Showing posts with label terrorist. Show all posts
Showing posts with label terrorist. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Will airports screen for body signals? Researchers hope so

The USA has invested a healthy amount of money into combating the terrorist threat -- certainly a bit more than $100. According to a CNN report, one of a few experimental methods being used to identify suspicious dudes at the airport uses Nintendo's Wii Balance Board (Wii Fit Plus).

Scientists part of the Future Attribute Screening Technology (FAST) program have taken the Wii Fit peripheral and adjusted it to measure how a person shifts their weight. Scientists hope to find "a level of fidgeting that would suggest the need for secondary screening."

BOSTON, Massachusetts (CNN) -- The days of being able to walk through airport security checkpoints while wearing shoes and a jacket could return if an experimental program proves successful, some Department of Homeland Security officials say.


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The Homeland Security-funded project is Future Attribute Screening Technology, or FAST. Instead of focusing on whether you have hidden explosives or whether you're carrying a weapon, sensors and cameras located at security checkpoints would measure the natural signals coming from your body -- your heart rate, breathing, eye movement, body temperature and fidgeting.

Those physiological signs, measured together, will indicate whether you might have the desire or intent to do harm, project manager Robert Burns said.

"There's been a large field of research that ties your physical reactions to your mental state, your emotional state. We're looking for those signals that your body gives off naturally," Burns said.

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Thursday, December 11, 2008

The 7 Dumbest Things Ever Done by Airport Security

If there's one holiday ritual we all know and hate, it's that yearly trip to the airport, where the friendly security man awaits with his X-ray machine, his metal detector and possibly a well-lubed rubber glove. While none of us want to spend the holidays involved in a terrorist incident (unless you're living in the Die Hard universe), you have to admit that sometimes security gets a little out of hand. And then there are horror stories like...

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