Abuse of Full-Body Scanners Confirms Privacy Concerns

When the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) installed two full-body scanners at the Pittsburgh International Airport some two weeks ago, The Publius Foundation suggested that the machines did little to improve security and constituted a significant assault on the privacy rights of Americans. In a story that confirms and indeed dwarfs our initial privacy concerns, the U.S. Marshall Service this week admitted that it recorded and kept 35,314 full-body images produced by just one machine in Florida, CNET reported.

This revelation directly contradicts previous claims by the TSA that nude images created by the full-body scanners “cannot be stored or recorded.” In fact, the TSA recently revealed that all full-body scanners are actually required to be able to record and store at least 40,000 images.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center – a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group – recently filed a lawsuit arguing that the TSA “has violated the Administrative Procedures Act, the Privacy Act, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and the Fourth Amendment.” Unless the Center is granted the emergency injunction against full-body scanners that it is seeking, these machines will shortly be installed at almost every major airport in the country and four more will be installed in Pittsburgh.

What should trouble Pittsburghers and others around the country who will be subject to screening by these machines is not only the loss of privacy but the arbitrary way in which the machines are being employed by an unaccountable security apparatus. As we already documented, the machines do nothing to combat the threats posed by Al Qaeda explosives and now we must also consider that nude images of Americans are being stockpiled by law enforcement agencies for no discernible purpose other than the fact that they can be stockpiled.

In the name of fighting terrorism, the nation’s security apparatus has developed arbitrary powers and the manifestations of this arbitrary power are now trickling down to the local level. In this case, the security apparatus arbitrarily victimized more than 35,000 people in Florida but, with these machines in place in Pittsburgh, we must consider the fact that we might be next.