Body scanners planned for main airports
Kiwis will soon be showing off more than just their boarding pass and ID before they board a plane, with full body scanners coming to New Zealand airports from next year.
The Aviation Security Service plans to install advanced imaging technology (AIT) scanners at Auckland Airport’s international terminal next year. Christchurch, Dunedin, Queenstown and Wellington airports will follow by late 2020.
It comes after a trial at Wellington Airport last year, which cost about $20,000.
But there are fears the scanners will create bottleneck queues at security screening points, with a report on the trial showing processing was slower for all passengers.
The so-called ‘‘naked scanners’’ have been a feature in United States airports since 2010 after ‘‘underwear bomber’’ Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab tried to blow-up an international flight with plastic explosives.
The technology has been controversial because of privacy concerns, with critics describing them as a ‘‘digital strip-search’’.
Devices that produce an unclothed image of a person breach New Zealand’s Aviation Crimes Act, so the scanners will be configured to reveal only a genderless stick figure image that highlight the areas of a passenger’s body that require investigation by security staff.
Suspicious or foreign objects will also not be displayed, but they will be indicated with a coloured marker. The scanners use non-ionizing radiation, which has no proven adverse health effects.
Passing through the scanners won’t be mandatory, but those who refuse will have to undergo a ‘‘pat-down’’ search.
There has been no increase in New Zealand’s terror threat level. But documents released by the Aviation Security Service (Avsec) under the Official Information Act note the scanners ‘‘are becoming the norm’’ in international airports.
Council of Civil Liberties chairman Thomas Beagle said it was ‘‘overkill’’ but he was now ‘‘resigned to the oversecuritization of the border.’’ ‘‘We acknowledge the need for security but think it is probably overdone. Air travel has got a lot less pleasant.’’