Posted on 03/02/2011 5:55:24 PM PST by CedarDave
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 Security showing that from 2006 to 2008 the agency planned a study 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” to “covert inspection of moving subjects” employing the same backscatter imaging technology currently used in American airports.
~~snip~~
EPIC’s McCall says that [proposed] 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.,” she says. “This is the digital equivalent.”
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.forbes.com ...
TSA is rapidly expanding its power beyond air transport security. You don't need your neighbors snooping on you; TSA has removed the middleman.
I would consider that an act of war by the government upon the citizens.
What will they do about all the concealed carry weapons? If they spot your pistol under your shirt will you get taken down by the SWAT team?
Everyone thought Alex Jones was crazy on FR so who has gotten the last laugh?Mr.Jones.
They really should use your neighbours to spy on you.
It’s cheaper and they would undoubtedly do a better job.
Feb 28th 2011
A Florida firefighter says he couldn't believe it when Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents gave "intrusive" pat-downs to passengers including kids getting off an Amtrak train in Savannah, Georgia earlier this month.
Lt. Brian Gamble, 38, of Leesburg, Florida, posted video of the incident on YouTube. And the TSA is now apologizing.
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.
"They sent us all into a roped-off holding area and said 'Y'all are going to be searched,'" Gamble says. "We were getting off the train. This didn't make sense."
Once in the area, the group was guarded while TSA officers began doing what Gamble says were "intrusive" pat-downs.
When he saw a family with young kids in the lineup, he took out his camera and started filming. He does not know the identity of the family.
"They were in front of us. They (the TSA agents) started lifting their shirts and wanding them."
Gamble's wife, Traci, 38, and a female friend were also searched and he says female TSA officers made them lift their shirts up to their midriffs and patted their bras.
"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," Gamble says.
"My wife was livid," he adds. "We thought this is silly, we are being harassed by the TSA."
Nearing the front of the line for his own search, Gamble complained to a TSA supervisor but says he was told to calm down. "They wouldn't give us an explanation for the search."
Meanwhile, the passengers' luggage was sitting on the train platform. So the fireman waved over an officer from the Georgia State Patrol to point that out.
"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.'"
Gamble says he would have had no problem with such a search happening on a train, "But getting off the train, that was kind of backwards."
With Gamble's video gaining steam on the Internet, the TSA took to its blog over the weekend to explain what happened.
The TSA's Blogger Bob writes that what the Savannah train passengers encountered is known as a VIPR operation, a randomized search "where anyone entering an impacted area has to be screened."
Such searches – involving federal, state and local law enforcement – were stepped up in 2004 in the wake of the Madrid train bombings in which 181 people were killed, and happen around the country on a regular basis, the TSA says.
"In this case, the Amtrak station was the subject of the VIPR operation so people entering the station were being screened for items on the Amtrak prohibited items list as seen in the video," Blogger Bob writes.
But Bob adds the TSA learned the VIPR operation in Savannah "should have ended by the time these folks were coming through the station since no more trains were leaving the station. We apologize for any inconvenience we may have caused for those passengers."
The TSA says the passengers did not have to go into the terminal to leave the station. But Gamble says the TSA agents didn't give them a choice.
"Their apology is kind of lame," he says. "I thought this whole thing was very unprofessional and very shady."
The Powers That Be can stop you for any reason, audit you for any reason, bust into your home at any time without even knocking for damn near any reason, even shoot your dog just b/c they can. And, I just learned that black panthers can intimidate voters at a polling place and the AG thinks that's perfectly acceptable. WTF, America?!???
Innocent until proven guilty? Contitutional protection against illegal search? Doesn't look that way from here. How do we get back to liberty? Or maybe the more accurate question is "Can we get back to liberty?"
I called it a while back. Slippery slope and all.
“What will they do about all the concealed carry weapons?...”
BINGO!!!!That’s PRECISELY what this is all about....who’s packing...
The acts of 09-11 were not to simply kill people. That was the obvious tactical event. The desired Strategic event was to damage our military (Pentagon attack), decapitate leadership (failed Congress/White House attack), and most importantly but little recognized, damage our financial structure (World Trade Center).
Terrorists killing a few or even 100s of people in a bombing(s) of sidewalks, trains, or planes will provide no military advantage to them. Unless, of course, our nation is lead by cowards.
I’m going to give a one-digit salute with both hands every time I have to walk through one of these miserable things.
It's a psyop designed to make us submit.
Me too.
Vipers, indeed. America is infested with venemous beasts.
Welcome to the USSA, comrade. You know what’s coming.
“VIPR” operations against American citizens.
The TSA is beta testing police state controls to see how far they can go without pushback.
What if these people juost told them to shove it and gathered their things and left? Without a warrant what can they do, it’s not an airport secure area or anything.
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