TSA: Cost/Benefit analysis fail

Are airport x-ray scanners harmful?

Not really. In fact it turns out the risk from the scanners is about the same as the risk of a terrorist hijacking…

Peter Rez, a physics professor at Arizona State University in Tempe, did his own calculations and found the exposure to be about one-fiftieth to one-hundredth the amount of a standard chest X-ray. He calculated the risk of getting cancer from a single scan at about 1 in 30 million, “which puts it somewhat less than being killed by being struck by lightning in any one year,” he told me.

While the risk of getting a fatal cancer from the screening is minuscule, it’s about equal to the probability that an airplane will get blown up by a terrorist, he added. “So my view is there is not a case to be made for deploying them to prevent such a low probability event.”

Of course, the more you fly the higher the risk from the scanners, but the risk from terrorism doesn’t change.

So why the fuck are we doing this?

The costs, both in money and harm to society, are not worth it.