Brit firm aims to make airport perv scans obsolete

It won't be long before...

Some idiot gets onto a plane with explosives hidden in his ass crack.

Then the obvious response from the security agiencies will be to have everyone infront of full body scanners with their hands down their kecks puling their ass cheeks apart to see if they can see your ringpiece or not.

I find the idea immensley ammusing, but probably less so when they have everyone doing it in order to enter a train or bus station.

Imaging full body scanners are nothing more than a quick way of doing a strip search.

This new tech looks like a way around that, if it works.

Now, lets see how long it takes for the firm to be taken over and swept under the rug by the imaging scanner companies.

lol

that's quiet a funny though (and a very good example of the times in which we live) that the number of people "saved" by terrorism could be vastly outnumbered by the number of people that die due to unexpected effects of exposing hundreds of millions of people to cutting edge scanning technology.

Where will it end?

Sooner or later someone is going to propose neutron activation scanning; after all, all explosives seem to contain nitrogen, so if we can detect nitrogen....

Except food nearly always contains proteins, which contain nitrogen. Excuse me sir, you can't take those foodstuffs through security.

People are also made of proteins.

Best of all, supposing there was an explosive that didn't contain any nitrogen ... how about ... triacetone peroxide? That 'Mother of Satan' stuff at the centre of the 2005 bombings and the liquids-on-aeroplanes scare?

So, no neutron activation scanning then, which is probably just as well. But I bet some fool is going to propose it anyway.

Wonderful

So now they'll start sticking the explosives where the sun doesn't shine to get through security at the airport where the sun doesn't shine (Manchester).

Hopefully they'll be able to remember the passwords and how to log on.

RE: Where will it end?

Actually, PETN isn't nitrogen-based. It also doesn't rely on combustion to perform its magic but rather explosively-rapid decomposition.

And I keep personally thinking of a female suicide bomber concealing the goods in a dildo or vibrator already "well seated". Last I checked, terahertz scanners have trouble going all the way through bodies because of the water content.

Security measures worked!

I don't get it. There was an attempt to blow up a plane. The attempt was unsuccessful. As far as I'm concerned, the security measures (metal detector for living goods, x-ray for luggage) worked. Yes, he took explosives on board but no, he couldn't bring the necessary ignition widget with him.

If we want to avoid that someone can bring any explosives on board those body scanners won't do the trick since, as other pointed out already, the culprits would find some other creative ways to hide the stuff. (And those air blast explosive detectors or passive scanners won't work either if the explosives have been swallowed.) We would need to x-ray every person - particularly a concern for frequent fliers... Then again, in the end this might reduce green house gas emissions; but that's not the point. If we succeeded in making on-board terrorist attacks impossible then the terrorists will just find other valuable targets such as earthbound public transport (er, they already did that), large building (that as well), football stadiums, etc.

I'm not saying we should make life (or rather suicide death) of terrorists easy but all those security measures won't make our own lives much safer though more troublesome.

EA

They will strike where security is weak

Who remembers the IRA bombing Heathrow with mortars back in 1994? It's only a matter of time before somebody repeats it. I'm surprised it hasn't been so far.

I have no idea how large the perimeters of Heathrow, Gatwick, etc., are, but they are not small. What next? Nobody will be allowed near an airport without having a gun shoved up his nose.

I must be honest and admit a slight sadness that the IRA didn't hit an American airline at the time. It might have shut up all those Americans who spoke up (and still do) for the IRA, who gave them money and support.

Re: We could save a fortune

And that still wouldn't stop someone who's swallowed the explosive or stored them inside an orifice such that they wouldn't be seen even when the person is naked.

@John Dee: You assume the explosive would detonate while still inside the orifice, but what if the bomber goes to the lavatory and takes the explosive OUT before setting it off?

Solution

Change the government to remove the scaremongers, then relax.

The terrorists will explode a bus or a plane or a house every now and again. No security measures will ever prevent that, however, more intrusive security measures increase the number of disgruntled citizens who in turn increase the number of potential terror recruits which in turn increases the probability of a successful terrorist attack.

There is a healthy amount of airport security, which is a step or two lower than what we have now. Beyond that no amount of extra hassle for passengers will ever result in a corresponding decrease in terror act probability.

As far as the prospect of dying on a plane brought down by terrorists - how much worse is that than dying in a plane brought down by a lightning or a microburst or CFIT or a maintenance problem?

Remember the Scarebus that fell from the sky on the way from Brazil? Hardly? Well, that's the answer - people die all the time in various accidents but life goes on.

Other than explosives

wouldn't it be simpler to take other weapons through security? Would a glass knife be detected? Or if it would, why not take a lump of glass and a rock in your carry-on luggage and chip out your own knife while in the toilet?