Colonel_Reb
Hall of Famer
More Big Brother intrusions and lies brought to you by the TSA and the Federal Government.
http://blogs.forbes.com/andygreenberg/2011/03/02/docs-reveal-tsa-plan-to-body-scan-pedestrians-train-passengers/
<h1 ="post-title">Documents Reveal TSA Research Proposal To Body-Scan Pedestrians, Train Passengers</h1><div id="attachment_2651" ="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 220px;">
A sample streetside scan image from American Sciences & Engineering.</div>
Updated with the TSA's response below, which denies implementing airport-style scans in mass transit.
Giving Transportation Security Administration agents a peek under
your clothes may soon be a practice that goes well beyond airport
checkpoints. Newly uncovered documents show that as early as 2006, the
Department of Homeland Security has been planning pilot programs to
deploy mobile scanning units that can be set up at public events and in
train stations, along with mobile x-ray vans capable of scanning
pedestrians on city streets.
The non-profit Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) on
Wednesday published documents it obtained from the Department of
Homeland Securityshowing that from 2006 to 2008 the agency planned a
study of of new anti-terrorism technologies that EPIC believes raise
serious privacy concerns. The projects range from what the DHS describes
as "a walk through x-ray screening system that could be deployed at
entrances to special events or other points of interest"Â to "covert
inspection of moving subjects"Â employing the same backscatter imaging
technology currently used in American airports.
The 173-page collection of contracts and reports,
acquired through a Freedom of Information Act request, includes
contracts with Siemens Corporations, Northeastern University, and
Rapiscan Systems. The study was expected to cost more than $3.5 million.
One project allocated to Northeastern University and Siemens would
mount backscatter x-ray scanners and video cameras on roving vans, along
with other cameras on buildings and utility poles, to monitor groups of
pedestrians, assess what they carried, and even track their eye
movements. In another program, the researchers were asked to develop a
system of long range x-ray scanning to determine what metal objects an
individual might have on his or her body at distances up to thirty feet.
</span>
"This would allow them to take these technologies out of the airport
and into other contexts like public streets, special events and ground
transit,"Â says Ginger McCall, an attorney with EPIC. "It's a clear
violation of the fourth amendment that's very invasive, not necessarily
effective, and poses all the same radiation risks as the airport scans."Â
It's not clear to what degree the technologies outlined in the DHS
documents have been implemented. Multiple contacts at the DHS public
affairs office didn't respond to a request for comment Wednesday
afternoon.
Update: A TSA official responds in a statement that
the "TSA has not tested the advancedimaging technology that is
currently used at airports in mass transitenvironments and does not
have plans to do so."Â
A privacy assessment included in the documents for one aspect of the
plans that focused on train security suggests that images wouldn't be
tied to any personally identifiable information such as a subject's
name. Any images shared outside the project or used for training
purposes would have faces blurred, and employees using the system would
be trained to avoid privacy violations, the document says. If the
scanners were to adopt privacy enhancements deployed in new versions of
the airport full body scanners currently being tested by the TSA,
they would alsouse nondescript outlines of people rather than defined
images, only showing items of interest on the subject's body.
But EPIC's McCall says that those safeguards are irrelevant: If
scanners are deployed in public settings, it doesn't matter if they show
full naked images or merely the objects in a user's pockets. "When
you're out walking on the street, it's not acceptable for an officer to
come up and search your bag without probable cause or consent.,"Â she
says. "This is the digital equivalent."Â
In August of last year, Joe Reiss, the vice president of marketing of security contractor American Sciences & Engineering told me in an interview
that the company had sold more than 500 of its backscatter x-ray vans
to governments around the world, including some deployed in the U.S.
Those vans are capable of scanning people, the inside of cars and even
the internals of some buildings while rolling down public streets. The
company claims that its systems' "primary purpose is to image vehicles
and their contents,"Â and that "the system cannot be used to identify an
individual, or the race, sex or age of the person."Â But Reiss admitted
that the van scans do penetrate clothing, and EPIC president Marc
Rotenberg called them "one of the most intrusive technologies
conceivable."Â
On top of exposing research into possible expansion of the scanner
program, EPIC has also filed a lawsuit against the DHS that fights the
use of the scanners in airports. The group is arguing its case in a D.C.
appellate court next week, though some expect the scanners to be ruled constitutional.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/tsa-lies-to-justify-illegal-train-station-grope-down.html
Passengers were forced to enter train station by TSA goons who swarmed them on platform
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
The TSA has been caught in yet another act of deception after
claiming that passengers who were subjected to an invasive pat down and
bag search after getting off an Amtrak train in Savannah, Georgia
earlier this month did not have to enter the station, when in fact
according to firefighter Brian Gamble, TSA agents swarmed the platform
as soon as passengers stepped off the train and ordered them inside the
building.
"(Lt. Brian) Gamble, who also works part-time as a travel agent, tells AOL Travel News
he was bringing a small group that included other firefighters and
policemen to Savannah for a Valentine's Day getaway. They were among 30
or 40 people getting off the train when he says TSA officers ordered
everyone into the terminal."Â
"They sent us all into a roped-off holding area and said ‘Y'all are
going to be searched,'"Â Gamble says. "We were getting off the train.
This didn't make sense."Â
In a lengthier personal account of the incident, Gamble, a firefighter, makes it clear that the train passengers were given no option to leave the station.
"When we got off in Savannah, there were TSA agents out on the
platform that told us to go inside to get our (checked) luggage. So we
were part of about 20 people that wondered inside. As soon as we went
inside the door, there were about 14 TSA agents waiting and they
ushered us into a roped off holding area. They stated we were all being
searched, as well as our luggage. We told them we just got OFF the
train. They said they didn't care, that if we entered the building, we
were subject to search. We told them we didn't want to enter the
building, that THEY told us to. (BTW our luggage was never inside â€" it
was waiting for us on the train platform)."Â
After forcing women to pull up their shirts, the TSA agents
proceeded to pat down two young boys, as seen in the video clip. When
the firefighter started to complain he was told by a TSA supervisor,
"calm down. This is for your own security"Â.
When Gamble informed a Georgia State Patrol officer of what was
going on, the officer asked to see Gamble's ticket and then said he and
his group were free to go.
"I explained what was going on, he left for a few minutes and then
came back and took six of us in our group and said ‘Sorry about that, go
get your luggage, you're good to go.'"Â
After Gamble's video clip of the incident went viral on You Tube,
the TSA was forced to resort to its usual tactic of wheeling out
"Blogger Bob"Â on the TSA website in an effort to explain away the
controversy. The blog states that
Gamble and his group had encountered a fourth amendment-busting VIPR
operation, a random search "where anyone entering an impacted area has
to be screened."Â
As we have documented, VIPR teams
are now occupying America in the name of "security,"Â having expanded
from airports, to train stations, to highways and now street corners.
VIPR is quite obviously a 21st century Gestapo designed to indoctrinate
Americans into accepting Soviet-style shake-downs, bag searches and
groping of genitalia at checkpoints across the country â€" not just in
airports.
"It should be noted that disembarking passengers did not need to
enter the station to claim luggage or get to their car,"Â claims the TSA
blog.
This is of course a complete mischaracterization of the incident. As
Gamble makes clear, the passengers were swarmed with TSA agents on the
platform as soon as they stepped off the train, and were directly told
that they needed to enter the station to pick up their luggage, even
though it was waiting for them on the platform. The passengers didn't
want or need to enter the station, but they were ordered to do so by
TSA workers.
The TSA has once again been caught lying about their conduct â€"
fabricating stories in a crass attempt to justify their assault on the
constitutional rights of the American people, who under the fourth
amendment are supposed to be protected from "unreasonable searches,"Â
which is precisely what the Savannah incident represented.
"Their apology is kind of lame,"Â said Gamble. "I thought this whole thing was very unprofessional and very shady."Â
A TSA worker's comment that he liked the smell of the perfume one woman was wearing was typically creepy given the fact that TSA employees have a propensity for predatory sexual harassment and criminal behavior.
"One guy went through (Traci's) hand luggage and smelled her perfume
and made comments about it smelling good. It was just not
professional. It was just weird,"Â Gamble said.
The fact that the women subjected to the search also had their
breasts fondled according to the firefighter is particularly prescient
in relation to a House committee hearing in New Hampshire scheduled to discuss
"a bill that would make it a sexual assault for an airport screener to
touch or view a person's breast or genitals without probable cause."Â
An online poll currently running on the WMUR website shows that an
overwhelming 92 per cent of respondents are in favor of the
legislation.
http://blogs.forbes.com/andygreenberg/2011/03/02/docs-reveal-tsa-plan-to-body-scan-pedestrians-train-passengers/
<h1 ="post-title">Documents Reveal TSA Research Proposal To Body-Scan Pedestrians, Train Passengers</h1><div id="attachment_2651" ="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 220px;">
A sample streetside scan image from American Sciences & Engineering.</div>Updated with the TSA's response below, which denies implementing airport-style scans in mass transit.
Giving Transportation Security Administration agents a peek under
your clothes may soon be a practice that goes well beyond airport
checkpoints. Newly uncovered documents show that as early as 2006, the
Department of Homeland Security has been planning pilot programs to
deploy mobile scanning units that can be set up at public events and in
train stations, along with mobile x-ray vans capable of scanning
pedestrians on city streets.
The non-profit Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) on
Wednesday published documents it obtained from the Department of
Homeland Securityshowing that from 2006 to 2008 the agency planned a
study of of new anti-terrorism technologies that EPIC believes raise
serious privacy concerns. The projects range from what the DHS describes
as "a walk through x-ray screening system that could be deployed at
entrances to special events or other points of interest"Â to "covert
inspection of moving subjects"Â employing the same backscatter imaging
technology currently used in American airports.
The 173-page collection of contracts and reports,
acquired through a Freedom of Information Act request, includes
contracts with Siemens Corporations, Northeastern University, and
Rapiscan Systems. The study was expected to cost more than $3.5 million.
One project allocated to Northeastern University and Siemens would
mount backscatter x-ray scanners and video cameras on roving vans, along
with other cameras on buildings and utility poles, to monitor groups of
pedestrians, assess what they carried, and even track their eye
movements. In another program, the researchers were asked to develop a
system of long range x-ray scanning to determine what metal objects an
individual might have on his or her body at distances up to thirty feet.
</span>
"This would allow them to take these technologies out of the airport
and into other contexts like public streets, special events and ground
transit,"Â says Ginger McCall, an attorney with EPIC. "It's a clear
violation of the fourth amendment that's very invasive, not necessarily
effective, and poses all the same radiation risks as the airport scans."Â
It's not clear to what degree the technologies outlined in the DHS
documents have been implemented. Multiple contacts at the DHS public
affairs office didn't respond to a request for comment Wednesday
afternoon.
Update: A TSA official responds in a statement that
the "TSA has not tested the advancedimaging technology that is
currently used at airports in mass transitenvironments and does not
have plans to do so."Â
A privacy assessment included in the documents for one aspect of the
plans that focused on train security suggests that images wouldn't be
tied to any personally identifiable information such as a subject's
name. Any images shared outside the project or used for training
purposes would have faces blurred, and employees using the system would
be trained to avoid privacy violations, the document says. If the
scanners were to adopt privacy enhancements deployed in new versions of
the airport full body scanners currently being tested by the TSA,
they would alsouse nondescript outlines of people rather than defined
images, only showing items of interest on the subject's body.
But EPIC's McCall says that those safeguards are irrelevant: If
scanners are deployed in public settings, it doesn't matter if they show
full naked images or merely the objects in a user's pockets. "When
you're out walking on the street, it's not acceptable for an officer to
come up and search your bag without probable cause or consent.,"Â she
says. "This is the digital equivalent."Â
In August of last year, Joe Reiss, the vice president of marketing of security contractor American Sciences & Engineering told me in an interview
that the company had sold more than 500 of its backscatter x-ray vans
to governments around the world, including some deployed in the U.S.
Those vans are capable of scanning people, the inside of cars and even
the internals of some buildings while rolling down public streets. The
company claims that its systems' "primary purpose is to image vehicles
and their contents,"Â and that "the system cannot be used to identify an
individual, or the race, sex or age of the person."Â But Reiss admitted
that the van scans do penetrate clothing, and EPIC president Marc
Rotenberg called them "one of the most intrusive technologies
conceivable."Â
On top of exposing research into possible expansion of the scanner
program, EPIC has also filed a lawsuit against the DHS that fights the
use of the scanners in airports. The group is arguing its case in a D.C.
appellate court next week, though some expect the scanners to be ruled constitutional.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/tsa-lies-to-justify-illegal-train-station-grope-down.html
Passengers were forced to enter train station by TSA goons who swarmed them on platform
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
The TSA has been caught in yet another act of deception after
claiming that passengers who were subjected to an invasive pat down and
bag search after getting off an Amtrak train in Savannah, Georgia
earlier this month did not have to enter the station, when in fact
according to firefighter Brian Gamble, TSA agents swarmed the platform
as soon as passengers stepped off the train and ordered them inside the
building.
"(Lt. Brian) Gamble, who also works part-time as a travel agent, tells AOL Travel News
he was bringing a small group that included other firefighters and
policemen to Savannah for a Valentine's Day getaway. They were among 30
or 40 people getting off the train when he says TSA officers ordered
everyone into the terminal."Â
"They sent us all into a roped-off holding area and said ‘Y'all are
going to be searched,'"Â Gamble says. "We were getting off the train.
This didn't make sense."Â
In a lengthier personal account of the incident, Gamble, a firefighter, makes it clear that the train passengers were given no option to leave the station.
"When we got off in Savannah, there were TSA agents out on the
platform that told us to go inside to get our (checked) luggage. So we
were part of about 20 people that wondered inside. As soon as we went
inside the door, there were about 14 TSA agents waiting and they
ushered us into a roped off holding area. They stated we were all being
searched, as well as our luggage. We told them we just got OFF the
train. They said they didn't care, that if we entered the building, we
were subject to search. We told them we didn't want to enter the
building, that THEY told us to. (BTW our luggage was never inside â€" it
was waiting for us on the train platform)."Â
After forcing women to pull up their shirts, the TSA agents
proceeded to pat down two young boys, as seen in the video clip. When
the firefighter started to complain he was told by a TSA supervisor,
"calm down. This is for your own security"Â.
When Gamble informed a Georgia State Patrol officer of what was
going on, the officer asked to see Gamble's ticket and then said he and
his group were free to go.
"I explained what was going on, he left for a few minutes and then
came back and took six of us in our group and said ‘Sorry about that, go
get your luggage, you're good to go.'"Â
After Gamble's video clip of the incident went viral on You Tube,
the TSA was forced to resort to its usual tactic of wheeling out
"Blogger Bob"Â on the TSA website in an effort to explain away the
controversy. The blog states that
Gamble and his group had encountered a fourth amendment-busting VIPR
operation, a random search "where anyone entering an impacted area has
to be screened."Â
As we have documented, VIPR teams
are now occupying America in the name of "security,"Â having expanded
from airports, to train stations, to highways and now street corners.
VIPR is quite obviously a 21st century Gestapo designed to indoctrinate
Americans into accepting Soviet-style shake-downs, bag searches and
groping of genitalia at checkpoints across the country â€" not just in
airports.
"It should be noted that disembarking passengers did not need to
enter the station to claim luggage or get to their car,"Â claims the TSA
blog.
This is of course a complete mischaracterization of the incident. As
Gamble makes clear, the passengers were swarmed with TSA agents on the
platform as soon as they stepped off the train, and were directly told
that they needed to enter the station to pick up their luggage, even
though it was waiting for them on the platform. The passengers didn't
want or need to enter the station, but they were ordered to do so by
TSA workers.
The TSA has once again been caught lying about their conduct â€"
fabricating stories in a crass attempt to justify their assault on the
constitutional rights of the American people, who under the fourth
amendment are supposed to be protected from "unreasonable searches,"Â
which is precisely what the Savannah incident represented.
"Their apology is kind of lame,"Â said Gamble. "I thought this whole thing was very unprofessional and very shady."Â
A TSA worker's comment that he liked the smell of the perfume one woman was wearing was typically creepy given the fact that TSA employees have a propensity for predatory sexual harassment and criminal behavior.
"One guy went through (Traci's) hand luggage and smelled her perfume
and made comments about it smelling good. It was just not
professional. It was just weird,"Â Gamble said.
The fact that the women subjected to the search also had their
breasts fondled according to the firefighter is particularly prescient
in relation to a House committee hearing in New Hampshire scheduled to discuss
"a bill that would make it a sexual assault for an airport screener to
touch or view a person's breast or genitals without probable cause."Â
An online poll currently running on the WMUR website shows that an
overwhelming 92 per cent of respondents are in favor of the
legislation.
