DHS: We Have the Authority to Routinely Strip-Search Air Travelers

Electronic Privacy Information Center

The Department of Homeland Security told a federal court that the agency believes it has the legal authority to strip-search every air traveler. The agency made the claim at oral argument in EPIC's lawsuit to suspend the airport body scanner program. The agency also stated that it believed a mandatory strip-search rule could be instituted without any public comment or rulemaking. EPIC President Marc Rotenberg urged the Washington, DC appeals court to suspend the body scanner program, noting that the devices are "uniquely intrusive" and ineffective. EPIC's opening brief in the case states that the Department of Homeland Security "has initiated the most sweeping, the most invasive, and the most unaccountable suspicionless search of American travelers in history," and that such a change in policy demands that the TSA conduct a notice-and-comment rule making process. The case is EPIC v. DHS, No. 10-1157. For more information, see EPIC: EPIC v. DHS and EPIC: Whole Body Imaging Technology.

Reprinted from the Electronic Privacy Information Center.

March 12, 2011

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