British mulling security cams that see through clothes?

There's no two ways about it: the British love their security. And when it comes to employing technology for keeping the streets clean (and Segway-free!) and the terrorists squirreled away, the Brits put the rest of the world to shame, what with their four million CCTV cams (some with mic's and speakers, but no aggression detectors -- yet), head-mounted bobby cams, rolling license plate scanners, and heck, even their camera-watching cameras. So it should come as no surprise that the government's latest idea for ensuring total citizen compliance putting safety first involves the deployment of security cams that have the ability to see through people's clothing, among other high-tech surveillance devices normally confined to your favorite airport. According to a leaked memo supposedly seen by The Sun -- they of the journalistically-dubious "Page 3" -- Home Office officials presented Tony Blair's working group on Security, Crime and Justice with a proposal to install what are technically known as "perv cams" to facilitate the detection of weapons and explosives at strategic locations around the UK, along with millimeter wave imaging and THz imaging and spectroscopy systems. The Sun's George Pascoe-Watson goes on to note that proponents of the plan are aware of the likely public backlash over such a Sliver-esque scenario, which is why some officials have suggested that only females be allowed to monitor the "dirty" feeds; whew, what a relief -- women would certainly never abuse a power like this for personal gratification. Anyway, we're not putting much stock in what is little more than a rumored pitch to a bunch of bureaucrats at this point, so it's probably okay to put away those lead-lined Jockey's for the time being.

[Via Yahoo]

[Michael @ Mar 10th 2008 4:27AM]

America has been under THz surveillance since about 2002 when active submillimeter-wave cameras were installed along interstate highways and prominent public places. Passive millimeter-wave surveillance cameras which can see through clothing have been available since early 2006. I know Best Buy Canada uses them.

[QP @ Jan 29th 2007 2:00PM]

I'm in ur dna mutating ur helix!

[adam @ Jan 29th 2007 2:02PM]

dude.. i can see that skeleton's nipple, huh-huh

[ASTROBOT @ Jan 29th 2007 2:04PM]

It's a nice way for security purposes but what's the cause? A couple of thousand people and children exposed to electromagnetic radiation?

[Andy Briggs @ Jan 29th 2007 3:34PM]

ASTROBOT:-

Wow! And you're exposed to electro-magnetic radiation ALL OF THE TIME! It's light! This can't be that damaging, but the uses of it seem limited and public rights?...

[Mike @ Jan 29th 2007 3:43PM]

Um, ya. Microwaves use electromagnetic radiation to, I don't see anyone volunteering to sit in a microwave while it's on.

It's all about intensity, duration and wavelength.

[Jon @ Jan 29th 2007 2:40PM]

What is journalistically-dubious about Page 3 ??

[Oliver M @ Jan 30th 2007 10:28AM]

The whole 'Big Brother' slant on all these UK security tech stories is getting a bit tiresome. I'm a UK citizen and I, for one, am supportive of every bit of surveillance that's out there.

I don't commit any crimes, so I have nothing to fear. Only the idiots have something to fear, and who cares about their 'privacy'?

[JV @ Feb 26th 2007 2:57PM]

I agree with oliver, if you have nothing to hide, why should you care? and false accusations? c'mon, the law states that you're innocent until proven otherwise so that whole parragraph from KC goes to the trash, even if that law is not accounted for the state needs proof to actually convict you for anything otherwise its pointless even for the government

[Kevlar @ Jan 29th 2007 2:51PM]

Man, that image just made my day.

[Mikeyg @ Jan 29th 2007 7:01PM]

The sun would do anything to discredit the Blair government, just like they did anything to discredit the Major government, if this appears in a proper paper (i.e. a broadsheet) then i will believe it

[Brian @ Jan 29th 2007 3:51PM]

I'm not sure where this whole "see through clothes" thing came from. X-ray's show very little soft-tissue, so really it's 'see through clothes & flesh', leaving just the skeleton, some cartilage, and outlines of some soft-tissue. Haven't heard of any cartilage-fetishes myself, but I guess anything's possible.

[Bernardo @ Feb 1st 2007 4:22AM]

This is becoming to look like V for Vendetta (good movie btw)

[anonymous @ Jan 29th 2007 4:23PM]

Wow guys, there is no point in your life that you will not be exposed to electromagnetic radiation. Anywhere from radio waves to visible light is electromagnetic radiation. What makes it dangerous if it's ionizing or not...

[Harry @ Jan 29th 2007 4:45PM]

The whole security thing is getting ridiculous here. The government should be cracking down on the crime culture, as well as crime itself. There's too much 'we'll stop the crime by making all components of it illegal' and less of the 'get rid of the criminals' because of the 'tough, tougher, toughest on crime' mentality of politicians trying to out-do each other.
To be honest, I can see it leading to a crime-oriented downward-spiral.

[ian mcgrady @ Jan 29th 2007 5:31PM]

can you guys pull that image from total recall where schwartzenegger passes through security and all his guns show up on his skeleton?

[Aaron @ Jan 29th 2007 7:02PM]

Anyone remember where "1984" took place? Yeah...

[Juicebeetle @ Jan 29th 2007 7:05PM]

"a rumored pitch to a bunch of bureaucrats"

A rumored pitch? We've had a full demo of a prototype on the 8 o'clock news here in Europe! Complete with the (male) journalist being scanned, naughty bits blocked out for TV.

This is here now. (And no, it wasn't on April first...)

[Juicebeetle @ Jan 29th 2007 7:40PM]

Similar (or the same?) techniques have been in the news before. Even on Engadget...

http://www.engadget.com/2006/12/04/phoenix-airport-set-to-test-all-seeing-x-ray/

There are lots of links if you google "new type airport security scan"

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TRAVEL/NEWS/03/18/rec.airport.xray/
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/07/17/eveningnews/main563797.shtml

More after the break...

[Juicebeetle @ Jan 29th 2007 7:40PM]

...Aaaaand we're back:


http://intraa.tgcrossroads.org/connections/story/?iid=40&aid=988
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0203/18/ltm.15.html
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/104544/airport_security_body_scanning_technology.html

[granny down east @ Jan 30th 2007 12:53AM]

message in duct tape on my ass:
SCREW U

[KC @ Jan 30th 2007 2:15PM]

So I guess you have never heard of a false accusation, by a vindictive ex who calls the cops and says your a terrorist and your cell phone is a detonator. Or a false identification by these facial recognition programs.

You don't have to be a criminal to get falsely accused of being one... and once you find yourself falsely accused you'd better hope you have allot of money stashed away somewhere to prove your innocence.

Or do you think the state will just fess up to their mistake, let you go and give you a handsome compensation package for your troubles out of the generosity of their hearts when you protest your innocence?

Every step in this - to ensure your safety - direction our world is taking is an erosion of everyone's rights.

The State NEVER admits when it makes a mistake. They simply prosecute the falsely accused until they utterly ruin them to the point where they are powerless to fight for their freedom.

The more security measures the easier it is for you and everyone else to get caught by the system. No one - no not even you - are perfect and completely innocent without a single thing to hide... what happens when the next popular crime is one that you have committed? Think the "little things" that no one cares about right now will remain little forever? What happens when something you think is not big deal is targeted as "leading cause of..." and you find yourself on some list of people to watch?

The point it it's a slippery slope and no one is safe in the long run the longer we stay on it.

[Bernieb @ Feb 2nd 2007 7:40PM]

To me the only people that carry on about intrusion to their "privacy" are people with something to hide.

If you are a normal human being with nothing to hide, who cares who knows?

In this day of global terrorism, let the powers that be do everything possible to protect us from the possible horrors.

Bernieb

[doug @ Mar 26th 2007 8:02PM]

Excess surveillance is not alright. Just because you don't care about it doesn't mean that I'm prepared to submit to it. It's an infringement on my privacy. More importantly, it's an infringement on my security:

-/ Once the infrastructure to watch me all the time is in place, and should it become valuable, there's no earthly way it can be prevented from getting into the hands of people who can exploit it.

-/ Governments and businesses are always interested in controlling and coercing the public. The trend here is towards increasing amounts of control, and surveillance is a handy part of that.

-/ Increased surveillance doesn't increase security. Whereas, for example, not becoming involved in illegal wars does.

[CJ @ May 7th 2007 1:48AM]

C'mon now, don't you think you're being just a little bit alarmist here? Slippery slope arguments hold no water for me. You can "what if" until the cows come home, but it hasn't happened, and it likely won't either.

- The "infrastructure to watch you all the time" already exists in the UK (as the article already said). You don't see a huge black market for that information exploding over there. The same stuff that all this "new" surveillance will capture is the same stuff that a lowly PI can capture now. If you're out in public, you're legally viewable (the see-through-clothes part is debatable, but the fact that you can be seen at all is not). How much or how little is irrelevant. If you don't have a reasonable expectation of privacy, especially out in public, more surveillance is not an invasion of privacy. There has been no discussion of surveillance inside your house, or in your bathroom, or any other place in which you have any sort of expectation of privacy.

- Governments already have the means to watch you 24x7, without installing new cameras. Space-based imaging can read the newspaper over your shoulder while you sit on your patio. Again, there is no black market for satellite imagery of you. The ratio of satellites to people makes that sort of information prohibitively costly, and re-tasking a military satellite takes an act of God and Congress. Nice try, but it ain't all about you.

- Besides completely ignoring your retarded "war" comment, increased surveillance does indeed mean increased safety and security. If you knew you were being watched 24x7 in public, would you be *more likely*, or *less likely* to commit a crime? Get real. As everyone has said, if you've got nothing to hide, you've got no reason to worry. The Bill of Rights is still a part of the Constitution, last time I checked.

Not to mention, you *completely* missed the point of the article, which was talking about perv cams, to present your innane conspiracy theory-laden babble to an audience who is wondering why you didn't talk about the camera that can see through clothes, and where we can sign up to get that job.