The new imaging technology creates an image of an unclothed body which privacy critics argue ‘amounts to a virtual strip search’ Photo: PA
Digital body scanners which leave little to the imagination will be used by airport security on passengers travelling across the European Union within two years.
Many travellers have been alarmed by the graphic nature of the black and white images body scanners generate – including revealing outlines of genitalia.
Telegraph | Sep 30, 2008
By Bruno Waterfield in Brussels
According to a draft European Commission regulation, seen by The Daily Telegraph, the new millimetre wave imaging scanners are to be used “individually or in combination, as a primary or secondary means and under defined conditions” to provide a “virtual strip search” of travellers.
The new EU regulation, which will be binding on Britain, is intended to enter into force across the continent by the end of April 2010.
Dominic Grieve, Shadow Home Secretary, stressed that while body scanners may be an effective security tool “the implementation must be carried out by the British government in a proportionate manner, based on UK security requirements rather than the dictates of Brussels”.
“Ministers need to explain publicly and transparently what these proposals are and why they are suitable to the UK,” he said.
The new imaging technology creates an image of an unclothed body which privacy critics argue “amounts to a virtual strip search” has been tested on a voluntary basis at Heathrow’s Terminal Four.
But the trial has now been discontinued, said a Heathrow spokeswoman.
Air passengers scanned by the new technology walk into a large booth where electromagnetic waves are beamed on to their body to create a virtual three-dimensional “naked” image from reflected energy.
Many travellers have been alarmed by the graphic nature of the black and white images body scanners generate – including revealing outlines of genitalia – raising concerns about privacy.
Gareth Crossman, Director of Policy at Liberty, said: “I don’t think people are aware of what these scanners can do and how demeaning it is to have your body on display. Heathrow was right to discontinue their use and they should not be used in Britain except as an alternative to strip searches.”
Security officials in the United States have pioneered use of the scanners at New York and Los Angeles airports because the technology reveals the contours of the body, picking up hidden items, such as guns or knives, more effectively than standard physical “pat-down” checks.
Tony Bunyan, the editor of Statewatch, fears that Brussels is rushing to follow the US by introducing a technology that could subject “people including women, old people and children to such a shameful and undignified experience”.
He added: “It would appear that this is yet another case of ‘if it is technologically possible it should be used’ without any consideration of proportionality, privacy and civil liberties.”
Paolo Costa, Chairman of the European Parliament’s Transport Committee, is concerned over the safety of the new technology and how “nude” images of passengers will be viewed, then stored, by security officials.
“What will the impact of the use of body scanners be on passenger health? What will the impact be on passenger privacy?,” he wrote in a letter to the Commission last week.
“How will the image data be held and how will it be destroyed?
Timothy Kirkhope, a Conservative Euro-MP who sits on the transport committee, is concerned that the new security regulations will be introduced without discussion or consultation with the travelling public.
“It must not be the case that unelected Commission officials, or security bureaucrats, can introduce these measures without elected MEPs or MPs being able to anything about it,” he said.
4 responses so far ↓
Bill // October 1, 2008 at 12:18 pm
A morning radio program here has commercials for something that blocks traffic video cameras from reading auto license plates. Is there anything we could put on our bodies (we do still own the rights to our bodies? please say ‘yes’) to block these airport scanners? I’m thinking also of metallic/Mylar underpants, or body paint containing metallic glitter. — I will look into this.
pjwalker911 // October 1, 2008 at 6:45 pm
They will just force you to take a physical strip search and they will put you on the terrorist list. You might even be detained and shipped off on a Blackwater rendition flight to get tortured for a year or two. Keep in mind, these systems will also be installed at bus and train stations and even at your local malls, schools and who knows where else.
The only way to stop this is for the entire world to wake up to the New World Order system of the Illuminati, but most likely they never will until it is far too late. In such a world, even awakened souls will tend to compromise their own liberties and privacy, just to survive.
We have to focus mainly on taking our own countries back first. Pull your cities, counties and states out of the federal system first and become independent. Then, the federal systems that are amalgamated with globalist entities will cease to have power to override your freedoms. Then states will decide on their own security at airports. We have lived in America for over two centuries without people looking beneath our clothing at checkpoints and we can go another two centuries just as easily.
wil // October 3, 2008 at 12:56 am
Aside from privacy–can’t be good for you being microwaved or whatever.
As we say more often here–the state tourism motto–Stay and See Georgia!” (USA)
As Paul said– USA and humanity have gotten by for years without all this malarky.
And true freedom can only be wrested a bit at a time at city council meetings and county commission meetings and the like.
More airports using virtual strip-search machines to observe naked bodies « Aftermath News // October 31, 2009 at 5:19 pm
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