Palm Beach Airport Won't Use Face-Scan Technology
Officials: Test Results Mixed
POSTED: Sunday, May 26, 2002
UPDATED: 5:25 pm EDT May 26,
2002
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- Palm Beach International Airport officials said face-scanning technology will not become part of their airport's security system. 
The airport used the scanning device during an eight-week trial period."There's room for improvement in this technology,'' said airport spokeswoman Lisa De La Rionda.Visionics Corp. of New Jersey and ATC Systems Integrators of Miami installed the equipment for a free test at the airport.The system is supposed to detect terrorists by snapping photos of passengers going through security checkpoints. The photos are then compared with pictures in a database.The airport tested the system to see if it could detect faces in a database of 15 employees. The system looks for 80 facial features and a match occurs when 14 features are the same.Officials said the test results were mixed. Less than half of test subjects were detected when they should have been.Visionics' face-scanning cameras were installed last week at the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. The American Civil Liberties Union says the technology is ineffective and unnecessarily invasive.Visionics also tested its system at airports in Boston, Dallas-Fort Worth and Fresno, Calif.
The airport used the scanning device during an eight-week trial period."There's room for improvement in this technology,'' said airport spokeswoman Lisa De La Rionda.Visionics Corp. of New Jersey and ATC Systems Integrators of Miami installed the equipment for a free test at the airport.The system is supposed to detect terrorists by snapping photos of passengers going through security checkpoints. The photos are then compared with pictures in a database.The airport tested the system to see if it could detect faces in a database of 15 employees. The system looks for 80 facial features and a match occurs when 14 features are the same.Officials said the test results were mixed. Less than half of test subjects were detected when they should have been.Visionics' face-scanning cameras were installed last week at the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. The American Civil Liberties Union says the technology is ineffective and unnecessarily invasive.Visionics also tested its system at airports in Boston, Dallas-Fort Worth and Fresno, Calif.Copyright 2004 by Internet Broadcasting Systems and Local6.com.
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