Techdirt. Stories filed under "scans"

Author Walter Jon Williams Asks For Fans To Help Him 'Pirate' His Own Works Better

Mike Masnick — Tue, 24 May 2011 15:25:30 PDT

Consumerist points us to a blog post from author Walter Jon Williams, where he discusses his disgust with pirate copies of his books -- but not for the reasons you might expect. It seems he's upset about the quality of the scanned copies and is asking his fans to help by creating better scans:

I embarked upon a Cunning Plan. I discovered that my work had been pirated, and was available for free on BitTorrent sites located in the many outlaw server dens of former Marxist countries. So I downloaded my own work from thence with the intention of saving the work of scanning my books-- I figured I'd let the pirates do the work, and steal from them. While this seemed karmically sound, there proved a couple problems.

First, the scans were truly dreadful and full of errors. (Even if you're desperate for my work, I can't really recommend them.) A lot of time has been spent copy-editing, both by me and by Kathy-- which isn't really so bad, because this would have to be d0ne anyway.

But second, apparently a few of my books were so obscure that they flew under the radar of even the pirates! You can't imagine how astounded I was when I discovered this.

I could really use some decent scans of some of my books, and I figure some among you must have better scanners and OCR than the piece of crap that's currently sitting on my shelf.

Not only that, but he's offering rewards to those who help him, saying he'll send them signed (physical) copies of certain books, and also put their name on the scan.

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Homeland Security Was Interested In Doing 'Covert' Pedestrian 'Scans' From 30 Feet Away

Mike Masnick — Thu, 3 Mar 2011 12:20:06 PST

Last year, we wrote a few times about how there was a company selling scanner vans -- based on the same technology used in those airport naked scanners -- that could be used to surreptitiously look into vehicles. Mostly they were being sold to law enforcement, however some of them were being sold to private buyers. Given all this, it should come as little surprise that Homeland Security has been interested in expanded use of such scanning technologies, with a newly released report suggesting it explored greater surveillance with naked scanners -- such as mobile units for special events or for public transportation hubs, as well as "covert" systems that could scan large groups of people without them knowing it. There was even discussion of one system that could scan people from 30 feet away.

To be honest, it's not all that surprising that Homeland Security would explore all of this (and it's a bit of an exaggeration to focus on the TSA as doing this -- which is implied in the link, since it appears to be a wider DHS effort), so I don't think it's as big a deal as EPIC makes it out to be. EPIC tends to over-exaggerate these types of things. The TSA has responded to the story with a sort of carefully worded denial that doesn't really speak to the issue:

"TSA has not tested the advanced imaging technology that is currently used at airports in mass transit environments and does not have plans to do so."

The is a pretty narrowly defined answer. First, it only focuses on the mass transit part, and it also limits the answer to the specific imaging technology used at airports. It does not answer whether or not the TSA has looked at other forms of technology for these kinds of scans. On top of that, it narrowly limits the answer to the TSA, not the wider DHS. Is it really that hard for Homeland Security to give a straight answer? I mean, the idea that it might research these technologies seems perfectly reasonable. Why not just say that, and then be upfront about it?

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TSA Starts Testing New Scanners That Don't Show Your Naked Body

Mike Masnick — Tue, 1 Feb 2011 14:15:00 PST

Despite all the protests from the TSA that there was nothing (nothing!) wrong with requiring everyone to display their naked body or be groped by TSA employees in order to board an airplane, it appears that even TSA officials are recognizing that the nudie scanners may have gone a bit too far. The TSA is now testing new screening machines that display a generic body outline, rather than showing a person's actual body. Of course, there's no word on if the TSA will similarly mislead the public about the safety (or lack of safety) in these new machines. Also, there's no indication if these new machines will be as easily defeated as the old ones.

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President Obama, After Traveling With Naked Scanner CEO, Defends Naked Scans

Mike Masnick — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 07:19:50 PST

As the whole mess with the TSA scanners has received a lot more attention in the last week or so, a few folks are noticing that ex-Homeland Security boss Michael Chertoff, who's been quite busy defending the naked scanners, happens to be making a ton of money from one of the main ones, Rapiscan, made by OSI, a client of Chertoff's consulting firm. Of course, similar concerns were brought up a year ago when Chertoff was busy promoting the scanners, but it appears that many in the mainstream press continue to highlight his old Homeland Security title, while downplaying his current role making money from seeing those scanners sold.

However, perhaps even more interesting is the news that President Obama was finally asked to address the whole thing this weekend, and (not surprisingly) defended the scans and the pat downs as "the only [procedures] right now that [the TSA] considers to be effective," to prevent terrorism (while also admitting that he doesn't have to go through security to get on airplanes, so he hasn't experienced the scans.

No surprise there. Of course, what he didn't mention is that he just got done traveling with the CEO of OSI, the parent company of Rapiscan, the makers of the main naked scanner that is being purchased and put into all these airports. Apparently, OSI CEO, Deepak Chopra (no, not the new agey guy), "was selected to accompany US President, Barack Obama, to Mumbai and attended the US India Business Entrepreneurship meeting..."

Now, of course, all of this may be perfectly legit and reasonable. There may be plenty of reasons why all of these things happened. Chertoff and Obama may really believe these scanners are the best way to protect us. But, as Larry Lessig has been fond of pointing out lately with his anti-corruption project, it's these kinds of "connections" that make the American public lose trust in their government, since it can certainly be read in a rather corrupt manner.

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Animated Version Of TSA Naked Scans And Gropings

Mike Masnick — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 08:16:11 PST

With all the recent stories of questionable TSA searches of people who opt out of both the TSA naked backscatter scanners and a personal groping by a TSA agent, it really was only a matter of time until the famed Taiwanese news animators NMA stepped up with an animated recreation, which I would say... um... takes some poetic licenses with the story -- especially when it comes to the availability of a private search area for the grope. That said, it covers the story of the "don't touch my junk" guy (and shows picketers with a sign saying that), as well as a planned protest of the machines for November 24th, one of the biggest travel days of the year. Among the more amusing bits are a prediction of all naked flights (on which the people all seem way too happy) and terrorists laughing at our new security measures.

Meanwhile, for those of us in the US (I know, I know, don't blame me, blame Viacom), you can watch Stephen Colbert's take on the TSA security mess, involving "x-raying your x-rated parts," along with noting that it appears the company making most of these devices, Rapiscan, hopefully is not pronounced "rape-iscan":

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

TSA Full-Body Scanners - Jeffrey Goldberg

www.colbertnation.com

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81% Of Americans Support Naked Airport Scans... If You Leave Out The Naked Part In Asking The Question

Mike Masnick — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 08:12:25 PST

With all the stories of people who don't want to be groped or seen naked just to travel by airplane these days, the TSA must be thrilled with a new poll that was put out by CBS that's getting lots of press claiming that 81% of Americans support such full-body scans. Thus we get titles about how Americans "overwhelmingly" are in favor of such scans.

Of course, as with any poll, the devil is in the details, and specifically in how the questions are asked. As Tim Lee properly notes, the poll question does not mention the whole naked bit or anything relaying the concerns of those protesting the machines. The actual question asked read as follows:

Some airports are now using "full-body" digital x-ray machines to electronically screen passengers in airport security lines. Do you think these new x-ray machines should or should not be used at airports?

Note that there's nothing about how someone will see you naked. Note that there's nothing about the health concerns some have raised (which, frankly, are probably blown out of proportion). Note that there's nothing about the compulsory genital groping should you refuse to be seen naked. Most people don't follow these issues, and without knowing the details, when you present the question as it's been presented in this poll, it should come as little surprise that most people agreed. Try asking the same people whether or not they approve of being scanned by a machine that presents TSA screeners a naked image of their body, and see what the results would be then.

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Pilot Group Urges Pilots To Refuse Naked Backscatter Scans, And Avoid Groping Pat Downs

Mike Masnick — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 11:07:00 PST

We recently had the story of a pilot who ran into some trouble after refusing to go through one of the "naked" backscatter scanners at the airport, and then refusing to go through a much more invasive "pat down" search as payment for skipping the scanner. Over the last few weeks, airports in the US have stepped up the use of both (though, it should be noted, I'm writing this particular post on an airplane and did not have to go through either such "search" in order to do so). It appears that the pilot in question was not the only one miffed at the rules. Apparently the head of the Allied Pilots Association (which represents American Airlines pilots among others), Dave Bates, has sent out a note to the members complaining about these new security procedures, suggesting that pilots refuse the new scanners, and insist that any additional pat down must be done in private, rather than out in the open. It does seem rather silly to give pilots this kind of treatment since they already pilot the damn plane. If they wanted to do something bad to the plane, they already have the ability to do so.

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Movie Star Claims Heathrow Airport Staff Printed Out, Circulated, His Naked Body Images

Mike Masnick — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 14:09:39 PST

There's been a big push over the last couple months to get those full body scanners installed in more airports. These scanners, if you don't recall, basically create a "naked" image of the person in them. This has resulted in all sorts of (mostly reasonable) concerns about privacy (well, and dignity) of those passing through the devices. Defenders of these systems insist that the images are seen by someone remotely who can't see the person, so there's no way to connect the image to the person, and the scans are deleted immediately.

Except... perhaps that's not always true. Eric points us to the news that Indian movie star Shahrukh Khan (oddly, I just saw one of his movies) is claiming that the staff at London's Heathrow airport had not just connected his scan to who he was, but also printed it out and circulated it among some staff.

I have to admit, this one could use a bit more proof, because my understanding was that the scan itself is done in a remote location, but Khan seems to indicate that staff had the printouts almost immediately:

"I was a little scared. Something happens [inside the scans], and I came out. Then I saw these girls -- they had these printouts. I looked at them. I thought they were some forms you had to fill. I said 'give them to me' -- and you could see everything inside. So I autographed them for them," stated Khan.

I could definitely see how another security or airport staffer might alert whoever was watching the remote scans of who was passing through the scanner. The last few times I've seen these devices used in airports the other security staff had radio contact with the person watching the scans (for obvious reasons). But having multiple printouts immediately distributed? It's not clear how that would happen.

Update: Yup, as we suspected, this story appears to be bogus. Security officials are denying it ever happened, and apparently Khan has some movie coming out about being detained by airport security... so... yeah, PR stunt.

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FTC Shuts Down More Bogus Spyware Scan Companies

Mike Masnick — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:22:00 PST

A few years back the FTC shut down some scam fake anti-spyware companies that would advertise "free scans" of your computer and would then (of course) tell you you had spyware. The scam, of course, was that for a fee of only $30 or $40, you could buy their "software" that would supposedly rid your computer of spyware. Of course, your computer probably didn't already have spyware, and the software you bought certainly wouldn't do anything towards ridding your computer of any actual spyware. It looks like some new scammers have picked up where the old ones left off, because the FTC is announcing, yet again, that it's been able to shut down some bogus anti-spyware operations. Apparently, this operation was slightly more scammy, because advertising networks have stopped accepting ads for such bogus anti-spyware. So, instead, they pretended to place ads for legitimate companies, but then used some code to swap out the "good" ad with the bogus anti-spyware ad.

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