the “pornoscanners” probably add a small dose (officially 0.025mrem per scan), but the paper makes a good point: is it really “only” 0.025mrem? and where do you deposit the radiation? and who is maintaining the scanners and checking the dose? xray machines in medical facilities have a trained radio technician, checking the dose often enough (and even those are known to fail and give patients way too much radiation), the TSA has, well, TSA trained people… with probably very little scientific/technical education (on average), so the probability for radiation failure at the TSA is just grotesquely higher (especially if you learn how the machines were lobbied and sold).

I will stay on the side of caution, and go for the hand job instead of a questionable radiation dose.

I think that if he is serious that he should apply the same rule to everything around him. Indeed he should use his pornocomputer to write a pornoletter to his pornocongressman asking for a pornomeeting. During this pornomeeting over pornocoffe he can make his case for banning all the threats he sees to his liberty: pornocarrots, pornozucchini, pornoyams, pornodogs, pornocats & lest we forget: pornogerbils.

Over my pornodead body!

And stay the hell away from the Rapiscan machines.

Russia routinely uses radio active material to do covert kills. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Alexander_Litvinenko http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrei_Tarkovsky

“Don’t scan us, it’s not healthy!”
“Don’t scan us, it’s a privacy violation!”
“I opt out because I don’t trust the machine to function properly”

What’s the core issue? Representative democracy fails in the form of enabling legislation for security issues. We have a RIGHT to travel freely inside of and to leave the United States. There is NO DEBATE on the right of freedom to travel. Even the UN agrees on this issue!

Some fucking bozo or collection of bozos at the TSA decided to buy these devices, force you into the thing, violate the constitution ten ways from Sunday, and now they’re fighting a media war against us all. We have legislation passed as law that allows the TSA to create policies that have the same impact and binding as law. People are being arrested because of a non-democratically elected bureaucrat and their ideas about rules. Please note that my issue isn’t just with these specific rules but that the rules are not from the people. The rules and regulations are from a collection of government agents that profess to know better and _also_ claim to be outside of the realm of criticism.

We’re doomed if we keep resisting with this cycle. We need to change the dialog. Yes, the scanners are unsafe. Yes, feeling your junk is a nightmare for a myriad of reasons. Yes, violent terrorism is a real problem. Yes, we need to protect air travel. No, we do not have to obey some orders because someone in a uniform told us to do something.

We need to get rid of enabling legislation without accountability! None of this discussion would be happening if the people impacted were consulted _before_ the actions of the TSA were taken. We would also find everyone in a better position to negotiate. We wouldn’t have millions of dollars worth of scanners sitting around, we wouldn’t have pending sexual assault lawsuits against the TSA – all of these things are expensive and overall negative for the country. They impact each of us in a fiscal manner but also in an important emotional sense.

We’ve created tons of security checkpoints in a free country as an emergent phenomenon of bureaucratic ass covering. We look like the Stasi more and more every single day. We behave less and less like a free people.

Here’s a great example: I’m using Tor to post this because it is well known that the FBI monitors popular websites – Reddit’s GPS tracking story being the most recent popular example – for so called ‘extremist’ thought crimes.

What is the result of posting your thoughts online? For communicating with people that cross some magical threshold? You will be followed, harassed, tracked with embedded electronic devices, detained at airports, equipment seized, and so on. What’s worse is the fear that comes with that kind of treatment – what will happen to you next? Will your house be raided? If you look at some of the stories on Boing Boing lately, we see that this isn’t so far fetched.

Dear Internet monitors at the FBI/NSAT&T – I know you think that you’re doing the right thing but this isn’t the country I want to live in.

The issues with the TSA are not limited to the TSA – it’s a problem with the entire US Government. The issue of flaws in enabling legislation are relevant for a whole slew of agencies and for nearly every issue.

Ummm, are you serious? You know who’s really serious, don’t you? Michael Cherthoff.

http://www.nowpublic.com/world/full-body-scanner-lobby-michael-chertoff-rapiscan-2552674.html

So, according to your metric, Mr. Cherthoff is much more believable, due to his seriousness, while we should ignore the serious fact that he is making serious money off these seriously ill-conceived and executed machines.

Of course, according to your serious metric, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were totally acceptable, because they were promoted by serious people.

And, moving on to your ‘let’s not jump to conclusions’ argument: yes, indeed, let’s not rush to judgment and spread misinformation about these machines that somehow got approved, even though it is obvious that no definitive testing has been done. Furthermore, you take the government’s word at face value. Gee, when have they ever lied to the people to get what they want?

Seriously?

On multiple occasions, TSA employees have been caught using the scanners (or the images of the people scanned that the machines save) for pornographic purposes.

[citation needed]

Do you want me to put this cigarette out on your arm? Its the same amount of heat you are exposed to by standing in the sun for 5 minutes, sitting in front of the campfire for 10 minutes, or turning up your furnace 1 degree. Ok, I ball parked the numbers, but hopefully you understand.

How that dose interacts with humans is as important as the size of the dose. The biologist has brought up a number of valid concerns that should be taken seriously. The devices have a X-ray source that is capable of damaging levels of radiation and have moving parts, how that does interacts with the body, and how the devices could be used or abused in the future are all very relevant to the discussion.

(Think Catch-22 and Milo Minderbinder.)

(Think Catch-22 and Milo Minderbinder.)

Showing up at the airport in speedos or bikinis is cute, but then going ahead and boarding the plane after a quickie interview really kinda defeats the purpose. Doesn’t it?

Businesspeople deciding not to fly because they have a legitimate fear of the technology that outweighs their fear of being blown up, though, could make an actual difference.

That’s what it comes down to, really:

If the overall health risks of this technology being harmful are statistically higher than the risk of being blown up, then our government is harming us more than terrorists ever could and we should ALL stop flying. If not, then the technology is a relative benefit.

Personally, I’d be a lot more frightened if a private physician or scientist with 20 years of experience (or a hundred of them?) came out and said, “This is dangerous,” than one or two people competing for attention. Seems to me we’ve had just about enough from people wearing tinfoil hats on both sides of LOTS of issues and it might be time to listen to the voice of reason.

Rich white people own their own planes and don’t go through the scanners or TSA gropers unleashed at us at mass-transit carrier airports.

Of course, according to your serious metric, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were totally acceptable, because they were promoted by serious people.

Wow. You really don’t know me.

Los Alamos: http://www.medgadget.com/archives/2010/01/study_looks_into_potential_side_effects_of_terahertz_full_body_scanner_technology.html

“How terahertz waves tear apart DNA”: http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/24331/

So if XRay machines that concentrate their energy in the skin are operated by $12/hour employees of an agency which makes a policy of lying about their policies, and the agency was buying them because their former head sells the things, forgive me if I give them less respect than the agencies that bought electronic voting machines for political reasons.

For example: the crystallographers routinely use a broad spectrum of different wavelengths of radiation within the X-ray band, and they are *acutely* aware — in quantitative terms — that these different wavelengths interact with matter in very different ways (e.g., Compton scattering, anomolous dispersion). Most physicians using X-ray sources don’t have to think about these issues nearly as much.

This is particularly relevant because the X-rays emitted for backscatter imaging are substantially longer-wavelength than the X-rays used in medical diagnostics. In short, the crystallographers are *extremely* likely to have specialized, *relevant* expertise that the physicians lack.

When I was doing research on the safety of the food coming out of the Gulf after the oil gusher I found out that the same issue of exposure to children was being ignored. Adults could eat shrimp more than children and the kids would have a hirer chance of a problem because of the lower body weigh.

However the FDA dismissed these issues and questions from the senior scientist of the NRDC. The reasons they were dismissed were many but on of the bigger ones was the inability of the scientists to understand how to push a potentially scary issue. Fear of a future death from cancer years down the road (and with out a specific traceable trigger) is hard for them to push and the public to accept.
If the scanner killed 5000 people a year it probably still would be hard to ban it. Only quick deaths of rich white people would cause the ban of the machine. Or the death of innocent babies and children of the rich media.

Anon what the hell are you talking about? "This is particularly relevant because the X-rays emitted for backscatter imaging are substantially longer-wavelength than the X-rays used in medical diagnostics. " The KvP for these machines is around 50 Kev. Typical Kv for mammo is 27-30 and for other exams around 100. Quit spreading misinformation.

Please read what Arenson had to say: http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2010/11/tsa_scanner_controversy_ucsf_r.php

Presuming the information made public about these scanners is close to accurate, this is totally trivial dose. The letter from the UCSF non-medical, non-physician PhD's did get one thing right, there should have been some review by an independent group of people.

One other observation: many of the people who are so incensed over this invasion of privacy seem to be the same who were also interested in passing obamacare, which, I guarantee you, will be a far far greater intrusion into your privacy and private choice than this ever will be. If you do not trust the government to be honest in this issue, please direct your efforts into keeping them away from running and ruining our medical care.