Coming soon to a security checkpoint near you - DHS super-duper emotion reader

[Lone_Star_Dem]

Homeland Security Embarks on Big Brother Programs to Read Our Minds and Emotions

Half-baked Homeland Security is spending millions to develop sensors capable of detecting a person's level of 'malintent' as a counterterrorism tool.

In the sci-fi thriller Minority Report, Tom Cruise plays a D.C. police detective, circa 2054, in the department of "pre-crime," an experimental law enforcement unit whose mission -- to hunt down criminals before they strike -- relies on the psychic visions of mutant "pre-cogs" (short for precognition) who can see the future. It may be futuristic Hollywood fantasy, but the underlying premise -- that we can predict (if not see) a person's sinister plans before they follow through -- is already here.

This past February, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) awarded a one-year, $2.6 million grant to the Cambridge, MA.-based Charles Stark Draper Laboratory to develop computerized sensors capable of detecting a person's level of "malintent" -- or intention to do harm. It's only the most recent of numerous contracts awarded to Draper and assorted research outfits by the U.S. government over the past few years under the auspices of a project called "Future Attribute Screening Technologies," or FAST. It's the next wave of behavior surveillance from DHS and taxpayers have paid some $20 million on it so far.

Conceived as a cutting-edge counter-terrorism tool, the FAST program will ostensibly detect subjects' bad intentions by monitoring their physiological characteristics, particularly those associated with fear and anxiety. It's part of a broader "initiative to develop innovative, non-invasive technologies to screen people at security checkpoints," according to DHS.

The "non-invasive" claim might be a bit of a stretch. A DHS report issued last December outlined some of the possible technological features of FAST, which include "a remote cardiovascular and respiratory sensor" to measure "heart rate, heart rate variability, respiration rate, and respiratory sinus arrhythmia," a "remote eye tracker" that "uses a camera and processing software to track the position and gaze of the eyes (and, in some instances, the entire head)," "thermal cameras that provide detailed information on the changes in the thermal properties of the skin in the face," and "a high resolution video that allows for highly detailed images of the face and body … and an audio system for analyzing human voice for pitch change."
http://www.alternet.org/rights/144443/homeland_security_embarks_on_big_brother_programs_to_read_our_minds_and_emotions

What will they think of next?

[mikelgb]

1. Who is not pissed at the airport?

[ixion]

3. exactly...

most people are stressed, at the very least, when shuffling through the airport concentration camp, er, system.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

6. I hate crowds. I wonder what that would read as on their malintent meter?

I bet they'd be pulling me out of line for questioning.

[Duende azul]

21. Don't worry. You'll be tasered before the questioning starts.

[tanyev]

2. Great. Soon they can pull out everyone who's fearful of flying and accuse them of being terraists.

[pipi_k]

5. Yeah, then they can go after people standing in line

in grocery stores, banks, etc. Really freak out the people with anxiety disorders who don't want to be there in the first place.

According to them, I'd be a terrorist in my own damned home, for crissakes...

idiots

:eyes:

[RaleighNCDUer]

8. And, ironically, if someone IS a terrorist and has a bomb in his shorts

he's just as likely as not to NOT be terribly agitated or emotional, because he has already made his decision - with the decision made, there is no anxiety, particularly if he is a 'true believer' in whatever cause he's acting for.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

11. Good point

If you've already reconciled yourself to the fact your dying for a cause, you'd be less be feeling stress.

[Richard D]

4. I wonder . . .

. . . what a couple short-term benzo's would do to the reading?

This isn't measuring mal-intent, just the physiological signs. Anxiety shut off, no physiological signs. Mal-intent can remain.

Seems a pretty stupid idea to me.

On edit: Or even learning via bio-feedback to control stress would negate these machines effectiveness, I'd imagine.

[Vinnie From Indy]

7. Terorists will just use BOTOX

[gratuitous]

9. Well, this should be a fool-proof system

Hard to imagine how anything could possibly go wrong with this, what with the general level of calm and serenity at any airport, the professionalism of the Homeland Security and TSA staff in reacting appropriately and not at all overreacting ever to any real or perceived threat, and the high level of confidence and trust the public has in airport personnel to process people quickly and efficiently in preparation for their flights, which practically always leave on time and without complications.

Three huzzahs for the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory! Hip-hip! Hip-hip! Hip-hip!

[Dinger]

10. 1984=2009

Look happy everybody! SMILE!!! You better fucking SMILE!!!

[charlie]

12. They'll need to be throroughly tested

Put prototypes at every access point between K Street and Congress. If the sirens don't consistently go off, they aren't working.

[MadHound]

13. Let's see here, you're anxious and pissed off about airport security

So you register "malintent" on this machine, which gets you labeled as a terrorist.

Let me guess, DHS is trying to force all of us to love being padded, poked and prodded. If you don't, you're a terrorist.

Just one more reason not to go flying anymore.

[kenny blankenship]

14. Don't worry. Be Happy!

Or we'll probably shoot you.

[L0oniX]

15. Couldn't they just borrow an E-meter from the scientoligists?

[hvn_nbr_2]

19. Phrenology is cheaper. :-) nt

[Forkboy]

16. That's ok, I learned how to hide things like that from Dexter.

:evilgrin:

[BeHereNow]

17. Wonder which corporate fuck is making a million on this contract?

They NEVER tire of playing the "Fear" card, do they.
Whistling all the way to their offshore accounts while we PAY for this shit.

BHN

[ThomCat]

18. How many disabled people with tremors are they going to snag

and harass with this shit?

"You seem unusually agitated. You are shaking with apparent nervousness and fear. Is there something you want to confess to these anti-terrorism officers here before they strip search you and lock you away?"

"I just have Parkinson's disease. What are you talking about?"

[KansDem]

20. They should just use mood rings...

Issue one to every passenger and DHS can monitor the colors:



They only cost a few bucks, but the price could be jacked up to $20-$30 for a handsome profit!

[tyedyeto]

22. Every time I head south of where I live in Southern Arizona

to a town which is in the US I get the feeling that is stated above.

I head home and have to pass through a 'border checkpoint' 30 miles in the US from the border. I have never left the US and, so far, have not had to produce papers to prove otherwise, but I always feel like I'm in some other world where I have to prove that I really do belong here in the US. I've at no point left this country but still have to go through a 'checkpoint' and tell some border patrol employee (ie: homeland security employee) that I am an American Citizen. And I never left this country.

Yet I still have to go though their bullshit when heading north. And the Federal Government wants to build a permanent 'checkpoint' to make sure everyone 30 miles from the border is legally "entering" our country. Excuse me, but the border is 30 miles away not where this 'checkpoint' is.

If thought control is in place, they would have stopped me long ago because I refuse to answer their questions. (I admit I'm Caucasian and they usually wave me through). But I have been known to reply when asked my nationality "What do I look like?" Because I speak an un-accented English, I've never had a problem.

My vibes however have been on full alert since I disagree with the entire concept of 'border checkpoints' within the US borders.

[Tabasco_Dave]

23. I have social anxiety disorder

Large groups of people make me nervous i guess i'll have to take the greyhound.:shrug: