5 ms·

The DHS's latest airport security device: Terahertz laser scanners

22 points by mrsebastian 14y ago

kintamanimatt 14y ago
It's a shame society at large has become so afraid of other people.
- jballanc 14y ago
  Only in some parts of the world.
  - kintamanimatt 14y ago
    Fear tends to spread like fungus.
daeken 14y ago
If that technology actually works (that is, if it detects materials the way they believe it does), that's... actually pretty slick. There are definitely some privacy concerns, but it's a large step forward both in terms of privacy and (technical) efficacy. That, of course, doesn't mean that it's actually a Good Thing (TM) that we use these, regardless; just because it works technically doesn't mean it's actually an effective way of preventing terrorist attacks, or that any of that is worth the privacy hit, even if it is smaller than with previous tech.
- naich 14y ago
  That is a huge "If" at the start there. I'm highly skeptical of their claims - especially the "50 feet" bit.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
UnoriginalGuy 14y ago
I like how the article goes to pains to describe this technology as NOT a visible laser beam and then uses a visible laser beam as their stock photo in the header.
jstalin 14y ago
Opt out. Every time.
- marquis 14y ago
  How is opting-out possible in this case?
masto 14y ago
This article makes my head spin with the author's confusing mixing of the terms shorter and longer, higher and lower, up and down, above and below, when referring to wavelengths. Am I the only one who is more accustomed to thinking in terms of frequency, so UV is "above" visible light which is above infrared? I would think with something named after its frequency, it would make sense to stick to that terminology.
droithomme 14y ago
If these devices worked to accurately identify unknown materials from 50 feet away, they would already be used in thousands of labs and we'd know empirically how well they work, whether non-scientists can use them as accurately as scientists, what the false positive rate is, etc. If more accurate than a traditional lab spectrometer they would already be used widely. If less accurate, we don't need them to be used to get probable cause for "bomb" searches that "just happen" to turn up things like too much cash or a bit of pot. Even worse, we don't need their results as "evidence" that drug or bomb "residue" was found. Already we see many people arrested for "possession of meth precursors" because they have aluminum foil, plastic sandwich bags and brake fluid in their house. In many cases it is about coming up with a plausible reason for arresting people these days rather than actually holding criminals who cause trouble (such as those on wall street) accountable.
- darklajid 14y ago
  Not sure if you did that intentionally (to make the claim even more questionable), but the article says "50 meters", not "50 feet". That's more than 3 times the distance. Silent downvotes, how lovely. Why? For reference: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/1194203/Terahertz.png https://dl.dropbox.com/u/1194203/Terahertz.png Unless they geo-locate me in Europe and s/feet/meter/ (how stupid would that be?) I fail to understand what the silent criticism is for.
  - pvnick 14y ago
    Your comment comes off as critical and hostile, whereas I'm sure his mistake was just that - a mistake. That's why you're getting downvoted. This isn't reddit.
    - darklajid 14y ago
      1) 'Comes off as' is more often than not wrong in a text based conversation where you don't know the other party. I didn't intend to nitpick, I wanted to emphasize 50m. 15m would be impressive, but 50m is just so much more unbelievable. 2) 'This isn't reddit' is a bullshit appendix for any comment. Thank you for helping me understand that the comment might be misunderstood. Let me return the favor by saying that your last sentence is (objective) useless or harmful, please avoid it.
michaelfeathers 14y ago
So what are the health risks of exposure?
- forgotusername 14y ago
  Non-ionising radiation, so assuming power level is low, very little.
napkindrawing 14y ago
Hilarious! So now all it takes to shut down an airport is to sprinkle a bunch of blackpowder outside in the parking lot for people to track in on their shoes? The government is making the "terrorists"' job way too easy.
icegreentea 14y ago
The company (Genia Photonics) is a Canadian startup that builds lasers. They appear to specialize in picosecond length laser pulses for a variety of imaging and sensing needs. They've published some papers/articles on their technology in biomedical imaging contexts. Link to one at the bottom. The point is that it doesn't look like some company 'inventing' some BS and pulling one on the DHS. Maybe. http://www.opticsinfobase.org/boe/abstract.cfm?uri=boe-2-5-1296 http://www.opticsinfobase.org/boe/abstract.cfm?uri=boe-2-5-1...
einhverfr 14y ago
Now this poses all sorts of new issues. The 4th Amendment issues are quite interesting to consider. This is programmable meaning it can search for specific substances right? Does this mean that the use of this device to find drugs will be an impermissible search under the test Alito articulated for the 3rd Circuit? It seems that this is a very promising way to get the bodyscanners challenged in court as needlessly intrusive, and force these to only look for explosives.
netfire 14y ago
If this were a replacement to the current backscatter scanners, this would be more interesting. Since it doesn't seem like this would catch knives or other non-chemical weapons, this seems like yet another step at the airport that won't provide very much additional security and could provide a lot of false positives, as already mentioned.
DanielBMarkham 14y ago
If I'm not mistaken I believe the question the author is posing here is "Isn't it better to have a passive device that can, from 50 meters away, spectroscopically determine what substances you've been around than one that takes pictures of you naked?" I don't know how to answer that. Is that better? More to the point, it's not going to be an either-or choice. What'll happen is that these devices, if they are useful, will simply be added to the armada of devices already present. And, more importantly, just like all this other tech being developed for DHS, it'll end up with local law enforcement. In the history of the republic there's probably been about ten situations where something like this could have saved lives but now we'll end up with it everywhere. When I say the TSA needs to be abolished its not simply because they are ineffective, expensive, intrusive into my personal affairs, and represent everything that's gone wrong with the security state. A bigger problem, it seems, is that they're creating huge markets for people to invent and commercialize things with really bad applications to my freedom. A Star Trek tricorder would be awesome, but have we really thought about that? Do we really want everybody walking around with a device that could see through your clothes, tell what chemicals you've been around, diagnose your medical conditions, and so on?

22 points by mrsebastian 14y ago

kintamanimatt 14y ago

It's a shame society at large has become so afraid of other people.

jballanc 14y ago
Only in some parts of the world.
- kintamanimatt 14y ago
  Fear tends to spread like fungus.

daeken 14y ago

If that technology actually works (that is, if it detects materials the way they believe it does), that's... actually pretty slick. There are definitely some privacy concerns, but it's a large step forward both in terms of privacy and (technical) efficacy. That, of course, doesn't mean that it's actually a Good Thing (TM) that we use these, regardless; just because it works technically doesn't mean it's actually an effective way of preventing terrorist attacks, or that any of that is worth the privacy hit, even if it is smaller than with previous tech.

naich 14y ago
That is a huge "If" at the start there. I'm highly skeptical of their claims - especially the "50 feet" bit.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]

UnoriginalGuy 14y ago

I like how the article goes to pains to describe this technology as NOT a visible laser beam and then uses a visible laser beam as their stock photo in the header.

jstalin 14y ago

Opt out. Every time.

marquis 14y ago
How is opting-out possible in this case?

masto 14y ago

This article makes my head spin with the author's confusing mixing of the terms shorter and longer, higher and lower, up and down, above and below, when referring to wavelengths. Am I the only one who is more accustomed to thinking in terms of frequency, so UV is "above" visible light which is above infrared? I would think with something named after its frequency, it would make sense to stick to that terminology.

droithomme 14y ago

If these devices worked to accurately identify unknown materials from 50 feet away, they would already be used in thousands of labs and we'd know empirically how well they work, whether non-scientists can use them as accurately as scientists, what the false positive rate is, etc. If more accurate than a traditional lab spectrometer they would already be used widely. If less accurate, we don't need them to be used to get probable cause for "bomb" searches that "just happen" to turn up things like too much cash or a bit of pot. Even worse, we don't need their results as "evidence" that drug or bomb "residue" was found. Already we see many people arrested for "possession of meth precursors" because they have aluminum foil, plastic sandwich bags and brake fluid in their house. In many cases it is about coming up with a plausible reason for arresting people these days rather than actually holding criminals who cause trouble (such as those on wall street) accountable.

darklajid 14y ago
Not sure if you did that intentionally (to make the claim even more questionable), but the article says "50 meters", not "50 feet". That's more than 3 times the distance. Silent downvotes, how lovely. Why? For reference: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/1194203/Terahertz.png https://dl.dropbox.com/u/1194203/Terahertz.png Unless they geo-locate me in Europe and s/feet/meter/ (how stupid would that be?) I fail to understand what the silent criticism is for.
- pvnick 14y ago
  Your comment comes off as critical and hostile, whereas I'm sure his mistake was just that - a mistake. That's why you're getting downvoted. This isn't reddit.
  - darklajid 14y ago
    1) 'Comes off as' is more often than not wrong in a text based conversation where you don't know the other party. I didn't intend to nitpick, I wanted to emphasize 50m. 15m would be impressive, but 50m is just so much more unbelievable. 2) 'This isn't reddit' is a bullshit appendix for any comment. Thank you for helping me understand that the comment might be misunderstood. Let me return the favor by saying that your last sentence is (objective) useless or harmful, please avoid it.

michaelfeathers 14y ago

So what are the health risks of exposure?

forgotusername 14y ago
Non-ionising radiation, so assuming power level is low, very little.

napkindrawing 14y ago

Hilarious! So now all it takes to shut down an airport is to sprinkle a bunch of blackpowder outside in the parking lot for people to track in on their shoes? The government is making the "terrorists"' job way too easy.

icegreentea 14y ago

The company (Genia Photonics) is a Canadian startup that builds lasers. They appear to specialize in picosecond length laser pulses for a variety of imaging and sensing needs. They've published some papers/articles on their technology in biomedical imaging contexts. Link to one at the bottom. The point is that it doesn't look like some company 'inventing' some BS and pulling one on the DHS. Maybe. http://www.opticsinfobase.org/boe/abstract.cfm?uri=boe-2-5-1296 http://www.opticsinfobase.org/boe/abstract.cfm?uri=boe-2-5-1...

einhverfr 14y ago

Now this poses all sorts of new issues. The 4th Amendment issues are quite interesting to consider. This is programmable meaning it can search for specific substances right? Does this mean that the use of this device to find drugs will be an impermissible search under the test Alito articulated for the 3rd Circuit? It seems that this is a very promising way to get the bodyscanners challenged in court as needlessly intrusive, and force these to only look for explosives.

netfire 14y ago

If this were a replacement to the current backscatter scanners, this would be more interesting. Since it doesn't seem like this would catch knives or other non-chemical weapons, this seems like yet another step at the airport that won't provide very much additional security and could provide a lot of false positives, as already mentioned.

DanielBMarkham 14y ago

If I'm not mistaken I believe the question the author is posing here is "Isn't it better to have a passive device that can, from 50 meters away, spectroscopically determine what substances you've been around than one that takes pictures of you naked?" I don't know how to answer that. Is that better? More to the point, it's not going to be an either-or choice. What'll happen is that these devices, if they are useful, will simply be added to the armada of devices already present. And, more importantly, just like all this other tech being developed for DHS, it'll end up with local law enforcement. In the history of the republic there's probably been about ten situations where something like this could have saved lives but now we'll end up with it everywhere. When I say the TSA needs to be abolished its not simply because they are ineffective, expensive, intrusive into my personal affairs, and represent everything that's gone wrong with the security state. A bigger problem, it seems, is that they're creating huge markets for people to invent and commercialize things with really bad applications to my freedom. A Star Trek tricorder would be awesome, but have we really thought about that? Do we really want everybody walking around with a device that could see through your clothes, tell what chemicals you've been around, diagnose your medical conditions, and so on?