Re: New airport agents check for danger in fliers' facial expressions

[Joshua Anderson <josh () afraid org>]

It seems they wouldn't be the first to try psychics, if so.
Looks like interest in psychics dates back to the 80's even.

http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mpsychicfed.html

"Over a period of more than 20 years, the CIA and Pentagon spent
approximately $20 million to study and employ numerous
"psychics." They were supposed to help track down terrorists,
find hostages, help anti-drug activities, etc. Experiments were
conducted on precognition, clairvoyance, and remote viewing."

rms () computerbytesman com (rms () computerbytesman com) @ Wed, Aug 15, 2007 at 11:46:59AM -0400 wrote :
> From: <rms () computerbytesman com>
> To: <funsec () linuxbox org>
> Date: Wed, 15 Aug 2007 11:46:59 -0400
> X-Mailer: Microsoft Office Outlook 12.0
> Subject: [funsec] New airport agents check for danger in fliers' facial
>       expressions
>
> I would rather see the TSA hired 500 psychics to root out the evil doers at
> the airport.......
>
> Richard
>
> http://www.mcclatchydc.com/homepage/story/18923.html
>
> New airport agents check for danger in fliers' facial expressions
> By Kaitlin Dirrig | McClatchy Newspapers 
>
> 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."
>
>
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