http://thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/item/12090-dhs-to-deploy-new-scanners-that-secretly-search-from-50-yards-away

Monday, 16 July 2012 18:28



DHS to Deploy New Scanners That Secretly Search From 50 Yards Away



Very soon the Department of Homeland Security won’t have to touch you to know everything it wants to know about you. Using
a new laser-based scanner that fires a beam from about 164 feet, the
government will be able to see everything it wants to see about your
body, your clothes, and what’s in your suitcase. Reports indicate
that the soon-to-be-deployed scanner is so powerful that it can detect
everything from “what you had for breakfast to the adrenaline level in
your body.”



And what’s the most frightening part about this long distance über-powerful pat-down? You’ll never know it’s happening.



In November 2011 Genia Photonics, the creators of
the scanner, was subcontracted by In-Q-Tel to perfect the device for use
by the Department of Homeland Security.



In-Q-Tel provides the following history of its creation on its website:



In 1998, CIA identified technology as a top
strategic priority, and set out a radical plan to create a new venture
that would help increase the Agency's access to private sector
innovation. In-Q-Tel was chartered in February 1999 by a group of
private citizens at the request of the Director of Central Intelligence
and with the support of the U.S. Congress. IQT was tasked with building a
bridge between the Agency and a new set of technology innovators.



Mission accomplished. The bridge builders at
In-Q-Tel have managed to find a company so innovative that it can
secretly bypass the Fourth Amendment from more than 50 yards away.



Naturally, the government wants to get this device
installed in airports and border crossings as soon as possible. Genia
Photonics’ website claims that their product will allow agents to detect
“drug mixtures, chemical and biological warfare (CBW), explosives and
toxic spills…” before they become a threat to the homeland or to the
agents themselves.



The beam used in this scanner is ten million times
faster and one million times more sensitive than those currently in
use. Imagine the possibilities of a tool so fast and so sensitive: no
longer will the TSA be resigned to plucking one or two or even a dozen
people out of a security line in the airport. Now, with the Genia
Photonics laser, they can scan every single passenger and know so much
more than just what he’s carrying. And again, the best part about it
is that passengers will never be the wiser. They will never know that
their very body chemistry is being monitored and recorded by agents
working on behalf of the U.S. government.



Of course, DHS and TSA will not be satisfied with
merely being able to quickly detect explosives, chemical, and biological
weapons and now they won’t have to be. Reading straight from the
promotional material produced by Genia Photonics, the new scanning
method (called terahertz spectroscopy) can “ penetrate through many
dielectric materials, such as clothing, paper, plastics, leather, wood
and ceramics.”



Does one often carry wood and ceramics on board an
airplane? No, but one certainly finds such objects in a home.
Fortunately, for Homeland Security, their new little scanner is very
portable and won’t be confined to use in airports or border patrol
stations.



Take this bit of boasting from In-Q-Tel as evidence of the ultimate unconstitutional use of the device:



An important benefit of Genia Photonics'
implementation as compared to existing solutions is that the entire
synchronized laser system is comprised in a single, robust and
alignment-free unit that may be easily transported for use in many
environments… This compact and robust laser has the ability to rapidly
sweep wavelengths in any pattern and sequence.



Everyone everywhere will now be a potential target for this
portable, powerful laser beam. From 164 feet the government can fire a
laser beam that can penetrate wood (houses?) and detect important
biological data about whatever (whoever) is inside.



Here’s a little bit of the history of the company that will soon deliver this device into the hands of the federal government:



Founded in 2009 by the merger of Optav Solutions
and FG2 Tech, Genia Photonics Inc. is an innovative company specializing
in high-speed picosecond fiber-based lasers and spectroscopic
measurement systems. Centered around our patented fiber laser
technology, Genia’s compact, easy to use and controlled via software
systems will change the methodology for various applications in
biomedical, industrial as well as defense and security.



In order to understand how the scanner works, read this brief description provided by Gizmodo:



The machine is a mobile, rack-mountable system.
It fires a laser to provide molecular-level feedback at distances of up
to 50 meters in just picoseconds. For all intents and purposes, that
means instantly.



The small, inconspicuous machine is attached to a computer running a
program that will show the information in real time, from trace amounts
of cocaine on your dollar bills to gunpowder residue on your shoes.
Forget trying to sneak a bottle of water past security — they will be
able to tell what you had for breakfast in an instant while you're
walking down the hallway.



Basically, if Genia Photonics can deliver on
their promises, there will be few places that the government cannot go
and few things it cannot know. Imagine, for example, the private
information that would become available to the government if were to
attach one of these devices onto a drone? The unmanned aerial vehicle
could carry the scanner to with 50 yards of a window or wall and
instantly detect crucial biological information from anyone on the other
side.



In another scenario, perhaps police cars will be
fitted with the scanners and allow local law enforcement to patrol
neighborhoods surreptitiously searching for otherwise undetectable
traces of drugs or explosive material without the need for a pesky
search warrant or probable cause.



One crucial question that is not addressed by
Genia Photonics or its promoters at In-Q-Tel is what exactly is the
“label-free genetic analysis, and chemical/biological sensing” that will
be performed by their machine.



Furthermore, what of the constitutional issues?
Who decides whom to target with the laser? Is probable cause no longer a
requisite for such intrusive searches and seizures? Will the eye of a
magistrate no longer need to look over the shoulder of law enforcement?
Are search warrants a thing of the past? Will there be no need for an
affidavit “particularly describing the place to be searched and the
persons or things to be seized"?



And, why does the government need to know the genetic or chemical makeup of citizens of this Republic?



According to testimony given in November of last
year by Tara O'Toole, M.D., MPH Under Secretary for Science and
Technology, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, before the Committee
on Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Infrastructure
Protection, and Security Technologies, “All of these projects are
expected to produce transition-ready technologies in the next 12 to 24
months.”



So, as soon as November of this year, the
government could be in possession of this scanner. A scanner that
detects and stores information about you on the molecular level via
high-frequency lasers aimed at your body from over 160 feet away. This
data will be instantly delivered to the controller of the device who
will then possess a range of information about you that includes a
precise “genetic analysis” of your body — and you’ll never know you’ve
been searched.

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