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Airport's new X-rated X-rays expose your naked body through your clothes

    WASHINGTON, DC -- The next time you go to an airport, your privacy may be invaded by "X-rated X-rays" -- new, high-tech scanners that reveal every curve of your naked body right through your clothes, the Libertarian Party warned today.

    The machines, called the BodySearch, are already in operation at JFK Airport in New York and five other major airports around the country, and will be installed in every large airport in the USA by June.

    "You can be exposed like a Playboy playmate by these new voyeur-vision devices -- even when you are fully clothed," warned Steve Dasbach, Libertarian Party national director. "With the BodySearch device, airport officials can eyeball your intimate body parts as casually as they X-ray the contents of your suitcase.

    "And since airport officials don't need a search warrant to use these X-rated X-rays, everyone from your teenage daughter to your grandmother can be technologically stripped stark naked -- in stark violation of their right to privacy."

    The new BodySearch device does not generate photographic quality images, but does display clearly distinguishable shapes of intimate body parts like genitals and breasts, according to federal officials. Portions of the display can also be enlarged by the operator for closer examination.

    Along with an image of the traveler's naked body, the device also shows anything being carried on the body or in clothing.

    Currently, the BodySearch is only being used by U.S. Customs officials to scan airline passengers who have been singled out for "special attention" -- but the technology could easily be extended to every security checkpoint, noted Dasbach.

    "The tendency of the government is to continually expand the use of invasive search technology, whether it is thermal imaging scans of private homes, gamma ray scanners at border checkpoints, or X-rated X-rays in airports. Unless Americans protest this trend, every traveler's naked body could soon be routinely examined by the government's high-tech Peeping Toms."

    But even if the BodySearch is only used by U.S. Customs officials, that's still cause for concern, said Dasbach, given the agency's alarming track record of privacy invasions.

    In 1998, for example, U.S. Customs employees ordered 2,797 international airline passengers to strip off their clothes at gunpoint, intimately groped them, and conducted humiliating body cavity searches. The agency also faces numerous lawsuits for selecting its strip-search victims based on racial profiling.

    "The U.S. Customs agency has shown it doesn't respect Americans' Constitutional protections against unreasonable search and seizure," he said. "Why should we trust them with a new high-tech way to invade our privacy?"

    Of course, Libertarians are sensitive to the fact that many airline passengers may be willing to give up some privacy to guarantee their safety from terrorists or hijackers, said Dasbach.

    "Everyone wants to be safe when they fly, and no one would object to reasonable security provisions from the airline companies," he said. "But, at the same time, the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights provide a protective barrier against unreasonable search and seizure that not even X-rated X-rays should be allowed to penetrate."

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