Scanners!

From The Rutherford Institute and Alliance Defense Fund:

11/16/2010




The Rutherford Institute Defends Airline Pilots, Sues Dept. of Homeland Security & TSA Over Scanners, Virtual Strip Searches & Full-Body ‘Rub-Downs’

WASHINGTON, DC -- In a case involving the continuing encroachment of modern technology upon personal privacy, The Rutherford Institute has filed a Fourth Amendment lawsuit in federal court against Janet Napolitano, secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and John Pistole, administrator of the Transportation Security Agency (TSA), on behalf of two airline pilots who refused to submit to airport security screening which relies on advanced imaging technology that exposes intimate details of a person’s body to government agents.



In opting out of being put through the Whole Body Imaging (WBI) scanners, the pilots, Michael Roberts and Ann Poe, both veterans of the commercial airline industry, also refused to be subjected to the alternative--enhanced, full-body pat- or rub-downs by Transportation Security Agency (TSA) agents. Insisting that the procedures violate the Fourth Amendment prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures found in the U.S. Constitution, The Rutherford Institute’s lawsuit asks the court to prohibit DHS and TSA from continuing to unlawfully use WBI technology and newly-implemented enhanced pat-down procedures as the first line of airport security screening in the United States.



The complaint in Michael Roberts, et al., v. Janet Napolitano, et al. is available here.



“Forcing Americans to undergo a virtual strip search as a matter of course in reporting to work or boarding an airplane when there is no suspicion of wrongdoing is a grotesque violation of our civil liberties, undermining our right to privacy and to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures by government agents,” said John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute. “Indeed, TSA is forcing travelers to consent to a virtual strip search or allow an unknown officer to literally place his or her hands in your pants.”



As airports across the country continue to install the controversial devices, a growing number of Americans are voicing concerns about the impact of the scanners on their privacy rights and the risks they pose to travelers’ health.



Collectively, Michael Roberts, a pilot for ExpressJet Airlines, Inc., and Ann Poe, a pilot on the Boeing 777 for Continental Airlines and one of the first 100 women commercial airline pilots in the United States, have more than 50 years of piloting experience and thousands of hours of combined flight time. In two separate incidents taking place on Oct. 15, 2010, and Nov. 4, 2010, respectively, TSA screeners asked Roberts and Poe, who were on their way to work, to submit to WBI scanning or be subjected to a full pat-down frisk of their persons. Upon refusing, both pilots were prevented from passing through security, and unable to report to work on the days in question and since then.



The only alternative to a WBI scan, which has been likened to a “virtual strip-search,” is an enhanced pat-down in which TSA screeners press their “open hands and fingers over most parts of an individual’s body including the breasts, and uses the back of the hands when touching the buttocks. Additionally, officers slide their hands all the way from the inner thigh up to the groin until the hand cannot venture any higher because it is literally stopped by the person’s groin.” The complaint alleges that these procedures, which are described as “profane, degrading, intrusive, and indecent,” besides being “patently unreasonable,” amount to an unreasonable search and seizure of airline employees and travelers passing through security. DHS continues to rapidly deploy WBI scanners throughout U.S. airports, with 491 machines to be deployed by December 2010, and an additional 500 machines in 2011.



And this, related, from The Washington Examiner:
 

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'Naked scanners': Lobbyists join the war on terror

By: Timothy P. Carney

Senior Examiner Columnist

November 12, 2010

Brandi Roberson, training instructor for TSA, looks at a scanned image of an anonymous volunteer on her computer at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, Wash. (AP Photo/The Seattle Times, Mike Siegel)



The degradations of passing through full-body scanners that provide naked pictures of you to Transportation Security Administration agents may not mean that the terrorists have won -- but they do mark victories for a few politically connected high-tech companies and their revolving-door lobbyists.



Many experts and critics suspect that the full-body "naked scanners" recently deployed at U.S. airports do little to make us more secure, and a lot to make us angry, embarrassed and late. For instance, the scanners can't see through skin, and so weapons or explosives can be hidden safely in body cavities.



But this is government we're talking about. A program or product doesn't need to be effective, it only needs to have a good lobby. And the naked-scanner lobby is small but well-connected.



If you've seen one of these scanners at an airport, there's a good chance it was made by L-3 Communications, a major contractor with the Department of Homeland Security. L-3 employs three different lobbying firms including Park Strategies, where former Sen. Al D'Amato, R-N.Y., plumps on the company's behalf. Back in 1989, President George H.W. Bush appointed D'Amato to the President's Commission on Aviation Security and Terrorism following the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103. Also on Park's L-3 account is former Appropriations staffer Kraig Siracuse.



The scanner contract, issued four days after the Christmas Day bomb attempt last year, is worth $165 million to L-3.



Rapiscan got the other naked-scanner contract from the TSA, worth $173 million. Rapiscan's lobbyists include Susan Carr, a former senior legislative aide to Rep. David Price, D-N.C., chairman of the Homeland Security Subcommittee. When Defense Daily reported on Price's appropriations bill last winter, the publication noted "Price likes the budget for its emphasis on filling gaps in aviation security, in particular the whole body imaging systems."



An early TSA contractor for full-body scanners was the American Science and Engineering company. AS&E's lobbying team is impressive, including Tom Blank, a former deputy administrator for the TSA. Fellow AS&E lobbyist Chad Wolf was an assistant administrator at TSA and an aide to Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, who sits on the Transportation and Defense subcommittees of Appropriations. Finally, Democratic former Rep. Bud Cramer is also an AS&E lobbyist -- he sat on the Defense and Transportation subcommittees of the Appropriations Committee.



The full-body scanners have caused an understandable uproar. Even before the devices were rolled out, they sparked predictable mischief: During training on the scanners, a group of TSA workers noted and mocked the genitalia of the guinea-pig employee sent through the scanner. The guy soon beat down one of his mockers and was arrested for assault.



After assurances by contractors and the TSA that the nude images of the scanners' subjects weren't being stored and saved, the U.S. Marshals Service admitted that it had stored thousands of such images.



Homeland Security insists that the "naked scans" are optional, but if you're randomly selected for one and you "opt out," you're subject to a very intimate frisk.



There's good reason to doubt these scanners significantly reduce the chance of a successful terrorist attack on an airplane. Deploying these naked scanners was a reaction to Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's failed attempt to blow up a plane on Christmas 2009, but the Government Accountability Office found, "it remains unclear whether [the scanners] would have been able to detect the weapon Mr. Abdulmutallab used."



But there's a deeper question to ask: how far are we willing to go to prevent weapons or bombs from getting on airplanes? In the past decade, terrorists on airplanes have killed just about 3,000 people -- all on one day. Even if the Christmas Day bomber had succeeded, the number would be under 3,500.



Those are horrible deaths. But in that same period, more than 150,000 people have been murdered in the United States. We haven't put the entire U.S. on lockdown -- or even murder capitals like Detroit, New Orleans and Baltimore.



While reducing the murder rate to zero is very desirable, we also understand that the costs, in terms of liberty and resources, are too great. But when it comes to air travel, 9/11 seems to have stripped away our ability to put things in perspective.



Politicians feed into that paranoia with their rhetoric. And lobbyists and government contractors feed on the paranoia.



Update: I failed to mention that Bush’s Homeland Security Secretary flacking for nudie-scanners, too



and Mark Hemingway notes that George Soros is also profiting off controversial new TSA scanners


Timothy P. Carney, The Examiner's senior political columnist, can be contacted at tcarney@washingtonexaminer.com. His column appears Monday and Thursday, and his stories and blog posts appear on ExaminerPolitics.com



Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/_Naked-scanners__-Lobbyists-join-the-war-on-terror-1540901-107548388.html#ixzz15bn3vNcF
 
 
And this, also related, also from The Washington Examiner:
 

George Soros also profiting off controversial new TSA scanners

By: Mark Hemingway

Commentary Staff Writer

11/15/10 12:55 PM EST

Be sure and read Tim Carney’s Examiner column today on the politically-connected lobby for the controversial new TSA scanners that are upsetting airline employees and travelers everywhere. Carney notes that a company called Rapiscan got a $165 million contract for the new body image scanners four days after the underwear-bomber incident this past Christmas. Not surprisingly, Rapiscan is politically connected, observes Carney:



Rapiscan got the other naked-scanner contract from the TSA, worth $173 million. Rapiscan’s lobbyists include Susan Carr, a former senior legislative aide to Rep. David Price, D-N.C., chairman of the Homeland Security Subcommittee. When Defense Daily reported on Price’s appropriations bill last winter, the publication noted “Price likes the budget for its emphasis on filling gaps in aviation security, in particular the whole body imaging systems.”



Then this morning Carney also noted that former Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff was flacking for Rapiscan.



As for the company’s other political connections, it also appears that none other than George Soros, the billionaire funder of the country’s liberal political infrastructure, owns 11,300 shares of OSI Systems Inc., the company that owns Rapiscan. Not surprisingly, OSI’s stock has appreciated considerably over the course of the year. Soros certainly is a savvy investor.



Note that OSI Systems CEO is Deepak Chopra, but it appears to be a different Deepak Chopra than the more famous liberal new age guru







Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/george-soros-michael-chertoff-profiting-off-controversial-new-tsa-scanners-108194724.html#ixzz15bnQ7reV
 
 
And lastly, this, also related, also from The Washington Examiner:
 

Bush’s Homeland Security Secretary flacking for nudie-scanners, too

By: Timothy P. Carney

Senior Examiner Columnist

11/15/10 12:20 PM EST



U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)



The companies that make the airport nudie-scanners have high-priced lobbying teams that include former congressmen, top Capitol Hill staff, and former TSA brass, as I reported in my column yesterday.



But because I focussed on registered lobbyists, I left out the highest-profile revolving-door character in the pay of the nudie-scanner industry: George W. Bush’s Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff. After the undie-bomber attempt on Christmas 2009, Chertoff went on a media tour promoting the use of these scanners, without disclosing that he was getting paid by Rapiscan, one of the two companies currently contracted by TSA to take a nude picture of you at the airport.



Here’s Chertoff in the NY Times just days after Christmas last year:



Screening technologies with names like millimeter-wave and backscatter X-ray can show the contours of the body and reveal foreign objects. Such machines, properly used, are a leap ahead of the metal detectors used in most airports, and supporters say they are necessary to keep up with the plans of potential terrorists. “If they’d been deployed, this would pick up this kind of device,” Michael Chertoff, the former homeland security secretary, said in an interview…



Chertoff was quickly reamed for not disclosing how he had monetized his public service.



The whole situation is depressing for two reasons:



1) It’s tawdry how much our “public servants” use their government jobs as meal tickets.2) It’s sad how much companies set up their businesses to depend on government, and thus lobbyists.



Influence magazine is a trade publication of K Street, and one of Rapiscan’s hired guns, McKenna Aldridge, is touting this article on its website:





Rapiscan’s Presence on Capitol Hill Pays Off



…Rapiscan Systems, an OSI Systems Inc. subsidiary, has already taken note. The Hawthorne, Calif.-based company puts around 15 percent of its revenues back into the company to develop new technology.



But Rapiscan knows it needs to play ball in Washington to increase its profits. Like all companies that deal in homeland security, Rapiscan faces myriad legislative issues involving privacy, liability, customs, and the implementation of the 9/11 Commission recommendations. To compete with Boeing, Northrop Grumman, and L-3 Communications Corp., among other companies, two years ago Rapiscan opened a Washington office and hired more outside lobbyists and agency-specific federal marketing and sales staff.



The results have been apparent. Last year the company did $17 million t $20 million in contracts. Over the past six months, the company has had $40 million in sales to the U.S. government, compared with $8 million in 2004.



Two parting notes:



1) ”Play ball” is an interesting choice of words, considering that the alternative to walking through the Rapiscan is a friendly pat-down. 2) You’d think parent company OSI systems, when naming its nudie-scanner subsidiary, would have come up with a name less similar to RapeScan







Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/bushs-homeland-security-secretary-flacking-for-nudie-scanners-too-108187479.html#ixzz15bncqumr