[Infowarrior] - Anxiety-detecting machines could spot terrorists

[Richard Forno]

(False positives, here we come!! --rf)


http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techinnovations/2008-09-18-bioscanner_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip

Anxiety-detecting machines could spot terrorists
By Thomas Frank, USA TODAY

UPPER MARLBORO, Md. — A scene from the airport of the future: A man's  
pulse races as he walks through a checkpoint. His quickened heart rate  
and heavier breathing set off an alarm. A machine senses his skin  
temperature jumping. Screeners move in to question him.

Signs of a terrorist? Or simply a passenger nervous about a cross- 
country flight?

It may seem Orwellian, but on Thursday, the Homeland Security  
Department showed off an early version of physiological screeners that  
could spot terrorists. The department's research division is years  
from using the machines in an airport or an office building — if they  
even work at all. But officials believe the idea could transform  
security by doing a bio scan to spot dangerous people.

Critics doubt such a system can work. The idea, they say, subjects  
innocent travelers to the intrusion of a medical exam.

The futuristic machinery works on the same theory as a polygraph,  
looking for sharp swings in body temperature, pulse and breathing that  
signal the kind of anxiety exuded by a would-be terrorist or criminal.  
Unlike a lie-detector test that wires subjects to sensors as they  
answer questions, the "Future Attribute Screening Technology" (FAST)  
scans people as they walk by a set of cameras.

"We're picking up things with sensors that can't necessarily be  
detected by the human eye," said Jennifer Martin, a consultant to  
Homeland Security's Science and Technology division.

The five-year project, in its second year, is the department's latest  
effort to thwart terrorism by spotting suspicious people. The  
Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has trained more than  
2,000 screeners to observe passengers as they walk through airports,  
questioning those who seem oddly agitated or nervous.

The system would be portable and fast, said project manager Robert  
Burns, who envisions machines that scan people as they walk into  
airports, train stations or arenas. Those flagged by the machines  
would be interviewed in front of cameras that measure minute facial  
movements for signs they are lying.

Like the TSA's program, FAST raises reliability questions. Even if  
machines accurately spot someone whose heart rate jumps suddenly, that  
may signal the agitation of learning a flight is delayed, said Timothy  
Levine, a Michigan State University expert on deceptive behavior.

"What determines your heart rate is a whole bunch of reasons besides  
hostile intent," Levine said. "This is the whole reason behavioral  
profiles don't work."

John Verdi, a lawyer at the Electronic Privacy Information Center,  
calls physiological screening a "medical exam" that the government has  
no business conducting. "This is substantially more invasive than  
screening in airports," Verdi said.

Burns said the measurements would not be stored and would give a quick  
read on someone. Previous research, Burns added, has found that people  
planning to cause harm act differently from the anxious or annoyed.

To pinpoint the physiological reactions that indicate hostile intent,  
researchers have set up two lab-like trailers on an equestrian center  
outside Washington, D.C. Science and Technology recruited 140 local  
people with newspaper and Internet ads seeking testers in a "security  
study." Each person receives $150.

On Thursday, subjects walked one by one into a trailer with a  
makeshift checkpoint. A heat camera measured skin temperature. A  
motion camera watched for tiny skin movements to measure heart and  
breathing rates.

As a screener questioned each tester, five observers in another  
trailer looked for sharp jumps on the computerized bands that display  
the person's physiological characteristics.

Some subjects were instructed in advance to try to cause a disruption  
when they got past the checkpoint, and to lie about their intentions  
when being questioned. Those people's physiological responses are  
being used to create a database of reactions that signal someone may  
be planning an attack. More testing is planned for the next year.



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