This is hardly surprising – they’ve been emailing the pictures (which resolve into full colour when you put the ‘negative’ filter over them in photoshop) and been poking fun at colleagues and now they’re basically just using them to check you out naked. Anyone suprised?
Lagos — The 3D full-body scanners procured for thorough body check of passengers at the nation’s major airports for security reasons are now being abused by security officials from the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria FAAN, THISDAY can confirm.They use the machines, installed in the wake of the Farouk AbdulMutallab affair, to watch the naked images of female passengers for fun.The controversial body scanners have been dubbed “e-stripping” in advanced countries because of the way they expose the nakedness of those being screened.THISDAY discovered that during off-peak periods, the aviation security officials, who are trained on the use of the scanners, usually stroll from the cubicle located in a hidden corner on the right side of the screening area where the 3D full-body scanner monitors are located.They do so to catch a glimpse of some of the passengers entering the machine and immediately go back to view the naked images, in order to match the faces with the images since the faces are blurred on the monitors while passengers are inside the machine.The face that appears on the scanner’s monitor is usually blurred so that the operator viewing the full body will not recognise who passes through the machine.But by coming out to see the passenger in person and then going back to see his or her image, the objective of protecting the privacy of the passenger has been defeated.THISDAY observed this development first-hand when it visited the screening area, passed through the conventional screening machine at 3pm last Saturday and observed that passengers were reluctant to use the new 3D full-body scanner.To compel them to use it, one of the conventional scanners was put out of service, leaving the ones at the left end and another very close to the new scanner.
via allAfrica.com: Now Showing at MMIA: Nude Images of Passengers.
Robin Edgar
Organisational Structures | Technology and Science | Military, IT and Lifestyle consultancy | Social, Broadcast & Cross Media | Flying aircraft