Monday, May 16, 2005

Security

Networked Server: Backscatter awaits as backup for billions in security shortcomings

By Ethan Forman

After a report found that airport screeners were still letting investigators tote knives, guns and fake bombs onto planes, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff endorsed backscatter X-ray technology in recent testimony before Congress.

Chertoff did not name any company names when he said "one form of technology that makes it easier to detect these kinds of threats is backscatter technology."

I asked an official at Billerica's American Science & Engineering Inc. - one of the two companies making detection equipment based on backscatter technology - if the company could see a lift from that kind of endorsement.

"We think so," said Richard Mastronardi, executive vice president of strategic marketing and sales for American Science & Engineering.

The company has 350 employees and builds its X-ray inspection systems entirely in Massachusetts. Its technology can be used to scan vehicles and cargo containers as well.

Mastronardi spoke with me on the phone recently from Quantico Marines Corps Base in Quantico, Va.

He was attending the Force Protection Equipment Demonstration V, a show that many of AS&E's military and homeland security customers attend to check out off-the-shelf equipment that can protect the nation's armed forces and first responders.

Over the weekend came more news about the technology and equipment the government bought to make us safer after the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

On May 8, The New York Times reported Uncle Sam had purchased $4.5 billion worth of equipment to help detect threats at airports, in the mail and in the ports. And much of it now has to be upgraded or scrapped, the report suggested. The report adds the government may now have to shell out billions more to make the country safer.

The news report cites interviews with government officials that said devices used to screen for weapons were no more effective than before the Transportation Security Administration took over.

A call to Mastronardi last week had him taking the same cautiously optimistic tone.

"I think what they are saying is they have to do something because what they have out there, what they bought is not doing the job. Every indication, it appears to us, confirms what the Inspector General said and what Secretary Chertoff said," Mastronardi said.

When asked if this might translate into sales for AS&E, Mastronardi said, "We sure hope so."

Shortly after Sept. 11 the company sold five units to the TSA.

"We have one competitor (OSI Systems Inc. in Hawthorne, Calif., with its Rapiscan Systems division) that has one product and I would have to say it is not as good as ours," Mastronardi said.

Rapiscan's scanner is also based on backscatter X-rays,

AS&E calls its version Z Backscatter. It can create a photo-like image by not only capturing an image from a direct X-ray pass, but by examining X-rays that are scattered back from organic material, in what is called the Compton Scattering Effect. This scattering can help detect plastics, explosives and biological items.

"We do the work of metal detector - We see the whole array of potential threats. Right now, there is nothing that can find the ceramic weapons," Mastronardi said. But backscatter technology can, he said.

Chertoff endorsed backscatter technology in front of the Homeland Security Subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee after being challenged about the need for new technology by Sen. Herbert Kohl, D-Wis.

A recent U.S. Inspector General report found that despite increased training and awareness by TSA screeners, investigators were still able to sneak fake weapons onto planes in similar numbers found in prior investigations.

The technology carries with it privacy concerns, however, because it can peer through clothing, though AS&E says backscatter technology can eliminate pat-downs and strip searches.

The problem is "you can see the threats, but you can also see quite a bit of people's anatomy," Mastronardi said.

Chertoff addressed those concerns in his testimony and said he would not want to see "endless debate" about backscatter technology and privacy.

"I very much want to start to take the step of moving that technology out and continuing to press forward on the research and development side, but also not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good," he testified.

"We have been working over the past year with the TSA to address the privacy issues," Mastronardi said.

Mastronardi said the TSA plans to test its technology at several airports in a pilot program, but he would not say in which airports.

He said the company has hit a growth curve. Revenues in the third quarter of fiscal 2005 were $23.5 million, a 44 percent increase over the quarter last year.

"We have been growing and our revenues are going up and our staffing is going up and we'll see," Mastronardi said.