The TSA tried to weasel its way out of a lawsuit in which a TSA agent forced a man to delete a video he'd taken of being searched by an agent but the court rejected its qualified immunity defense. Cory Doctorow has more on his Pluralistic blog:

Qualified immunity is a bizarre American legal doctrine that says that government officials (especially cops) that break the law aren't personally liable for their lawlessness unless the law they violate is "clearly established."

Last September, Jessica Lundquist passed through a body-scanner at Burbank airport and was told by a TSA screener that they wanted to conduct a "groin search" on her.

Last Mother's Day, grandmother Rhonda Mengert was subjected to a pat-down search at Tulsa airport, wherein a TSA agent felt a panty-liner in her underwear; she was then forced to strip down and show her panty-liner to a female TSA agent. — Read the rest

Back in 2012, Jon Corbett made headlines by showing that he could easily get metal through TSA checkpoints' full-body pornoscanners: his experiences fighting the TSA convinced him to get his law license and hang out a shingle, and now he has his first client: Rhonda Mengert, a grandmother who was illegally strip-searched by the Tulsa TSA because they felt a panty-liner when they patted down her crotch. — Read the rest

Jon Corbett, who posted a video explaining a vulnerability in TSA full-body scanners that might allow dangerous objects onto airplanes now reports that two different reporters have told him that they were contacted by a TSA spokesperson called Sari Koshetz who "strongly cautioned" them not to write about his video.

Yesterday, I wrote about Jon Corbett's video, in which he demonstrates a method that appears to make it easy to smuggle metal objects (including weapons) through a TSA full-body scanner. The TSA has responded by saying that they still trust the machines, but they won't say why, "for obvious security reasons." — Read the rest

Jon Corbett, an engineer who is suing the TSA over the use of full-body "pornoscanners," has developed and documented a simple way to smuggle metallic objects, including guns, through the scanners. He tested the method at real TSA checkpoints, producing video-documentation that shows him apparently passing through the scanners with odd-shaped metal objects in a hidden pocket sewn into his garments. — Read the rest