TSA Takes Bold Step Toward Nude Flights at SeaTac

Backscatter scan, courtesy TSA, leaves little about how it's hanging to the imagination.

Goldy at HorsesAss is having none of the full-body security scans starting up at SeaTac this September, claiming the invasion of privacy and safety concerns are just too much. (In March 2010, the TSA purchased 450 advanced imaging technology units with ARRA funds--at $130,000 to $170,000 each, says the Seattle Times.)

Regular surveillance cameras were enough to catch the TSA supervisor who stole $20,000 worth of valuables from checked luggage, but SeaTac, which has one of the more complex and inane security/performance art installations in the nation, has no problem with an invasive upgrade. (In fairness, they arbitrarily downgrade, too: "TSA Relaxes Restrictions for Cigarette Lighters and Breast Milk in Carry-On Luggage.")

Of the two types of imaging technology, millimeter wave and backscatter, it's the latter that has health professionals worried. Backscatter relies on low-dose x-rays just strong enough to "see through" clothes, but be reflected back by skin and soft tissue.

Health professionals are concerned that this kind of exposure directed at the skin could still have effects: "[T]here really is no threshold of low dose being OK. Any dose of X-rays produces some potential risk," David Agard, a biochemist and biophysicist at UCSF told NPR.

In an Orwellian touch of "sensitivity," the x-ray units employ a blurring algorithm while passengers are observed nude, and the TSA has instituted a complicated privacy procedure so that you will never actually see the officer checking you out nude:

...the officer who assists the passenger never sees the image the technology produces. The officer who views the image is remotely located in a secure resolution room and never sees the passenger. The two officers communicate via wireless headset. Once the remotely located officer determines threat items are not present, that officer communicates wirelessly to the officer assisting the passenger.

Does it strike anyone else as odd that after spending over $130,000 on a machine whose only purpose is to allow close inspection of the body, that the results should be actively made harder to see? Look, you're either invading someone's privacy or not--no Peeping Tom has ever gotten off by arguing that his photos were slightly out of focus.

I know we're pretending technology is doing the looking, not people, but wouldn't it be easier and much less expensive to have people strip down entirely at the airport and get their clothes back once they're arrived at their destination? We're already taking our shoes and belts off, and now everything has to come out of our pockets, metallic or not. Let's cut to the chase: Compulsory nudity is what the TSA really wants. I'm inclined to give it to them, but only so long as the airport heating is adequate.

In a not-unrelated side note: "62 percent of airports worldwide lost traffic in 2009."