New York – If 23-year-old Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab had succeeded in his attempted Christmas day airline attack, 289 people would have died. But some security analysts say a powerful but controversial piece of technology might have prevented the alleged terrorist from ever boarding that Northwest Airlines flight to Detroit.
Subscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
Full-body imaging scanners, or so-called “naked scanners,” might have spotted the explosive materials officials said Abdulmutallab had sewn into his underwear, some security analysts contend.
According to the Transportation Safety Administration, 19 airports across the country already give passengers the option to undergo a full-body imaging scan instead of a pat-down. And the agency recently purchased 150 more scanners that use X-ray beams to generate an image of a passenger — including possible foreign objects hidden under their clothing.
In light of the recent attempted bombing, some security experts are raising their voices in support of a more widespread adoption.
“I value my privacy as much as any individual, but I travel all around the world, and when it comes to my safety and my family’s safety, and I know these things work, then I want to be safe first and I’ll worry about my body exposure later,” said Billie Vincent, former director of the Federal Aviation Administration’s Office of Civil Aviation Security and president of Aerospace Services International, Inc.
Full-body scans are generated by two kinds of technology. Millimeter wave scanners emit radio frequency energy to generate a 3-D image of a passenger. And backscatter scanners beam low-intensity X-rays to create a 2-D image.
Vincent said both scanners would have likely detected the foreign objects on Abdulmutallab’s body.
The technology has been used in prisons and other military installations for years, but former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told the Washington Post that it was time to renew calls for more widespread usage.
“This plot is an example of something we’ve known could exist in theory, and in order to be able to detect it, you’ve got to find some way of detecting things in parts of the body that aren’t easy to get at,” he said. “It’s either pat-downs or imaging, or otherwise hoping that bad guys haven’t figured it out, and I guess bad guys have figured it out.”
The imaging technology units range from approximately $130,000 to $170,000. The TSA purchased the 40-millimeter wave units currently in use from Santa Ana, Calif.’s L-3 Communications and the 150 new backscatter units from Torrance, Calif.-based Rapiscan Systems.
pat down don’t help cause the bomber hid it in his underware
there should be a warning on this thing; more dangerous then cell phone.
I’ll take a violation of privacy in exchange for safety any day!
“im hashem lo yishmor ir, shov shukad shomer”
Profiling is the ONLY answer, be it religious, ethnic, or psychological.
what if they swallow the explosive material in a bag and then extract it and booom? people have been known to smuggle drugs by swallowing it.
These scanners are the right answer. That way you don’t have to worry about demographic shifts to avoid profiling (use of women instead of men, use of different ethnic groups, use of people who’ve changed their names as appears to have happened in Mumbai), you look for the bombs.
This also works for bombs in places that are less likely to get a thorough pat down — the underwear in this case, or the brassieres in the cases of some bombings of airplanes in Chechnya a few years back.
Rabbonim have said that when it comes to protecting lives and security, it is mutar to use these full body scan machines with no concerns regarding tzinus. If a frum passenger is concerned about tzinius, they can always ask to bypass the machines and subject themselves to a “pat down” or body cavity search in a private area and also by a security agent of the same gender when available. Again, since the purpose of the search is for security, there is no issue of negiah, especially if the guard is a goy.
I think the airlines should use fingerprinting. It works for Disney, no more ticket swapping.
One must ask what are the radiation levels? How will this effect pregnancy?
Number two: And how are we so certain this would have caught the underwear bomber? If he hides it in his crotch area, then the scanner will need to focus on every male’s crotch area for an unusual shape… not an easy job. It seems to me that there is no guaranty these scanners would have picked some powder hidden in the crotch area.
Maybe the answer is explosive chemical detectors.