The /*Transportation Security Administration*/ rolled out new software Wednesday for its millimeter wave Advanced Imaging Technology body scanners.
Instead of displaying a detailed image of the human anatomy, a mere outline of a body is what is shown. That's a picture both passengers and TSA agents can view without embarrassment.
"The new software demystifies the image," said Nico Melendez, a TSA spokesman. "Passengers can see it at the checkpoint and it maintains the effectiveness of security because we're able to see what we need to see."
The screening process is still the same, but the new software allows passengers to reveal much less.
The new software uses auto-detection to pick out items that could pose a potential threat and highlights it in yellow.
Prior to the software upgrade, a security officer was in a separate room viewing images of passengers. Information was then communicated to another officer at the checkpoint.
"The one person looking at the images is the one person resolving the images and they can communicate with the passenger right there and do a targeted pat down if there is some kind of an anomaly," Melendez said.
TSA officials said the technology upgrade enhances already existing privacy protections and streamlines the security check-in process.
For passengers it is provides something else.
"I think this is a fair process," said Katherine Friedman of Claremont. "It eliminates - in my mind - singling people out for race or other factors."
