Posted on 08/15/2007 7:39:06 AM PDT by Dan Evans
WASHINGTON — Next time you go to the airport, there may be more eyes on you than you notice.
Specially trained security personnel are watching body language and facial cues of passengers for signs of bad intentions. The watcher could be the attendant who hands you the tray for your laptop or the one standing behind the ticket-checker. Or the one next to the curbside baggage attendant.
They're called Behavior Detection Officers, and they're part of several recent security upgrades, Transportation Security Administrator Kip Hawley told an aviation industry group in Washington last month. He described them as "a wonderful tool to be able to identify and do risk management prior to somebody coming into the airport or approaching the crowded checkpoint."
The officers are working in more than a dozen airports already, according to Paul Ekman, a former professor at the University of California at San Francisco who has advised Hawley's agency on the program. Amy Kudwa, a TSA public affairs specialist, said the agency hopes to have 500 behavior detection officers in place by the end of 2008.
Kudwa described the effort, which began as a pilot program in 2006, as "very successful" at identifying suspicious airline passengers. She said it had netted drug carriers, illegal immigrants and terrorism suspects. She wouldn't say more.
At the heart of the new screening system is a theory that when people try to conceal their emotions, they reveal their feelings in flashes that Ekman, a pioneer in the field, calls "micro-expressions." Fear and disgust are the key ones, he said, because they're associated with deception.
Behavior detection officers work in pairs. Typically, one officer sizes up passengers openly while the other seems to be performing a routine security duty. A passenger who arouses suspicion, whether by micro-expressions, social interaction or body language gets subtle but more serious scrutiny.
A behavior specialist may decide to move in to help the suspicious passenger recover belongings that have passed through the baggage X-ray. Or he may ask where the traveler's going. If more alarms go off, officers will "refer" the person to law enforcement officials for further questioning.
The strategy is based on a time-tested and successful Israeli model, but in the United States, the scrutiny is much less invasive, Ekman said. American officers receive 16 hours of training — far less than their Israeli counterparts_ because U.S. officials want to be less intrusive.
The use of "micro-expressions" to identify hidden emotions began nearly 30 years ago when Ekman and colleague Maureen O'Sullivan began studying videotapes of people telling lies. When they slowed down the videotapes, they noticed distinct facial movements and began to catalogue them. They were flickers of expression that lasted no more than a fraction of a second.
The Department of Homeland Security hopes to dramatically enhance such security practices.
Jay M. Cohen, undersecretary of Homeland Security for Science and Technology, said in May that he wants to automate passenger screening by using videocams and computers to measure and analyze heart rate, respiration, body temperature and verbal responses as well as facial micro-expressions.
Homeland Security is seeking proposals from scientists to develop such technology. The deadline for submissions is Aug. 31.
The system also would be used for port security, special-event screening and other security screening tasks.
It faces high hurdles, however.
Different cultures express themselves differently. Expressions and body language are easy to misread, and no one's catalogued them all. Ekman notes that each culture has its own specific body language, but that little has been done to study each individually in order to incorporate them in a surveillance program.
In addition, automation won't be easy, especially for the multiple variables a computer needs to size up people. Ekman thinks people can do it better. "And it's going to be hard to get machines that are as accurate as trained human beings," Ekman said.
Finally, the extensive data-gathering of passengers' personal information will raise civil-liberties concerns. "If you discover that someone is at risk for heart disease, what happens to that information?" Ekman asked. "How can we be certain that it's not sold to third parties?"
Whether mass-automated security screening will ever be effective is unclear. In Cohen's PowerPoint slide accompanying his aviation industry presentation was this slogan: "Every truly great accomplishment is at first impossible."
Yah, since we all know that terrorists would never use children or babies to hide explosives. They’ve never done that, have they? We should only check middle eastern males. They’ll never catch on. Brilliant! :-)
Dang I didn’t realize it was so easy. This is really going to save a lot of time.
Your gobmint at work (no pun intended)...
Seems to me if they want to be LESS intrusive ..and MORE effective they should have MUCH MORE training.
An ACLU lawsuit may happen, just because they admit that this is a form of profiling. The ACLU prefers to search everyone so that we can prove to the terrorists that we aren’t profiling people.
Now the evil doers will be looking all around trying to guess who is observing their behavior.
Why not have "fake" passengers who can mingle in and wait in line next to suspects...?
First off, your reading skills need some improvement. I do not believe I mentioned children anywhere. I did mention babies in strollers and if you have any proof of babies in strollers being used by terrorists, let us all know. Maybe I was not specific enough.
But, since you wish to talk children lets do so. I have personally witnessed the TSA pulling children out of line for additional security. Oriental children, white children in the age range of 5-10 years old. Again political correctness at its worst and something that will not enhance our security. But then again, maybe I am wrong. Please let us all know all the times an oriental or white child was used in a bombing and I will be happy to admit my mistake.
I also see that you did nothing to dispute my contention that focusing on grandmothers, priests, old white men, etc. is a waste of time and resources, all in the name of political correctness.
The TSA has hired too many low life scum and given them enormous power over us, all in the name of security. But even if they were all Mensa members, the TSA does not have them focus on (profile) those types of people that history has shown are the most likely to carry out a terrorist act. That does not enhance our security whatsoever but actually diminishes it by stretching resources out.
You don't happen to work for the TSA or know people that do?
Nope.
Those high school dropouts couldn’t tell if someone was farting much less was on a terrorist mission.
What if the ‘trainer’ is a bit wacko?
"I did not have sexual relations with that woman, (flinch) .....Mis Lewinsky, (flinch) and I never told anyone to lie, (flinch) not a once, (flinch) never. (flinch) These allegations are false, (flinch) and I need to go back to work for the American people."
Oh great, I always have a scowl on my face as I go through all the hassles of flying. They’ll stop me every time.
I believe there is truth to this method if it is properly implemented. To be really effective, the idea of Muslim profiling will have to be added.
Between the astounding stupidity of the workers and the nightmare that is airport parking, I might as well never plan a flight again.
You know, I agree with much of what else you had to say, but I do get tired of cheap shots like this. I understand that it's fun to feel superior to people that are in a lower caste in life. Yay for us "smart" people.
But I think shots like that are unfair and needlessly demeaning. Security staff like TSA agents have a difficult job to do, every day. All day they deal with nothing but smug, rude and obnoxious jerks that all know how to do the job better and who take out their hatred of flying on the "help".
No, I don't work for the TSA or anything like it. I'm just somebody that does travel a lot and I see a lot of screeners at airports. I've never been treated rudely by anyone other than obnoxious passengers. I happen to have some sympathy for the screeners because the only thing that'll get their name in the paper is to fail once, and they put up with a whole lot of really REALLY stupid passengers without losing their cool. I'm not sure I could.
Like the lady in line ahead of me a while back that must have, I kid you not, been wearing every piece of freaking metal jewelry she owned, a studded belt and collar, studded shirt, and thigh-high lace-up boots with metal studs all over them... she was a freak show. Did she not know she was getting on a plane when she got dressed? And then... SHE has the nerve to get all bent out of shape and whine and bitch about the "hassle" she was getting just trying to get through the metal detector. You wanna talk low IQ's? There's one, and there's a line of people like her that hit that checkpoint day after day.
So yeah, I cut 'em a little slack.
I’m always surprised when they manage to put their shoes on the correct feet and line up the buttons on their shirts properly. They always seem to pick me to take off my shoes.
How many terrorists look like tired middle aged bald white men?
You are aware of the Terrorist plan to smuggle liquid explosives onto aircraft?
How would you prevent this? Test every bottle of water as part of the screening process?
This makes me laugh.
Two weeks ago on the 1st, I was in the Philadelphia Airport. My family was flying standby, and we did quite a few hours of sitting and waiting.
At one point, three TSA agents walked past us and began “setting up shop” in front of a gate awaiting an arriving aircraft. Two of the TSA folks were heavy-set gentlemen in their late 20s/early 30s and one was a very thin mid to late 50s female. All three set up a table and opened up three folding chairs in which they placed their rear ends for about 20 minutes. Two of them chewed gum like it was cud. One sat and played with a cell phone for a bit, then took out a magazine. One continued reading a paperback book.
I begged my husband to unzip his back which housed our digital camera, but he declined. We just sat there, shaking our heads watching the “safety” personnel before us. They never looked around or looked up from what they were reading or doing. Not once.
So what are you saying, not exactly El-Al material?
Yes, you're right. Just because someone is stupid doesn't mean he is a bad person. But the point is: if we want to catch terrorists shouldn't we hire people in a little bit higher "caste" in life? I mean after 9-11 we had thousands of ex-military, ex-cops and other professionals who volunteered to do the job for free. They were turned down in favor of the usual affirmative-action, political patronage hires.
That's why I say we should get the government out of it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.