Lawsuit challenges airport full-body scanners

[The Northerner]

A privacy advocacy group is suing the Department of Homeland Security to suspend the use of the controversial full-body scanners employed at airports across the country, including at every major checkpoint at Logan International Airport.

The machines, which use X-rays or radio frequency energy to detect weapons and explosives beneath passengers’ clothing, have been much criticized because of privacy concerns.

In the lawsuit, filed last month, the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington, D.C., said the slightly blurred but accurate pictures of passengers’ naked bodies produced by the machines are the equivalent of a “digital strip search.’’

The suit says the program, run by the Transportation Security Administration, which is part of the Department of Homeland Security, violates the Privacy Act and the Administrative Procedure Act.

The program also violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the lawsuit says, referencing religious laws about modesty.

Court documents allege the scanners also violate the Fourth Amendment by having passengers undergo “a uniquely invasive search without any suspicion that particular individuals have engaged in wrongdoing.’’

Read more: http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2010/08/04/lawsuit_challenges_airport_full_body_scanners/

[truedelphi]

1. These scanners should also be banned due to possibility of high radiation levels that they emit.

We know very well that we cannot rely on the type of firms that have contracts with Homeland Security to do any due diligence. Even regarding the health of us Americans.

Does anyone here know how many rads a single exposure to this scanning causes?

And of course, the frequent traveler is totally screwed - they have to pass through these things repeatedly.

[BlueIris]

3. Yeah, the radiation factor scares me a lot more than

some pervy airport security people seeing me virtually naked.

[Tesha]

5. I oppose the scanners but you do need to know...

...that the radiation dose you receive while
flying on the airplane at altitude is much
larger than the radiation dose you receive
from the scanner. (And only some of the scanners
use X-rays anyway.)

It's the continuing erosion of our privacy
rights that bothers me, and the fact that we
all just sheepishly submit to every added
insult to our rights.

Tesha

[truedelphi]

6. I agree w/ U about the sheeple. But, Tesha, they say that dose of radiation that they use

is so many rads, and that it is safe.

But do you really trust the contractors? I wouldn't buy a microwave oven from any one of the firms doing the work for the Homeland Security. (And I use the microwave from Amana that I own all the time.)

I mean, look at the industry record for the jet bombers they manufacture, worth billions of bucks, and yet the planes crash.

[Tesha]

8. Radiation dosimetry is pretty-well-understood, easily-obtained science.

You couldn't get away with mis-stating the
radiation does from these gadgets for very
long. The first time they fogged somebody's
film badge, the jig would be up.

Tesha

[felix_numinous]

2. At the very least

perhaps just use them as a substitute for real strip searches, for real suspects. Innocent people should not be made to feel like criminals.

Innocent until proven guilty.

[seabeyond]

4. a uniquely invasive search without any suspicion ... this one is what really pisses me off. nt

[raouldukelives]

7. I haven't flown in years but

Can't you request a pat down? I had heard passengers had the choice of being scanned or getting a pat down. Not that either is great but I'd rather opt for a pat down than a scan.