telabadmanwot

Hmm good point, it would seem that the us and UK governments are seriously misrepresenting its people.

Its not the people, its the people in charge. Particularly when they explicitly go against the opinion of the people they represent.

relangford

The US (and UK) are not perfect, but better than any of the other five countries on three continents I have lived in and more than 40 I have worked in or visited. The current crop of terrorists want the whole world to be Moslem (or, at least, their radical version of Islam) and will kill anyone who stands in their way. It has little to do with racism (by the way, most Moslem terrorists are Caucasians - oh, that means "from the Caucasus mountains of Turkey, Iran, Armenia, Georgia, etc.", by the way) - or whatever YOU may THINK the reason is.

SeriouslyLost

At the risk of this going OMNI, I would disagree. Those controlling and instigating "terrorism" couldn't give two hoots about the US or the UK as such. The failure to understand that is part of the problem in the US. (In the UK, it's well understood, but the power grab is more basic there) If terrorists really cared about the US or UK then you'd be seeing dozens of attacks a year because the security systems in place can't stop them and aren't designed to. You do get random acts and attempts at acts, but with a few exceptions those tend not to be the work of the "name players". They're lone wolf actions, generally. The real goal of terrorism is control in the areas in which they actually operate, pure and simple. The US and UK are simply stalking horses to focus the real target population against - just as Germany did with Jews, the US did with the Japanese, the British did with the Boer, etc. (Yes, I could come up with better examples, but I'm tired)

So, to drag this back to the security aspect, you have countries that are reacting to a threat that doesn't really exist in any meaningful sense. The threat is aimed elsewhere. The response is not aimed at the threat. Who're the sheep in this equation? Until and unless the US and UK general population understands that they're not under real threat then both countries establishments will continue on their merry way towards emplacing systems that are designed to control and instill a sense of fear and willingness to be controlled. Security theatre certainly has a role: instill fear and foster compliance, but "security" is not part of the function of security theatre.

IanFromHKG

To your first point, I am reminded of the words of the late, great Sir Winston Churchill: "Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

To your second point... I am not sure I agree. I think many of them believe they are fighting against oppression of Islam, not aiming to proselytise.

Superguy

The good news about this article is Mrs. Super finally got the message about these things and will opt out whenever she can.

Me? I have a chronic shoulder injury that only flares up around airport checkpoints.

FliesWay2Much

No kidding! I've got the same injury and I just know it will act up tomorrow afternoon. It's funny --- It always goes away after 5 or 10 minutes.

Superguy

It's really intense, but they're only periodic flare ups. Fortunately, those flare ups are predictable so I can better manage the pain.

Blame it on the rain.

Pesky Monkey

I can assure you that Costa Rica and Honduras are WAY more free than either the USA or the UK. They're not rich, and Honduras is definitely not safer. But they're both much more free. That's a fact. We only sing our praises because we're rich.

Schmurrr

Steven Colbert gave TSA a "wag of the finger" last night due to this article.

KDS

And in another chapter of "You can always predict what the TSA will say":

http://www.latimes.com/business/mone...#axzz2srQahZ8H

Too bad the TSA has zero credibility; and that this former screener's stories match up with what we've observed during our gauntlets through the airports.

TSA -- the agency that lies and misdirects and makes stuff up!

Fredd

A belated and absolutely unpersuasive retort from TSA, e.g.

Yes, but they were in existence when Harrington was an employee.

No, of course not.

Spiff

Nope. Still there. Software may be obscuring the image that the screen shows to the drone and the world, but the naked picture is still taken and is still in the buffer.

WillCAD

I am not entirely convinced of that. I don't trust TSA any more than you do, but I'm not sure that the machines actually create an image any more; rather, the ATR software just evaluates the raw scan return data.

Of course, the raw scan return data can still be compiled into an image, just as it was before, but I'm not convinced that the machines still do so now that it's no longer needed; I think they just evaluate the scan returns and light up an LED on the indicator panel corresponding to any anomolies they detect.

As for "obscuring the image", that's a misrepresentation. There is no image displayed on the control panel, obscured or otherwise; ATR-equipped NoS units have a panel attached to them that shows a sketch of a human body with yellow squares indicating the locations of any anomalies they detect. But this is not an "obscured image" of the body any more than the Check Engine light is an image of your car's engine.


Of course, my inate paranoia has always led me to distrust TSA's assertions about these machines.

You see, they have always maintained vehemently that the machines did not and could not store or transmit the images they created. But they never said anything about whether the machines store or transmit the raw scan return data upon which the images are based. And that, I believe, is a distinct possibility.

Schmurrr

I think they store the raw data. Maybe they don't store it forever, but I think they store it (a) in case there is a terror event and they need to figure out if/how WEI made it through the checkpoint and (b) for quality control purposes.

Spiff

The path of least resistance is what was followed.

Original: Naked image created, sent to someone leering at image in little room. Anomalies highlighted for person leering in the little room.

Now: Naked image created. Software simply transposes image's anomalies to screen on exterior of nudeoscope. Image still exists.

I really cannot see a complete software re-engineering that does away with the naked image entirely as that is what the nudeoscope is built to do - take naked pictures of people.