New Airport Scanners Breach UK Child Pornography Laws

The UK's Guardian reported late Monday that the full body scanners being tested in the UK and like those planned for the US, are being challenged on the grounds that they breached UK laws against child pornography and cannot be used on those under 18. Under the Protection of Children Act 1978, it is "illegal to create an indecent image or a 'pseudo-image' of a child." I posed a question a few days ago: How many parents are going to want some stranger viewing virtually naked pictures of their child(ren) from these scanners? On the other hand, we know terrorist groups are more than willing to blow up their children as well as ours. And they quickly adapt their strategy...make them take of their shoes and they put the explosives down their pants....

While awaiting a ruling, "voluntary trials" started last month for those 18 and over. One wonders how many actual "volunteers" they could get unless they were offering a choice between a scan and a body cavity search. And the question of whether the machines would be used in a, "lawful and proportionate and sensitive manner based on rational criteria rather than racial or religious bias" has been broached,   thus setting up the protest which will certainly be used by any group or person attempting to smuggle such a weapon.

The expensive, doomed debacle that is the full body scanner slogs on. But there is a glimmer of hope...celebrities:

...concerns were echoed by Simon Davies of Privacy International who said he was sceptical of the privacy safeguards being used in the United States. Although the American system insists on the deletion of the images, he believed scans of celebrities or of people with unusual or freakish body profiles would prove an "irresistible pull" for some employees.

Maybe, just maybe...if those elite jet setters (and even better yet, some politicians) realize they and their families might be in for a little more publicity than they bargained, the idea will be quashed before too many tax dollars are paid out.