[Infowarrior] - DHS Reads Your Mind

[Richard Forno]

Homeland Security Detects Terrorist Threats by Reading Your Mind

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

By Allison Barrie

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,426485,00.html

Baggage searches are SOOOOOO early-21st century. Homeland Security is  
now testing the next generation of security screening — a body scanner  
that can read your mind.

Most preventive screening looks for explosives or metals that pose a  
threat. But a new system called MALINTENT turns the old school  
approach on its head. This Orwellian-sounding machine detects the  
person — not the device — set to wreak havoc and terror.

MALINTENT, the brainchild of the cutting-edge Human Factors division  
in Homeland Security's directorate for Science and Technology,  
searches your body for non-verbal cues that predict whether you mean  
harm to your fellow passengers.

It has a series of sensors and imagers that read your body  
temperature, heart rate and respiration for unconscious tells  
invisible to the naked eye — signals terrorists and criminals may  
display in advance of an attack.

But this is no polygraph test. Subjects do not get hooked up or  
strapped down for a careful reading; those sensors do all the work  
without any actual physical contact. It's like an X-ray for bad  
intentions.

Currently, all the sensors and equipment are packaged inside a mobile  
screening laboratory about the size of a trailer or large truck bed,  
and just last week, Homeland Security put it to a field test in  
Maryland, scanning 144 mostly unwitting human subjects.
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While I'd love to give you the full scoop on the unusual experiment,  
testing is ongoing and full disclosure would compromise future tests.

• Click here for an exclusive look at MALINTENT in action.

But what I can tell you is that the test subjects were average Joes  
living in the D.C. area who thought they were attending something like  
a technology expo; in order for the experiment to work effectively and  
to get the testing subjects to buy in, the cover story had to be  
convincing.

While the 144 test subjects thought they were merely passing through  
an entrance way, they actually passed through a series of sensors that  
screened them for bad intentions.

Homeland Security also selected a group of 23 attendees to be civilian  
"accomplices" in their test. They were each given a "disruptive  
device" to carry through the portal — and, unlike the other attendees,  
were conscious that they were on a mission.

In order to conduct these tests on human subjects, DHS had to meet  
rigorous safety standards to ensure the screening would not cause any  
physical or emotional harm.

So here's how it works. When the sensors identify that something is  
off, they transmit warning data to analysts, who decide whether to  
flag passengers for further questioning. The next step involves micro- 
facial scanning, which involves measuring minute muscle movements in  
the face for clues to mood and intention.

Homeland Security has developed a system to recognize, define and  
measure seven primary emotions and emotional cues that are reflected  
in contractions of facial muscles. MALINTENT identifies these emotions  
and relays the information back to a security screener almost in real- 
time.

This whole security array — the scanners and screeners who make up the  
mobile lab — is called "Future Attribute Screening Technology" — or  
FAST — because it is designed to get passengers through security in  
two to four minutes, and often faster.

If you're rushed or stressed, you may send out signals of anxiety, but  
FAST isn't fooled. It's already good enough to tell the difference  
between a harried traveler and a terrorist. Even if you sweat heavily  
by nature, FAST won't mistake you for a baddie.

"If you focus on looking at the person, you don't have to worry about  
detecting the device itself," said Bob Burns, MALINTENT's project  
leader. And while there are devices out there that look at individual  
cues, a comprehensive screening device like this has never before been  
put together.

While FAST's batting average is classified, Undersecretary for Science  
and Technology Adm. Jay Cohen declared the experiment a "home run."

As cold and inhuman as the electric eye may be, DHS says scanners are  
unbiased and nonjudgmental. "It does not predict who you are and make  
a judgment, it only provides an assessment in situations," said Burns.  
"It analyzes you against baseline stats when you walk in the door, it  
measures reactions and variations when you approach and go through the  
portal."

But the testing — and the device itself — are not without their  
problems. This invasive scanner, which catalogues your vital signs for  
non-medical reasons, seems like an uninvited doctor's exam and raises  
many privacy issues.

But DHS says this is not Big Brother. Once you are through the FAST  
portal, your scrutiny is over and records aren't kept. "Your data is  
dumped," said Burns. "The information is not maintained — it doesn't  
track who you are."

DHS is now planning an even wider array of screening technology,  
including an eye scanner next year and pheromone-reading technology by  
2010.

The team will also be adding equipment that reads body movements,  
called "illustrative and emblem cues." According to Burns, this is  
achievable because people "move in reaction to what they are thinking,  
more or less based on the context of the situation."

FAST may also incorporate biological, radiological and explosive  
detection, but for now the primary focus is on identifying and  
isolating potential human threats.

And because FAST is a mobile screening laboratory, it could be set up  
at entrances to stadiums, malls and in airports, making it ever more  
difficult for terrorists to live and work among us.

Burns noted his team's goal is to "restore a sense of freedom." Once  
MALINTENT is rolled out in airports, it could give us a future where  
we can once again wander onto planes with super-sized cosmetics and  
all the bottles of water we can carry — and most importantly without  
that sense of foreboding that has haunted Americans since Sept. 11.

Allison Barrie, a security and terrorism consultant with the  
Commission for National Security in the 21st Century, is FOX News'  
security columnist.