When screening makes you scream

Globe & Mail | February 10, 2010
Bert Archer

Already frustrated by post-Christmas airport security, Andrea Pilati thought she had seen it all. And then airport security personnel told her to stick her hands down her pants.

The consultant had passed the first wave of security for a January flight from Toronto to New York. “As I approached the second security, I was asked to put my hands in my pockets. Wearing a women’s suit, I did not have pants pockets. The guard then told me to put my hands down my pants. I was flabbergasted. …They wanted to swab my hands for explosives,” she recalls.

She did, and was initiated into the humiliating new world of explosive-powder checks, now part of the security process at Canadian airports for travellers who don’t pass through the full-body scanner.

Transport Canada senior adviser Maryse Durette said Transport Canada and the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority “use a variety of screening equipment and methods, using a targeted and random approach, to detect prohibited items during the screening process, including different forms of explosives.”

Though she didn’t discuss specific methods, technologies and details, citing security reasons, she said these methods are “based on international best practices and standards and an assessment of threat and risk information.”

Full article here