Comments on: Pat downs, puffers or full body scans – what’s your preference?

By: AKFlier

AKFlier — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 20:12:47 +0000

I’ll go for the pat down over the scan any day. Although I did have an issue with a pat down shortly after 9/11 — I’m slim and the female agent thought the edge of my rib cage was a weapon of some kind! She obviously hadn’t felt her own ribs for some years . . .

Once a digital image is created, e.g. through a body scan, there’s no telling what will happen to it. It can be copied and stored indefinitely. I don’t find the “trust us, the person operating the scan can’t see you” statement very reassuring. Human nature being what it is, some passengers’ bodies will eventually be displayed for anyone to see. If IRS employees can break the law by looking up celebrities’ tax returns, it doesn’t take much imagination to project what TSA employees will do with images of bodies they find remarkable (negatively or positively).

By: ton

ton — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 07:40:54 +0000

so it’s easy, put the sceeners in a place where they can’t see who they are screening.

From what i’ve seen the picture produces by these machines is not very, how do i say this, visualy exciting on itself.

having some burly guy grab en fondle me is much more of an invasion than this machine. So unless they combine TSA and hooters i will go for the machine 100%

By: Carrie Charney

Carrie Charney — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 20:42:39 +0000

I just dare them to put me on You tube!

By: Nick Hawkins

Nick Hawkins — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 19:56:05 +0000

I’m unhappy with the full body scans. It is a strip search – and it’s going to be abused. Just think of all the fun you’re going to get out of screeners at LAX with celebrities and their body scans.

One thing I haven’t been able to find is a comparison of effectiveness between these machines and regular x-rays. We’re still relying on the human element, the screeners, to make judgement calls on scanned items. And if your TSA screeners are anything like mine, they can be barely bothered to do their job in between yelling at passengers and gossiping with each other.

It’s a disaster waiting to happen. I feel like we should be picking dates on when the first major embarassment to come from this hits the news.

By: Hapgood

Hapgood — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 16:32:33 +0000

Whether it’s a virtual strip search from a machine or an old-fashioned spread-eagle groping from Bubba, it’s still a strip search. That may indeed be a necessary and effective tool for protecting aviation, certainly more so than removing shoes and confiscating lip gloss.

The only objection I have is that the TSA seems intent on trying to convince the public that the machines are something other than a strip search. They put out comforting propaganda about how the machines are “non-invasive” and “protect your privacy,” and get very upset when people refuse to believe it.

I think they’d get more acceptance if they were honest and up front about what the machines really are, and tell us that a “virtual strip search” is an effective tool (and then preferably do away with some of the less effective stupidity they foist on us). One of the most serious problems with the TSA is that they regard the public as both stupid and an enemy. In reality, we passengers want the same thing the TSA (supposedly) wants, and they’d do a lot better at their supposed job of protecting aviation if they had the cooperation of travelers rather than resentment and antagonism.