There’s been plenty of resistance to the new full-body scanners that have been installed in airports all over the world in the wake of The Great Underwear-Bomb Scare of 2009. Our own Scott Carmichael worried just last week that images of nude children could surface and find their way into the hands of pedophiles.

After Alan Johnson, the UK Home Secretary, announced yesterday that full-body scanners would be introduced at Heathrow Airport in about three weeks, many in the UK have grown concerned that a full-body scan of a child would break laws against child pornography. The law in question is the Protection of Children Act from 1978, which prohibits creating an indecent image or “psuedo-image” of a child.  Read more... (245 words, 1 image, estimated 59 secs reading time)

The full body scanners being introduced to Britain’s airports risk breaking child protection laws against making indecent images of children, campaign groups have claimed.

The pictures created by the scanners are so graphic they are tantamount to “virtual strip searching”, according to privacy campaigners who oppose the use of the security devices.

Ministers may be forced to consider making under-18s exempt from the scans and civil liberties campaigners are demanding measures to ensure the images, which will include those of celebrities, are not leaked onto the internet. Airport officials say the images from the £80,000 scanners are only seen by a single security officer in a remote location before it is deleted.  Read more... (398 words, 1 image, estimated 1:36 mins reading time)

WASHINGTON ? The alleged Christmas Day terrorist had been in one of the U.S. government‘s many terror databases since November, which is when his father brought him to the attention of embassy officials in Nigeria.

However, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab came to the attention of intelligence officials months before that, according to a U.S. government official involved in the investigation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because it is ongoing.  Read more... (732 words, 1 image, estimated 2:56 mins reading time)

The already dire plight of women in Afghanistan risks deteriorating further as the US and its allies take steps to turn around the war against the Taliban, according to a report by Human Rights Watch today.

Eight years after the Taliban were ousted from power, rapists are often protected from prosecution, women can still be arrested for running away from home, and girls have far less access to schools than boys, the report says.

With the insurgency strengthening in the south and making inroads into the north, the few gains made for women’s rights since the US-led invasion of 2001 could be further eroded if Hamid Karzai‘s government and the international community push for peace talks with factions of the fundamentalist movement.  Read more... (671 words, 1 image, estimated 2:41 mins reading time)