
TSA Body Scan? Just Say 'No,' Leading Expert Says - ycnews
http://www.forbes.com/sites/lisabrownlee/2015/12/24/tsa-body-scan-just-say-no-leading-expert-says/
======
pfooti
Wow, so the important part that's not made clear in this headline is that the
TSA recently (last week) asserted that it could deny people patdowns and
require submission to body scans.

The article indicates that this is likely an untenable legal position, but it
seems like that's the opinion of the lawyer rather than a court injunction or
retraction by the TSA. Likely there needs to be more lawsuits before the
policy is forced to change.

~~~
saurik
It is frustrating (and to my eyes highly suspicious) that the TSA announced
this when it did, when a lot of people are paying less attention and doing
less reporting as so much of the country is shut down for the holidays :/.
Here is the context you may have missed.

"TSA can now force you to go through body scanners [pdf]" (166 comments)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10779589](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10779589)

"TSA Sued Over New Policy to Refuse Opt-Outs" (77 comments)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10788826](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10788826)

"TSA Announces It Will Decide Who Goes Through the Body Scanner, Thank You" (4
comments)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10782118](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10782118)

~~~
hellbanner
Stand up for yourself. If you're fine with the pat down but not the body
scanner and you're refused, turn around and go home.

~~~
pfooti
_If you 're fine with the pat down but not the body scanner and you're
refused, turn around and go home._

Or, say, turn around and stay where you are instead of going home.

I do get the pat down pretty regularly, but I can't say for certain that I'd
cancel an entire flight (and take the hit to either my professional reputation
(outbound) or delay getting home to my family (return)) to stand up for this.
That's not even considering the financial hit - I doubt the airlines would be
sympathetic and waive the $100+ rebooking fee they've started charging.

I get the principled stand you're trying to make, but there's quite a few gray
areas here.

edit: balancing parentheses, and context

~~~
saurik
I once made an (extremely benign, I swear) comment, directed at a friend of
mine, about a situation I had just seen where a man who paid for pre-check was
not being provided with any special line access. My friend and I then, as I
always do and directed him to do, opted out. I swear a TSA employee overheard
the comment and we were "punished" for the entire thing: I have never
experienced such a thorough and invasive interrogation, even going through
customs.

We were each assigned, simultaneously, two employees (so four people, total):
one to do a pat down and the other to just _stare_ at us and lord over our
stuff. We were then asked a barrage of questions about who we were, why we
were in the area, who the other person was... great questions that were
absolutely hilarious given my job and the two of us being a tiny tech company
("what is his job title?" "oh man, what does he call himself? I think it is
Vice President of Business Development or something like that?").

I was asked about how I felt standing in line and then the interrogator used
my answer (which I will state was extremely deferent; I actually can tell back
most of the interaction pretty accurately, but I will save you that version of
this ;P) to kind of chastise me (we were late for our flight, by the way, and
knew we had no way of getting to it in time, but simply _did not care_ as we
had nowhere to be in life _for days_ and we both seasoned and crazy travelers,
so I wasn't at all rushed _or_ bothered). I hate these people. I hate them so
very very bad.

Ok, but so: in my experiences with them I think you will just fail. The TSA
agent will be quite happy to have you sit there until you miss your flight,
and they will probably love telling other TSA employees stories about the
asshole in line who thought they would stand up and fight but who got no
sympathy from anyone in the command hierarchy and got to sit there "as I
smiled at them and shook my finger" as their flight took off :/. Or maybe I
don't know what your goal is with "turn around and stay where you are"
(actually, after typing all of this, I am wondering if your point was that you
might get stranded when you are out and about?).

~~~
late2part
Next time, try this: "I will not answer questions without an attorney, why are
you impeding my Constitutional right to travel?"

~~~
morganvachon
To which they will likely retort with the part of their script dealing with
Constitution-free zones in airports and near the borders.

As I've said elsewhere in this discussion: You can't win the war by losing
battles on the ground. You have to take the fight to the top. If you want
change, you have to approach it politically, as disgusting as that concept is.
Unfortunately, I fear it will take an entire new generation of Congress to
effect that change, and with no term limits that will never happen.

------
pmoriarty
How many people actually opt out of the scans? I always do, but when I'm
waiting to be patted down I always seem to be the only one. Everyone else
always seems to go for the scan.

Another annoying thing is that invariably they have me wait sitting almost
right next to the scanner. I've seen images showing that people behind
scanners also get scanned. The best I can hope for is that the radiation dose
is somewhat lower than when you're actually in the scanner itself.

~~~
nitid_name
How much of a dose do you actually get from the scans?

The best numbers I can find seem to point to something in the 0.015 μSv to
0.88 μSv range. At cruising altitude, you get 0.04 μSv per _minute_ from
cosmic radiation.

I don't think the radiation from these machines should be the biggest concern.

~~~
pmoriarty
The radiation may not be that much, relatively speaking. But it's all focused
on your skin.

Plus, this kind of radiation exposure hasn't been tested on humans for long.
I'd feel better about being scanned had these scanners been in use for 20
years without many adverse effects reported. As it stands, the jury's still
out. And I'd personally rather wait a little longer in line and get a pat down
than take a chance with my health.

~~~
DanBC
Do you drive to the airport?

EDIT: Driving to the airport will expose you to far more risk than walking
through the machine, however you define that risk.

~~~
rbcgerard
What is you confidence level regarding the maintenance and calibration of
these machines?

~~~
DanBC
I have no idea. I do know that driving is far more dangerous how ever you
define danger.

------
chx
My problem with body scanners? Before Snowden I thought I am in tinfoil hat
territory -- but now I am reasonably sure this happens or could happen any
time: they store those scans along with your personal data. But, you are
saying, you are not identifying yourself going into the scanner. Sure you
don't but they have a very, very good idea about who is at the airport based
on simply the flight manifests and then it's just a matter of matching your
face to a relatively small list: Atlanta had 100M passengers, that's only 274
000 daily and you can start with likelier candidates the closer to the time,
it's unlikely you'd need to check more than 10-20k faces.

Edit: to add, the TSA does not even need to be aware of this going on, the
clerks on spot even less so.

~~~
JshWright
> you are not identifying yourself going into the scanner

You don't have your ID checked and boarding pass scanned moments before
entering the scanner? Sure, you wouldn't know exactly the order folks entered
the scanner after being identified, but assuming you couldn't correlate the
scan to the ID based on other publically available information, all it would
take is for you fly twice to correlate the scan to the ID (say... both legs of
a round trip flight?).

~~~
chx
I fail to see how could you exfiltrate data from the "name game" stations. I
have watched very, very closely and I just can't see how your data could enter
into a computer. Or do I remember wrong? I do not think they have an actual
data connection to verify the validity of the boarding pass.

~~~
moftz
They don't, the agent at the desk is just making sure that the name on the
ticket matches the name on the ID you provide. There's been countless articles
about how insecure this is. You buy a ticket under a false name and print out
a second one that has your real name on it. The airline's no-fly list checks
the fake name on the real ticket you bought but the TSA agent checks the real
name on the fake ticket matches the ID that's handed to him.

------
Bud
Extraordinarily annoying Forbes anti-ad-blocker wall. Can't even proceed into
site without disabling ad blocker. Ick.

~~~
dsjoerg
You want to read an article for free, they want you to see their article with
ads. It's a negotiation, and you are free to say no and just not read the
article.

I thought it was tastefully done. They even mentioned they were running a
"light ads" site.

Why would they want to serve their pages to people using ad-blockers anyway?

What would you prefer they have done?

~~~
LesZedCB
My ad-blocker is run to prevent tracking as well. I want them to not track
either.

~~~
dbg31415
I disabled ad-block but left tracking-blocker on and it still wouldn't let me
in. At that point I figured it wasn't worth it.

They want to lose visitors, fine.

What they're forgetting is that people who have ad blockers also share and
post links to various networks... they aren't just shutting out the ad-
blockers, they're shutting out anyone the ad-blockers may be friends with.
It's retarded, but it's their prerogative.

Incidentally, here's a great host file blocker for programs that run ads but
don't support ad-block plugins.

[http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/hosts](http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/hosts)

------
ycnews
Marc Rotenberg is the lawyer who the author obtained comments from for this
article.

------
jsjohnst
Glad to see this story getting some coverage, hope to see more. As someone who
has always opted out (when not pre-check), last week's news made me anxious of
how many debates I'd have to get into all over again in regards to the
constitutionality of the AIT machines when flying.

Can anyone give a good reason why they don't send you through the metal
detector before the pat down? If security were the objective, that seems far
better to combine the two.

Sadly as we all know at this point, their mission seems to be security
theater, not actual security.

~~~
brians
Yes! The legal precedent that allows them to insist on examining you hinges on
then having no initial information about what you're carrying. If you cleanly
pass through a metal detector, then refuse a pat-down, a court MIGHT say the
TSA can't pat you down after. Similarly, the TSA officers before the screening
can't be trained in detecting concealed weapons, because that might count as
knowledge about whether you're armed, and a court might say that the
government only gets one observation. Hence the BDOs: oh no, your honor. Those
staff aren't trained to detect weapons. They're there to detect behavior!

I know you asked for a good reason, and I feel embarrassed to propose this as
one. But it appears to be the actual reason.

~~~
jsjohnst
I knew of this reasoning previously, hence my using of "good reason", but none
the less appreciate the reply. +1'd it as it might be educational for someone
else, especially as you clearly stated the "logic" they are likely applying.

------
bisby
In Belfast, flying over to Edinburgh, my wife (who previously had cancer)
asked to not use the machine. They told her "it's not radiation, it's not like
the American ones" (despite being the exact same one they had at O'Hare).
After 2-3 minutes of debating, they finally let her get a pat down. And then
after the pat down, forced her to go through the machine anyway.

We were in a foreign country, on a pretty tight schedule (missing this flight
wasn't an option), and I wasn't exactly well versed on the legality of these
things in Europe to make the argument.

Having seen the photos these things generate, it seems like they're pretty
much useless unless someone is carrying something on them that would probably
be pretty apparent anyway. Is there any cases where these machines have caught
someone?

------
amyjess
The TSA's body scanners are actively and deliberately hostile to transgender
people: [https://archive.is/LOoPB](https://archive.is/LOoPB)
[http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/trans-woman-
upset-t...](http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/trans-woman-upset-tsa-
scanners-flagging-body-anomaly-article-1.2369457)

If you have both breasts and a penis, you will be treated as a terrorist,
detained, and humiliated.

This is why, as a trans person myself, I refuse to fly until the TSA is
abolished.

~~~
cryoshon
Yeah, the TSA's behavior is disgusting.

If you want things to change in your favor, you need to howl from the rooftops
and make people understand the trouble the TSA puts you through. Personal
accounts are the most compelling. Write your congressman!

------
Xephyrous
Archive.org cache:
[https://web.archive.org/web/20151226155815/http://www.forbes...](https://web.archive.org/web/20151226155815/http://www.forbes.com/sites/lisabrownlee/2015/12/24/tsa-
body-scan-just-say-no-leading-expert-says/)

------
nickthemagicman
The thing that makes me nervous, and I might be being conspiratorial here, but
could they store your body features in a database? I.e. Sort of a
fingerprinting like facial recognition but for the entire body?

I'm sure everyone's body has unique features.

------
mythealias
I am surprised that speed at which this article fell off the front page. There
are older article with fewer comments and points that are still on the front
page.

Is it due to the downvotes for the forbes link?

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noja
London (so not TSA) will deny requests to bypass the body scanners.

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jgalt212
I find the both the scans and pat downs invasive. The pat downs take longer
and I find them more invasive, so I choose the scan.

If the situation were reversed, I'd opt out of the pat down.

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mark_l_watson
They want more people to use the machines, just to justify them.

I think the pat downs are more effective security wise.

------
glasz
i was thinking about how to phrase this: i just hope anyone, who never opts
out, doesn't get grilled by a defective device some day.

------
bitwize
Ah, the old Constitutional bait-n-switcheroo.

------
draw_down
If you're gonna do this, please have the courtesy to be behind me in line.
Your stance is admirable and all, but getting through security is slow enough
as it is.

~~~
saurik
When I opt out I get to sit around waiting for a male TSA employee to no
longer feel he has better things to do so he can give me a pat down; I have
ended up waiting rather extreme periods of time in the past for this to
happen: you get to go around me in line the second I say "opt out", and
nothing I do affects your line... I can end up with an argument with the
employee (which may be what you are objecting to), and it still probably
doesn't affect you (as in, I am pretty sure that my arguing with the person
assigned to direct the people at he conveyer doesn't slow you down _even if
you are intending to opt out_ as I will just keep finding myself punted to
later and later in the queue).

~~~
late2part
I wonder if there's an argument you're making that suggests your due process
rights should involve blocking others queued.

I wish it were true.

Maybe the 14th amendment could be used to say that the not immediately
servicing your opt-out is unequal treatment?

~~~
saurik
(I was just making a point that someone should not be angry at me for opting
out because they claim I made their day take longer.)

