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 Canada to introduce body scanners at airports (AFP) – 14 hours ago OTTAWA — Body scanners will be introduced at all major Canadian airports in a bid to tighten up security following a failed plot to bomb a US airplane, the government said Tuesday. The controversial scanners, capable of peering through clothes to create three-dimensional images of passengers to reveal any concealed weapons or explosives, are to be installed at 11 airports over the next two months. Eventually, 44 scanners are to be deployed in all, at a cost of about 250,000 Canadian dollars each (240,000 US), Minister of State Rob Merrifield told a press conference. "We are not immune to acts of terrorism or terrorist threats and we must remain vigilant to be at the forefront of new security technology," he said. "Today I'm announcing the government of Canada is purchasing 44 new millimeter wave imaging scanners to enhance passenger security at Canadian airports." "The scanner will offer an additional layer to security measures that are already in place." Travelers selected for secondary screening at checkpoints will be asked to walk through the scanner, or may alternatively submit to a physical search, Merrifield explained. Graphic images created by the machines, criticized by privacy advocates as amounting to "virtual strip searching," would be viewed by officers in a closed room with no view of the passengers themselves and deleted, he said. Canada's privacy commissioner commented in October that privacy issues raised by the use of this novel technology were addressed. The scanners were tested at a small airport in Kelowna, in westernmost Canada, and 95 percent of passengers surveyed said they would prefer to submit to a scan over a physical search. Nathalie Des Rosiers, executive director of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, however, told public broadcaster CBC: "The experience in Kelowna was less rosy than presented." "Seventy percent of the people that went through the scanners had to be patted down afterwards anyway because there were too many false positives," she said. Several countries, led by the United States, have announced additional security measures at airports since Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was charged with trying to blow up a US-bound jet on Christmas Day. The Netherlands, Britain and Nigeria earlier announced that body scanners would also be rolled out at their international airports. Abdulmutallab, 23, reportedly confessed to being trained by an Al-Qaeda bomb-maker in Yemen for the suicide mission on the Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit. It was foiled when explosives sewn into the man's underwear failed to detonate, and passengers jumped on him. Copyright © 2010 AFP. All rights reserved.

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