Alert: Terrorists look to implant bombs in humans

@kurisupisu; Great explanation.....couldn't be more clear.

@techball

yes it is BS.

Firstly do your own research and thinking and then get back to me .........

One more demonstration of the futility in trying to deal rationally with a religion/culture that is utterly failed, and at war with modernity and sanity.

Last year, it was reported that British officials uncovered intelligence that al-Qaida was seeking to surgically implant bombs inside people, a move some believed was prompted by the use of full-body imaging machines at major airports around the world.

Information discovered by the British is American BS? Explain please.

American BS pure and simple,though it would be possible for a 'government' to arrange this...right?

"Why are these leaders still playing the terror card?" asks poster tkoind.

The Christmas Day bomber made Obama look weak and vulnerable, all the more so since he was not an Arab from the Mid East but an erstwhile exchange student from Nigeria.

I do wonder about this. I always thought that the body scanners were never going to be effective, as the level of radiation they emit is way too low to see much other than contours. Obviously, if someone really wanted to hide something, they might be able to do so. Hence the invasive groping that is going on now, when or if the scanner might not work thoroughly. I doubt very much that the surgical implant theory is real - when you think about the difficulties presented, it doesn't make sense. But, if the story was put about that it could be done, would it be used to go for much heavier radiation from the scanners? How else are they going to be able to check that a bulge or lump isn't a threat?

Like much of the anti-terror legislation and practices of the past few years, the real application of this would lie in the prevention of drug and other smuggling, just as fingerprinting, photo and retinal scanning, and RFID passports have much more to with immigration factors.

They already implanted the Bomb of fear in your hearts, That is more destructive than a any physical bomb which may kill number of people only.

It's your fear of the TSA and the government that is taking center stage here. You're just telling people to be afraid of what you're afraid of, you're not telling them to not be afraid.

I probably should not have pandered to your mischaracterization at all, but fear is not quite the right word. I am advocating being wary and cautious. If it was fear I was advocating I would suggest purchasing equipment like Chertoff does. I would tell people to dig secret rooms in their basements, purchase firearms and join a militia. But no, all I am saying is that we should not hand the authorities even more power. And you accuse me of being a fearmonger? Your rabid and disingenuous approach to this makes me wonder if you have stock in Chertoffs company or something.

See the word "may"?

Yeah. I saw the word may when they were talking about the original scanners and fingerprinting and creating the TSA and making us take our shoes off and stow knives and nail clippers in the check in baggage and every danged useless affront to freedom that has not made us any more secure. But of course after the fact I am sure you would say the time to complain was BEFORE those things became reality, whereas now you seem to be suggesting we wait until AFTER.

FYI the technology exists and is being promoted. Its but a short hop from here to purchase and implementation. Now is a very good time to venture an opinion. Now is a very good to form an opinion. Now is a very good time to offer an opinion to others undecided. You think Chertoff is just talking casually? Hell no! He is drawing up plans to make this reality! And if and when it happens I will get to say "I told you so!" Why should I skip that opportunity?

If I'm doing something wrong, please let me know.

You are giving up freedom to have security but you won't have either.

This is purely a message intended to keep people freaked out over things that are not a real issue for 99% of us.

Except each new measure and idea has met with around half of posters having a problem. I have flown since this crap started. I wanted to make snide comments to the security people but I didn't. That was not a silent vote of approval. That was the desire to not cause trouble for my wife and her family. Geez, just to make the statement of 99 percent! How arrogant and clueless can you get?

Huh...well I hope they don't pull it off. Considering most of these explosives fail and only start smoking anyway I'd really hate to be sitting next to the guy when it sputters and starts burning somewhere in their abdomen. Unpleasant way to go and the smell would be horrendous.

chewitup: I do not deny preaching a specific fear though, because surely there are things in this world people should be afraid of. Butt bombs, in the grand scheme of things, are not one of them.

Then don't be afraid of them. You'll be in the company of pretty much everyone else in the world. It's your fear of the TSA and the government that is taking center stage here. You're just telling people to be afraid of what you're afraid of, you're not telling them to not be afraid.

The reason this is getting printed is because it's a sensational story. The mental image of people putting bombs into themselves makes for a good read. And it also brings out people such as yourself with the standard script that usually includes references to police states and the Founding Fathers. It gets hits for the website and generates revenue. You're just another automatic dollar sign.

The information was just a report that the government gave to the airlines based on (British) intelligence. If you go back and really read how the story is written you'll see quite a few holes. And the holes are there for a reason. And you're the reason. They know some people are happy to connect dots that just aren't there. Notice the first two sentences. See the word "may"? Now look near the end where the spokesperson for the TSA gives a general statement about how terrorists are constantly changing their tactics and new security measures may arise. What the writer did was use a bunch of generalities and put them into a story about people implanting bombs in their bodies. With or without this new intelligence the fact is that terrorists are always looking for new methods and new security measures may arise. The story does not link any specific new measures to this intelligence, probably because it can't. It even says it has no knowledge of any plans to use this method.

So in the the you take a routine intelligence briefing, craft a headline that reads, "Alert: Terrorists look to implant bombs in humans," talk about nebulous new security measures that may or may not arise which is really saying nothing at all, and then you have a nice piece of steak for the "fear the government" crowd to chew on. Sorry, but I don't fear the government. And I really don't fear terrorists. If I'm doing something wrong, please let me know. I'd at the very least like to know that if I am going to buy into fear I'm getting it from the right people.

tkoind2: Why are these leaders still playing the terror card?

This is purely a message intended to keep people freaked out over things that are not a real issue for 99% of us.

People aren't afraid to fly. Period. If that's the government's goal then they're doing a pretty lousy job of it.

The goal is not to make people afraid to fly. The goal is to amass power and money, and they do that by pimping fear and at the same time offering solutions...for a price. The sale of snake oil is hardly a new practice.

Or, if you believe Michael Chertoff is just seriously worried and concerned for his fellow Americans, well, you are welcome to that opinion. Just forgive me if I snort or guffaw when you state it.

What would you like them do to? Come out and say, "Someone tried to bring a liquid bomb on a plane but please, feel free to brings as many liquids as you want through security."

I would like them to treat a one off event as a one off event rather than treat it like a pattern. No need for them to state anything except that they will exercise more caution and that they advise passengers to do likewise. Anyone who reacts to single events with a total overhaul of the system and new equipment especially for that event is a fool, and a broke fool to boot. I resent not being able to bring water on the plane. I resent having to stow the tiniest of knives in my luggage along with my danged nail clippers. I resent taking my shoes off. I resent these things because they are just an inconvenience with no real meaning. I am seriously more concerned about a crash from pilot error or mechanical failure than I am a terror attack from fellow passengers.

And why are we taking off our shoes? Because of one lousy failed shoe bomber. Millions of people taking off their shoes because of one man and one non-event! Its insane. Same for the rest.

There are abuses and there always will be abuses.

My concern is not so much of abuses right now, but what is next? People are getting too used to being treated like livestock. By the time they wake up on their own, it will be too late. We see it over and over in history. Bowing to authority is not something that should be done as a matter of course. It should never be done lightly or casually but with extreme scrutiny. You get lax and you will have tyranny, its just a matter of time. The entire American system is based on perpetual awareness, rigor and checks and balances. This is from the Founding Fathers. And what I see is masses of Americans just casually accepting proceedures not only invasive, but ineffective. And if you think we have no measure of tyranny right now, just look at how much Afghanistan cost us and how much we are in debt as a nation, but how insanely rich some certain people are! Might be the friendliest tyranny in the world, but I believe we will pay heavily, or our children will.

If you want to know who is selling fear I'll go ahead and hand you a mirror.

I got my own mirror and I looked and saw the Founding Fathers standing behind me! I am not selling fear, because unlike Michael Chertoff, there is no possible way for me to profit from my position, in this case by urging people to reject the scanners.

I do not deny preaching a specific fear though, because surely there are things in this world people should be afraid of. Butt bombs, in the grand scheme of things, are not one of them.

And what tkoind2 said.

This is purely a message intended to keep people freaked out over things that are not a real issue for 99% of us. Terror is not what we need to be worried about day to day. I could provide a very long list of higher priority worries ranging from global warming to obesity to the oil supply.

Why are these leaders still playing the terror card? All of us will die from something other than terror. It just isn`t a real threat. Again, your bathroom, car or even spouse is more likely to kill you than you are to be harmed by terror in any way.

I mean their track record with bombs on planes...

I mean their track record with bombs on planes...

I agree that this seems like a scare tactic. It seems like it would be very difficult to do the surgery and have the patient recover and hop on a flight before accidently blowing themselves up or getting a serious infection. And considering their track record with bombs, I am not all that frightened by this news.

tkoind2: Keep the masses afraid and you can control them. Keep them terrified and they will allow the nation to become a virtual police state. Keep them on edge and they will not have the bandwidth to resist government actions.

This kind of announcement is intended to induce fear.

She said there are only so many places to hide a bomb in the body, and a suicide bomber would have to recover enough from the surgery to travel and set off the device.

Does that mean the TSA would screen fat people differently than thin people? Are Americans ready to profiled as potential threats based on their weight? Let's face facts, a fatty American is a better candidate to be carrying a body bomb than a thin middle easterner. Who could hold the bomb easier? Who is a better candidate? Personally, that is something I would almost like to see for the unintentional comedy value.

Taka

But Jimmie C Oxley, a chemistry professor at the University of Rhode Island and explosives expert, said it would be tough to carry out such an effort successfully. She said there are only so many places to hide a bomb in the body, and a suicide bomber would have to recover enough from the surgery to travel and set off the device.

Considering the difficulty in pulling this off and the link that Farmboy shared, I really see this as a Chertoff graft from the govt. using security as a ruse.

Fear sells well.

Taka

Easy solution: make passports include a separate IC card (like the old yellow vaccination certificates we used to have to show) indicating the traveler's weight, taken within the previous three months.

Easy solution to the easy solution: fill your pockets with stuff before you get weighed for your card.

Once they twig to that and start weighing people nekkid, have a very heavy meal just before getting weighed, and fast/go to the toilet before being weighed to get on the plane.

Keep the masses afraid and you can control them. Keep them terrified and they will allow the nation to become a virtual police state. Keep them on edge and they will not have the bandwidth to resist government actions.

Let us face two inescapable facts.

If terrorists want to kill people, they will find a way. No degree of security, no plans can prevent such disasters. If we make air travel to hard to target, they will switch to trains, highways or buildings. The bottom line is that terrorists are and always have been able to find a way.

You are far more likely to be killed by your bathroom than by a terrorist. Just look at the numbers who die every year by slipping in the shower or some other mundane accident in the bathroom. So why spend your life in fear of terror? We do not spend our lives in fear of bathrooms, hamburgers, traffic crossings or appliances. This fear of terror is unreasonable. We should be cautious but not live in fear.

This kind of announcement is intended to induce fear. It is a mechanism of control. One many people are starting to see through.

Easy solution: make passports include a separate IC card (like the old yellow vaccination certificates we used to have to show) indicating the traveler's weight, taken within the previous three months. Check the weight. and if any discrepancies are found, pull the passenger out of line and examine for recent suture marks.

Right, since I don't agree with you then I must be on the absolute other side of the spectrum with my fingers in both ears and my eyes closed just wanting to be raped by the government while unearthing the Founding Fathers and dumping them over the side of a boat. But it's nice to see you're being reasonable about it.

People aren't afraid to fly. Period. If that's the government's goal then they're doing a pretty lousy job of it. For every one person in government talking about airline security there are about 100 people like you telling us that we need to live our lives in fear of the government and the TSA. There are abuses and there always will be abuses. Like I said before the key is whether it falls within what could be described as normal limits. So far I've heard anecdotal stories that get passed around without the disclaimer that hundreds of millions of passengers travel in the US every year so for every story you hear there are about 10 million other stories where people had no problems. If you're worried about reporting then go ahead and give that one a spin.

Someone tried to light a bomb on a plane so they banned lighters. Someone tried to bring liquid explosives on a plane so they banned liquids. Someone put a bomb in his pants so now they do random searches. What would you like them do to? Come out and say, "Someone tried to bring a liquid bomb on a plane but please, feel free to brings as many liquids as you want through security." When money is spent there will always be some kind of corruption but just because money is spent isn't evidence of corruption. And considering that some company somewhere profits anytime the government decides to make a any new regulation, that in of itself isn't evidence of anything, although you obviously don't mind planting the seed.

If you want to know who is selling fear I'll go ahead and hand you a mirror.

For those who say that companies are looking to make money, that's just stupid.

Right. No company has ever falsely influenced the government and the people for the sake of profit. Never happened.

Look, that is not the entire basis for the accusations, but it is part of the puzzle and it fits. The added security is mostly a hoax. Even our Founding Fathers way back in the 18th century had problems with searches and placed restrictions on them, seeing them as a route to tyranny. People like you act like it could never a problem that the authorities are granted too much power to get invasive for next to no tangible benefit to those on the receiving end.

Its not the report itself that bothers us, its the style and bent of the reporting. Only one dissenting voice in the piece.

Holy Ship!

The cynic in me says that this is just an excuse for more intrusive searches. I don't know how you would stop such a thing though. X-ray everybody?

I really don't see what the big deal it. Information has been discovered that terrorists are considering a new option. The government reports the information. I just don't think there's any alternate agenda to make people rich or make people scared. The only ones who seem to be selling fear are the ones who want you to believe the government is one step away from chopping off body part from travelers.

I just got back from the US and went through all of the securing procedures. In the old days you had to remove all metal parts and go through the metal detectors. I did that. In addition I took off my shoes and took my laptop out of my bag. Since people didn't really have many laptops to travel with 10 years ago it's not like they're adding a needless measure. So the net change in the procedure is taking off my shoes and putting my laptop in a plastic case to be scanned. Sorry, but I just don't see they hype about all of it. People go around telling us the TSA wants us to be afraid but in reality people are just trying to make people afraid of the TSA. Something like 500,000,000 passengers used US airlines last year. There have been some stories of abuse but you can count them on one hand, and more often than not the stories turn out to be bogus. When you have hundreds of millions of passengers and you can't name more than a handful of abuses it sounds like it's par for the course and within normal limits. Either that or you expect the TSA to get everything right for 500,000,000 people and anything less than perfection is some sort of evidence of an agenda. It's just stupid when you look at the overall numbers.

The security people were courteous and professional and the security checkpoint took less than 10 minutes. I've never been stopped, searched, questioned, or anything, and I'm betting no one here has either. Or if they did it was probably entering Japan, not the US. Yet they'll tell you that we live in a police state anyway just because they like the way it sounds. There was a great article where a reporter went to an airport and asked people about their experience going through security and all of them said they were expecting the worst and in the end nothing happened. If you want to talk about fear mongering, I can't think of a better example.

For those who say that companies are looking to make money, that's just stupid. Unless you expect to have an all volunteer force with no technology then someone is going to be making money. Putting guard rails on Shinkansen platforms costs money and they needed a company to do it. Just because a situation like that exists isn't evidence of corruption or some evil government conspiracy to make people afraid. And heaven forbid the government gets information and doesn't release it, then a terrorist uses the loophole to destroy a plane. Those same exact people who tell us the government wants us to be afraid are more than likely to say the government intentionally didn't release the information and wanted the terrorists to succeed so the government can get even more power and control. It's a win-win situation for people selling fear.

I find it comforting that articles like this give great ideas to terrorists.

Staggeringly idiotic. Yes, if only this Associated Press article hadn't been published, terrorists never would have thought of it, despite the fact that the article itself is reporting the fact that terrorists are working on it. If you want to believe the story is meant only to scare up support for ever-intrusive airport security measures, fine, but to suggest that malefactors a world away are waiting for mainstream western media outlets to provide them with ideas is beyond brainless.

Perhaps if we can just find a way to block the terrorists' Internet connections and New York Times subscriptions, they'll simply give it all up, seeing as how the idea pipeline would be totally dry.

As predicted, the state of fear just keeps escalating and so does the over-wrought security and the expense. The terrorists are winning, because the people are to chicken turd scared to keep their government in check. You would think they would be more scared to get into a car. Nope. That would require a rational analysis of what is relatively dangerous. So they fly in fear of butt bomb but drive on fearless despite the much greater danger of the road. If the world is a ship of fools, one of its decks is an insane asylum called America.

My bad that article wasn't from Kyoto but AP=Associated Propaganda

Its bad enough western media tries to make us feel negative, Japanese news in general is quite positive, I have to admit and I dont feel negative when watching it, please stay on the same path JT! ^_^

JT and kyodo please post less negative news about terror its not interesting

Must be a slow news day......

The credible source, someone in Wash DC codenamed FEARMONGER, has delivered this info to coax would-be travellers to the US to accept the uber-privacy invasions by TSA for your "safety". Best solution is: DON'T FLY TO/THROUGH USA. So anyone with any implant may soon experience "enhanced security procedures". Land of the Free?

more scare tactics from the media fear=controlling society

Forget about the terrorists, there are high school kids all over the place in Japan riding their bikes and e-mailing at the same time!

Now, that is something to be afraid of.

What a load of crap, more scare tactics from the media fear=controlling society

I always thought we were being scanned so as to spot embedded bombs within the body. Does this mean those machines cannot spot surgically implanted bombs? Seesh ... here in Japan we're getting radiation from all directions (including x-rays, which I and perhaps you or your friends got recently for medical purposes) and now we might be facing even more before boarding planes. May the terrorists blow up on the operating table ...

I'm surprised they haven't started screening luggage and passengers BEFORE they get to the airport! Wasn't so long ago we saw terrorists attack in the lobby of the Moscow airport by hiding a bomb in a suitcase.

woops, care* not car :P

I really dont car, I will fly regardless, if my plane goes down in flames so be it

as a result, travelers may find themselves subjected to more scrutiny when flying

Another great excuse to search us all.

This is not new at all. Anyone remembers the Bond Persiflage Casino Royale (1967) with Woody Allen as Jimmy Bondi. This whole plot was based on an explosive, which was swallowed.

makiminatoJul. 07, 2011 - 08:19AM JST This is why I stopped flying.

The bombs or the security checks? You're more likely to die from falling coconuts in Japan than die in an exploding airplane.

The security checks are WAY more scary and likely. Just the though of one of those security people grabbing some lube and slipping on the rubber glove for a "full cavity search" is frikkin' scary.

Let me get to the bong and then make 2 cents.

I find it comforting that articles like this give great ideas to terrorists.

Raymasaki.

They will come up with ways after they happened most security measure are way after the fact.

As for bombs in dead bodies, nothing new been used in the middle-east for years. Living ones is a new twist though.

Most meat would foul air-port scanners if they were implanted deep enough, stomach is a perfect location up the wahoo, etc is only good for drug smuggling.

Full body scan can & would work. how small can it be? size of a GolfBall? easy to detect. the more Brainless ideas they (terrorists) come up with, the more countries will come up with ways to Stop it.

this was the first thing i though of when they started using full body scanners. where there is a will there is a way, there is no such thing as complete security.

Japan Today, I wonder why on Earth you publish this?

Why this news now? This has to be a scare story. We knew about this possibility at least a year ago.

They need to get people to accept unpopular back-scatter full-body X-ray machines at airports at a time when further increased exposure to radiation is a really sore subject.

If I am asked to go through one I will refuse, and perhaps like makiminato above I will have to stop flying.

who else but from our world police headquartered in washington do we get this valuable information. Read: we're running out of ways to scare you.

be afraid, be very afraid. 1 kilo explosives are riding up someone's but on a flight near YOU!

This is why I stopped flying.

Still, there is no current information that points to a specific plot involving surgically implanted explosives, a U.S. security official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss such sensitive matters.

such announcements should come with a big face not anonymity. Anyway, should be easy for the security services to catch the surgeons performing such implantation rather than (would be) terrorists.