by the privacy group and provided to CNN, the TSA specifies that the body scanners it purchases must have the ability to store and send images when in "test mode."

That requirement leaves open the possibility the machines -- which can see beneath people's clothing -- can be abused by TSA insiders and hacked by outsiders, said EPIC Executive Director Marc Rotenberg.

EPIC, a public-interest group focused on privacy and civil rights, obtained the technical specifications and vendor contracts through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.

The written requirements also appear to contradict numerous assurances the TSA has given the public about the machines' privacy protections.

"The machines have zero storage capability," the TSA Web site says.

A TSA video assures passengers "the system has no way to save, transmit or print the image."

And the TSA has distributed numerous news releases with similar language as it lobbies for public acceptance of the machines as a less intrusive alternative to pat-downs.

http://bit.ly/8yUp6U

tests show body scanners don't see liquids, powders, and plastic

The explosive device smuggled in the clothing of the Detroit bomb suspect would not have been detected by body-scanners...

Since the attack was foiled, body-scanners, using "millimetre-wave" technology and revealing a naked image of a passenger, have been touted as a solution to the problem of detecting explosive devices that are not picked up by traditional metal detectors - such as those containing liquids, chemicals or plastic explosive.

But Ben Wallace, the Conservative MP, who was formerly involved in a project by a leading British defence research firm to develop the scanners for airport use, said trials had shown that such low-density materials went undetected.

Tests by scientists in the team at Qinetiq, which Mr Wallace advised before he became an MP in 2005, showed the millimetre-wave scanners picked up shrapnel and heavy wax and metal, but plastic, chemicals and liquids were missed.

If a material is low density, such as powder, liquid or thin plastic - as well as the passenger's clothing - the millimetre waves pass through and the object is not shown on screen. High- density material such as metal knives, guns and dense plastic such as C4 explosive reflect the millimetre waves and leave an image of the object.

http://bit.ly/5Qc7ah

Should we trust TSA with Radiation & Our lives?

If you can't trust the people at Cedars-Sinai to properly operate a radiation producing machine...can you really trust TSA?

At one of the most famous hospitals in Los Angeles, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 206 patients were exposed to 8 times the normal dose of radiation...

As a result of the higher dosing, patients were exposed to as many as 4 grays of radiation to the head, instead of the expected 0.5 grays.

http://tinyurl.com/y8nkn6p