When the impact of new technologies is factored in, the challenges may be both alleviated and made more complex:

• As Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs) move from the military to the civil aviation sector, robotic navigational technologies become more pervasive.

 
• FANS (Future Air Navigation Systems), developed by NASA, permit on-board satellite-assisted navigation that renders ground control unnecessary.

New technologies also present opportunities for new forms of security:

• Lighter-than-air vehicles (also known as airships) may be deployed in the stratosphere as telecommunication ‘stratellites’ that could also be used for security surveillance.

 
• Management of transportation services is changing dramatically as a result of the information technology revolution and market deregulation. Supply chains can be re-engineered to produce inventory visibility in real time. Passengers will be processed online from home to destination.

While these technologies offer enhanced capacity for tracking, monitoring and security control, they also offer opportunity for hostile cyber attacks potentially capable of incapacitating the system or creating air disasters. Contemporary crimes such as identity theft raise issues of concern to aviation security, since terrorists could manipulate identification to breach security controls. This challenge in turn encourages the introduction of greater use of technological solutions, such as biometrics, as a verifiable security check on identity.

Existing screening equipment currently deployed at Canadian airports is designed to detect dangerous or potentially dangerous concealed items on passengers and in carry-on and hold baggage. ^{[ 5 ]} This represents a considerable investment. CATSA has deployed over 6,000 pieces of equipment utilizing X-ray, Computed Tomography (CT-X), and explosive trace detection technologies to support its screening operations in checking both carry-on and hold baggage. However sophisticated, and however effective at detecting what it was designed to detect, this equipment is nonetheless challenged by the ingenuity of those who potentially have access to new and difficult-to-detect substances and methods. For instance, component parts for an improvised explosive device could be assembled and deployed during flight. New and ingenious methods of concealing weapons or explosive devices within apparently innocuous objects such as liquids or gels also pose a threat. Certain kinds of dangerous chemicals, as well as biological and radiological agents that are difficult to detect, also present a challenge for authorities.

There is a wide range of options currently available or in development that promise to deliver better detection of dangerous materials and methods. These include trace explosive detection portals, backscatter X-ray and millimetre wave imaging machines, and projected techniques using nuclear technologies and fluorescent polymers. ^{[ 6 ]} The trace explosive detection portal, also referred to as a “puffer,” is designed to screen passengers carrying explosives. It is a walk-through portal that passes air gently over the person from head to toe causing the release of any particles that are naturally absorbed by or clinging to a person’s clothing or body. These particles or vapour are drawn into the machine for analysis and can instantaneously indicate whether that person is carrying an explosive device or has come into contact with explosive substances. Such machines have already been deployed in other countries, including at passenger screening points in some U.S. airports by the Transportation Security Administration. However, it has been found that an airport environment is different from a laboratory. Problems of reliability have been encountered, including an unacceptably high number of false readings due in part to environmental factors such as dust, dirt and fuel fumes that are typically found in airport terminal buildings.

The detection of liquid explosives is another area where technology manufacturers are developing equipment that is more affordable, fast, reliable and easy to use. While systems already exist, some have limitations and may not fit all the needs for aviation security. For instance, one device, using a laser beam, can analyze the contents of a clear bottle but is unable to see through opaque containers.

There are a number of caveats that must be applied to the promise of these technologies. Firstly, they are still very expensive, even though prices are coming down. Advanced CT-X machines currently employed in hold baggage screening, for example, cost more than $2 million per unit. ^{[ 7 ]} The more complex the equipment, the longer the downtimes caused by mechanical failures, the more that must be spent on maintaining trained service people with rapid response capability, and the more that must be invested in system redundancy to avoid passenger backups.

Since its inception, CATSA has invested over $500 million in capital equipment. Much of the equipment is technologically advanced, but also requires periodic updating. For depreciation purposes, all capital equipment used by CATSA, such as the X-ray and explosive detection machines, is considered to have a useful life of seven years. We heard from some European airports that the EU would like screening equipment to be updated after only three or four years to take advantage of new technology. If equipment is continually replaced prior to being fully depreciated, then this is an added cost burden. Adopting the latest technology and maintaining the highest degree of security in a cost-effective manner has serious public policy implications.

Some of the technologies give rise to privacy and human rights concerns (for instance, sophisticated techniques like backscatter X-ray machines that produce near ‘nude’ images). Others have concerns about the potentially harmful health effects such as the radiation used in scanning people. The backscatter X-ray portal is similar to trace explosive detection portals in that a person is scanned by a single low-dose X-ray beam moving rapidly over their form in the machine. This technology produces a highly realistic image on a computer screen. The image enables the operator to detect both concealed weapons and substances on the person being screened. Suppliers of such technology realize that privacy issues are very much a concern and have been improving the system’s masking techniques to hide body parts the image produces. A solution that we encountered in the U.K. is to give passengers requiring a search the option to select between a hand search and a backscatter X-ray where images are viewed by screening officers of the same sex.

A warning might also be in order concerning the purchase of new screening technologies: there is a growing private sector security industry engaged in research and development of screening technologies. While this is the source of innovation and for that reason should be encouraged, some of the equipment being developed is of dubious capability. This places an additional burden on government to maintain its own informed technical capacity to objectively assess the claims of industry on behalf of products, many of which will find their most important market in the public sector. We are satisfied that Transport Canada and CATSA have this capacity to test and assess new technologies and we note how important it is that this capacity be maintained within government in support of objective and appropriate procurement decisions. We recommend that this capacity should most appropriately be lodged within CATSA, as the agency that deploys and operates screening equipment in compliance with expectations set by Transport Canada. In this role, CATSA should take into account human resources considerations, such as the competencies required of screening personnel and their managers, before the acquisition and implementation of new technologies and screening processes.

Recommendation 7.2

It is recommended that CATSA have responsibility for the assessment (including pilot projects) of emerging technologies and techniques in the detection of potential threats, as part of its lifecycle management of its capital program.

A promising aspect of screening is the reconceptualization of what it means to screen ‘persons’ and ‘things.’ Future technologies may permit people to be screened without divesting their carry-on baggage, emptying pockets or removing shoes. Integrated scanning units are being developed that perform multiple functions (detect explosives in shoes, metal objects and explosives hidden on the passenger); no removal of coats or contents of pockets is required. Manufacturers claim a throughput of 240 passengers per hour, with consequent reductions in staffing requirements. The Kelowna and Vancouver airports have expressed interest in participating in a pilot project to test this type of equipment. In five to 10 years, screening technologies are expected to be available that could be imbedded in the walls of a hallway. These would be invisible to passengers and much less invasive than the current approaches.

Behavioural analysis is another innovation that could be used to identify higher-risk passengers for more thorough searches. Screening techniques such as this involve a mix of technology and human judgment. Technologies under development claim to be able to detect malicious intent in individuals and include voice analysis (measuring stress levels) and physiological response (polygraph-like tests). For example, the Suspect Detection System (SDS) consists of a booth in which a three-minute polygraph is administered through voice recording to discern whether a person may have criminal intent, based on the principle that fear will be reflected in measurable psycho-physiological parameters. If specific parameters are triggered, a further face-to-face examination is conducted. The U.S. Transportation Security Administration has begun testing of Israeli-designed SDS technology at one American airport.

There are also claims made on behalf of remote sensing technologies, like electromagnetic neurological imaging, which at present sound more like science fiction than realizable technology. There seems little likelihood that all of these speculative projects will be coming to fruition in the near future. In any event, were they to prove practicable, they would raise serious privacy issues and concerns about the objective value of the indicators they claim to detect. For instance, the identification of stress in an individual might have a number of innocent explanations, and might even be linked to the relatively high stress experience of air travel – or of being tested for stress indicators under such conditions. We were not sufficiently persuaded by the available evidence concerning technologies that claim to measure an individual’s intent to conclude that they should be developed for use at Canadian airports within the coming years.

The exercise of human judgment in screening for behaviour of passengers can be taken more seriously. Some countries, notably Israel, employ trained frontline personnel who make initial judgments regarding risk levels of passengers based on behavioural observation. This triage of passengers into high-, medium- and low-risk streams results in more focus being placed on the individuals displaying higher risk. Elements of this approach are being adopted at some European airports. In the United States, Boston Logan Airport has pioneered a program that similarly streams passengers according to estimated risk, and the Transportation Security Administration is piloting a program called SPOT (Screening of Passengers by Observation Techniques) that may be applied at a wider range of U.S. airports. These programs rely upon observation of atypical behaviour patterns to identify suspicious persons who are flagged for closer attention. It is important to note that these programs do not attempt to extrapolate presumed intentions, but merely observe anomalous external behaviour.

We have some concerns about the application of this approach in Canada. However interpreted, it implies a degree of discretion assigned to frontline personnel to make judgments about passengers – judgments that might have serious impact on individuals. We note that the threat environment in some other countries greatly exceeds anything experienced in Canada; consequently there is widespread acceptance in Israel, for example, of security measures that might not be as acceptable to Canadians. We would note as well the danger of such a system of passenger analysis being misunderstood as ‘profiling,’ which in its ethnic, religious and racial forms is generally seen as inappropriate, if not illegitimate, in Canada. In fact, these implications are neither necessary nor inevitable if such an approach is planned and implemented properly. However, there would certainly be public perception and civil liberties issues that must be taken seriously.

Widespread adoption of the behavioural approach may require redesign of existing airports. This type of risk triage is intended to facilitate throughput of low- and medium-risk passengers, while screening resources concentrate on the high-risk stream. For this to be effective, the airport must be designed so as to accommodate the process efficiently. We note in this regard that Ben Gurion International Airport in Israel was designed with multiple layers of security in mind. However, the airport also has a relatively low volume of passenger traffic – about 30 per cent of the total volume of passenger traffic at Pearson International in Toronto. ^{[ 8 ]}

Despite our reservations about the introduction of the behavioural analysis method as an additional type of screening tool, the Panel recognizes that its application is being both tested and adopted in a few other countries. Before the adoption of such a technique is considered for Canada, it would be necessary to review international experiences with this method and to carry out carefully planned and controlled pilot projects in Canada in order to assess such things as the accuracy of the behavioural analysis process, the competencies and training required, and the impact on the overall efficiency and effectiveness of screening.

7.4 Impact On CATSA

It is clear that in the future, screening for things – up to this point CATSA’s staple activity – will become more automated and less labour-intensive. As new, more sophisticated technologies and techniques become a feature of aviation security, more specialized and highly trained personnel will be required to operate and interpret the outputs of the equipment and assess for behavioural screening. Future requirements could also involve new responsibilities for CATSA, such as inspection and verification of identity against travel documents, including boarding passes.

The precise forms that future screening will take remain unclear at present, as considerable uncertainty is attached to the viability and acceptability of emerging technologies and techniques. The general direction is, however, clear: as technological solutions advance, greater emphasis will shift toward development of the human skills needed to make the risk assessment decisions that are at the heart of this process. This further highlights the importance of making timely intelligence information available to the frontline screening staff who will need to have the background and capacity to understand the information and apply it in on-the-spot decision-making. Any such transition remains some way down the road, but we are satisfied that this will be the general direction over the next decade. If so, there are a number of important implications for CATSA as an organization.

As new forms of weapons and explosives and new techniques for concealing and deploying them are developed, CATSA will have to develop new and better means to detect them. As the requirements for screening shift in response to new technologies and new threats, as well as higher volumes and more diversified traffic, CATSA requires the flexibility to adjust its methods and operations to meet the new challenges. Collecting information and sharing best practices on screening techniques and technology with the international community will help the organization stay abreast of developments and make it more difficult for terrorists to defeat the systems put into practice.

Our vision for CATSA would see it becoming Canada’s expert organization for delivering aviation security screening by being fully responsible and accountable for the practices, procedures and operations necessary to protect the travelling public. With management authority and accountability for all aspects of its operations, as recommended in this Report, CATSA will be well-placed to efficiently deliver the level of screening effectiveness and customer service that Canadians expect, and that industry requires to remain competitive. Transport Canada will remain the lead government organization for aviation security and will be responsible for providing strategic direction and establishing a results-based regulatory framework as the roadmap. Freed of operational details, Transport Canada will be able to focus on quickly closing known gaps and developing proactive strategies for the aviation security sector as a whole. Together, the two organizations, and their partners in aviation security, should be better able to prepare and respond to the challenges of today and those in the future.

Chapter Seven: Footnotes

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