Newly installed full-body scanners at American airports give Transportation Security Administration (TSA)

employees the ability to use powerful advanced imaging technology (AIT) to see the naked bodies and genitalia of travelers. Four hundred ninety-two full

body scanners are expected to be in use by December 2010 and an

additional 500 units will be shipped out in 2011.

The alternative is reportedly an embarrassing full-body search.

However, a new lawsuit by watchdog group Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) claims the body scanners are easily hackable, store

nude pictures for unknown periods of time, and don’t even catch

terrorists. But that’s not the worst news: the collective bargaining

agent organization for American Airlines pilots alleges the machines

pose a radiation risk.

EPIC has filed

a lawsuit in the District of Columbia Court of Appeals urging the

court to suspend the AIT body scanner program. Well-known consumer

advocate (and 2000 election gadfly) Ralph Nader has also joined EPIC

in urging

Senate hearings on full body scanners at airports. The federal

government’s brief in the lawsuit is due by December 15, 2010.

Also named as a petitioner in EPIC’s

lawsuit is Nadhira al-Khalili, national legal counsel for the Council

on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). CAIR is one of the largest

Muslim organizations in the United States and has repeatedly

targeted alleged discrimination against Muslim-American airplane

passengers in the past. The organization is mentioned several times

in EPIC’s filing.

But the interesting thing? According to

EPIC’s legal

papers, the government is actively discouraging other airport

screening methods, saving images of naked travelers in databases,

exposing travelers to unhealthy amounts of radiation … and the

machines don’t even work. Here’s a list of the highlights of their court filing: