The Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) is likely to release the technical norms for operating full-body scanners to screen passengers at airports next month, according to a senior government official.
“A committee comprising representatives of the Intelligence Bureau, National Investigating Agency and Cabinet Secretariat will be finalising technical specifications for full-body scanners using millimetre wave technology, following which these will be published next month,” a senior official of the Ministry of Home Affairs said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The BCAS had decided to recommend body scanners using active and passive millimetre wave technologies instead of back-scatter and full transmission X-ray technologies after consulting the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB), which had expressed concerns about frequent exposure of passengers to X-ray radiation, the official said.
The two types of millimetre wave scanners produce a silhouette of the passenger being screened instead of a naked image, thereby safeguarding the privacy of the individual.
These machines don’t generate beeps, ensuring that there are no false alarms every time a woman wearing jewellery such as a mangalsutra is scanned by it — as was discovered during trials conducted at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport.
The official added that these scanners would not be mandatory for airports to deploy but could be used in addition to equipment such as door metal frame detectors, explosive trace detectors, explosive vapour detectors as well as pat down searches.
An official of the Airports Authority of India said that the full-body scanners were likely to be installed in a phased manner starting with ‘hypersensitive’ airports that see international flights.
As many as 28 airports have been identified as hypersensitive from a security standpoint. Of these, 22 handle international flights including Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai and Kolkata.
Aviation security watchdog BCAS is likely to release technical norms for full-body scanners next month enabling airports to enhance screening of passengers.
