Monday, March 05, 2007

security a la total recall

In an article on slate.com by William Saletan entitled "Invasion of the Naked Body Scanners" it seems that just around the bend is a human xray machine designed to penetrate clothing and to effectively see people nekkid...no more drug running for me!

excerpt:
"This is no joke. The government needs to look under your clothes. Ceramic knives, plastic guns, and liquid explosives have made metal detectors obsolete. Carry-on bags are X-rayed, so the safest place to hide a weapon is on your body. Puffer machines can detect explosives on you, but only if you're sloppy. Backscatters are different. They can scan your whole surface, locating and identifying anything of unusual density—not just metals, which have high atomic numbers, but drugs and explosives, which have low ones."

Below is a picture of then director of the TSA Susan Hallowell some time ago...posing for a trial run of the device.
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link to the article
http://www.slate.com/id/2160977?GT1=9231

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2 comments:

Jamon said...

that technology is interesting because it's not even phased by a head of human, it just cuts right through to the flesh. this makes me wonder, though, did the director of the TSA volunteer for the first scan simply to show that the process was harmless, efficient, effective, etc., or did she want to make everyone think that she was bare "down there" even though she may not have been?... thus, the first successful application of this technology for a virtual brazilian wax.

Mendez Tropical Pool & Patio said...

She looks like murderous TV repairman Horace Pinker (Mitch Pileggi).