Airport Security Advances Clash With Privacy Issues

Photo Credit: NY Times

Photo Credit: NY Times

At a mock airport in an underground laboratory here at Northeastern University, students pretending to be passengers head through a security exit in the right direction, while a young man enters going the wrong way. On a nearby computer screen, a newly developed video surveillance software program flags the wayward person and sounds an alarm.

In a lab across the street, researchers are developing a new way to detect explosives using radar.

Just down the hall, a professor and a team of students are working on a scanning system that they hope will speed up security lines. The system uses machines installed in walls or other places to scan passengers as they walk past instead of having them walk individually into a conventional scanning machine.

“The goal is to have a system that provides better scanning of individuals going through security, while at the same time making it more convenient,” said Jose Martinez Lorenzo, a professor of mechanical and industrial engineering, who is directing the project.

But the ambitious research in the name of passenger safety and easing air travel delays is colliding with pressure to protect privacy and to reduce federal spending. (Read more from “Airport Security Advances Clash With Privacy Issues” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.