The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) inspector general (IG) is currently conducting covert testing of people scanners used at airport screening checkpoints and the early indications show potential problems with the technology, the head of the office said on Wednesday.
The “early returns” of the ongoing covert testing of the Advanced Imaging Technology (AIT) “give us some concern,” John Roth, the DHS IG, told the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Asked what the nature of the concern is, Roth replied, “Whether they’re effective.”
The Transportation Security Administration has deployed hundreds of AIT systems made by L-3 Communications [LLL] to the nation’s airports for use in screening individuals as they pass through the aviation security checkpoint. The company’s millimeter wave-based systems, which are also deployed at airports in other countries, automatically alert screening officers to the location of potential threat objects on a person’s body hidden beneath their clothing.
Roth said that a classified report on the covert testing will eventually be produced by his office. In his prepared statement for the committee, he stated the testing is evaluating the effectiveness of the automated target recognition software and checkpoint screener performance.
TSA previously also deployed AIT machines made by Rapiscan Systems, a division of OSI Systems [OSIS], but pulled those scanners from checkpoints after the company was unable to meet the agency’s requirements for automated threat detection.
The agency recently awarded L-3 a $10.1 million contract for the next-generation of AIT systems, called AIT-2. The company will provide 61 of the machines to being to replace existing body scanners at airports. The newer systems are expected to increase detection capabilities and passenger throughput and also take up less space.
L-3 remains the only company supplying TSA with the AIT machines. Smiths Detection, a division of Britain’s Smiths Group, had a low-rate initial production (LRIP) contract to supply TSA with several AIT-2 machines for operational testing and evaluation but the company last year withdrew from testing after failing. American Science and Engineering [ASEI], another company that received an AIT-2 LRIP contract from TSA, so far has also failed the operational testing and must address these failures to continue with the testing, according to the agency.
Roth also said in his prepared testimony that the IG office, in general, has done a “series of covert penetration tests—essentially testing TSA’s ability to stop us from bringing simulated explosives and weapons through checkpoints, as well as testing whether we could enter secured areas through other means. Although the results of those tests are classified, we identified vulnerabilities caused by human and technology-based failures.”