TSA groping, it's not just for the airport anymore… The TSA is now expanding its body scanner searches to train stations in NYC and LA. The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) will now be randomly searching visitors to New York's Penn Station via body scanners alongside Amtrak Police. The "virtual searches" via body scanners are for now random, but the new "passive millimeter wave" technology may become more widespread. The Amtrak changes are counter to what TSA Administrator David Pekoske stated in November 2017, when claiming that the TSA had no plan s to introduce "airport-like security" in other forms of public transit.
Downtown Los Angeles is also a testing ground for this new invasion of privacy in our daily lives. LA County's Metro is working with TSA on a "pilot program" to test how the new security tech works in practice. The program is facing some blowback from, among others the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) who argue that it is not constitutional since the Fourth Amendment guarantees right to be free of unwarranted searches. Another concern is lack of transparency regarding how the technology will be used. Then there's the fact that <a href="http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-aclu-tsa-20170207-story.html">TSA has never even stopped a terrorist</a>, so the question of why they are rolling out TSA style security tech in other arenas is especially apt.
https://thegoldwater.com/news/18384-Miami-ISIS-Recruit-Arrested-At-Airport
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">TSA to test suicide vest detectors with Amtrak at Penn Station <a href="https://t.co/T9D0D1qSFx">https://t.co/T9D0D1qSFx</a> via <a href="https://twitter.com/USATODAY?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@USATODAY</a> Yay transparency! All you potential hostiles, gather round…let us tell you about some new security capabilities, just in case, I dunno’, you want to come up with a workaround.</p>— Mike Baker (@MBCompanyMan) <a href="https://twitter.com/MBCompanyMan/status/971818658942001153?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 8, 2018</a></blockquote>
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The Sacramento Bee touched on the issue recently:
<blockquote>“While I expect going through airline security to be time-consuming and mildly annoying, my attitude changed recently as I prepared to board a flight out of Sacramento International Airport in the days after Memorial Day weekend. As I stood in line, Transportation Security Administration officials announced at SMF that everyone was to take books, magazines and food out of their bags and put them into a separate bin for inspection. That was it. A line was crossed for me.”</blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The agenda for <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SmartCities?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SmartCities</a>. {Infographic}<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/CyberSecurity?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#CyberSecurity</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/IoT?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#IoT</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/BigData?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#BigData</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/sensors?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#sensors</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/startup?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#startup</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Analytics?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Analytics</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/AI?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#AI</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/P2P?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#P2P</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/fintech?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#fintech</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/innovation?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#innovation</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/MachineLearning?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#MachineLearning</a> <a href="https://t.co/REMeupLpgB">pic.twitter.com/REMeupLpgB</a></p>— Michael Fisher (@Fisher85M) <a href="https://twitter.com/Fisher85M/status/970611171320647680?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 5, 2018</a></blockquote>
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One argument against TSA searches and scanners after 9/11 was that the technologies and measures would eventually extend beyond the airport. The sort of scanners brought to us by Sheldon Adelson's OSI that were incorporated at the Wynn hotel in Las Vegas after the Vegas massacre could be coming to a location near you if this keeps up. And that's not even considering the Orwellian surveillance and Big Data info-gathering that "smart cities" like NYC and LA will increasingly offer.
Related coverage:
https://www.thegoldwater.com/news/17940-ISIS-Terror-Attack-Movie-Is-Eastwood-at-His-Best
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That sucks! best thing about the train was no security.