Good news for frequent fliers -- the TSA is removing the remaining so-called naked body scanners manufactured under the unfortunate moniker of Rapiscan.
The U.S. Transportation Security Administration will remove airport body scanners that privacy advocates likened to strip searches after OSI Systems Inc. (OSIS) couldn’t write software to make passenger images less revealing.
TSA will end a $5 million contract with OSI’s Rapiscan unit for the software after Administrator John Pistole concluded the company couldn’t meet a congressional deadline to produce generic passenger images, agency officials said in interviews.
The agency removed 76 of the machines from busier U.S. airports last year. It will now get rid of the remaining 174 Rapiscan machines, with the company absorbing the cost, said Karen Shelton Waters, the agency’s assistant administrator for acquisitions
The peep-show scanners will be replaced by machines manufactured by L-3 Communications Holdings Inc. (LLL) that do not produce explicit full frontal photographs.