2009年圣誕節阿姆斯特丹飛往美國底特律的飛機爆炸未遂事件使得越來越多的機場開始啟用全身掃描安檢系統，也就是我們所說的“裸檢”。此舉引起了很多隱私維權人士的抗議。上周日，德國海盜黨的成員們穿著內衣齊聚在柏林特格爾機場，抗議機場“裸檢”政策。抗議者們在自己的身體上寫滿了諸如“藏了什么東西嗎？”和“做個好公民——把褲子脫了”等標語，而且還將他們的游行視頻上傳到了YouTube網站。德國和荷蘭政府于本周宣布將一起研究和測試全身掃描安檢系統，并有可能在明年開始實行。目前，美國已有19家機場實行“裸檢”，美國交通安全部計劃將其擴大到另外的300多個機場。不過，乘客可以自己選擇接受全身掃描或者由安檢人員進行手檢。

To protest the use of the so-called Nacktscanner (naked scanner), members of the Pirate Party in Germany organized a “fleshmob” of people who stripped down to their skivvies last Sunday and converged on the Berlin-Tegel airport.

The underwear bomber’s Christmas Day attack has prompted calls for the increased use of full-body scanners at airports that would strip-search passengers down to their naked bodies.

So to protest the use of the so-called Nacktscanner (naked scanner), members of the Pirate Party in Germany organized a “fleshmob” of people who stripped down to their skivvies last Sunday and converged on the Berlin-Tegel airport. They posted a video of their protest to YouTube, with soundtrack provided by Muse’s song “Uprising.” The lyrics articulated their protest: “They will not force us. They will stop degrading us. They will not control us. We will be victorious!”

The protesters marked their bodies with a number of messages such as, “Something to hide?” and “Be a good citizen — drop your pants.”

The full-body scanners use high-frequency radio waves to produce an image of a passenger’s naked body beneath clothes. Anything a passenger is carrying against the body — weapons, drugs or explosives — would be exposed. The scanners would also reveal the presence of prosthetic devices and breast implants.

As such, there have been privacy and legal concerns raised about the invasive equipment, particularly because it’s unclear if the scanners would be able to detect explosives hidden in body cavities and would therefore likely provide only minimal security.

German and Dutch authorities announced this week that they would be working together to test and possibly deploy full-body scanners in the two countries over the next year. The move comes in the wake of concerns that a would-be bomber was able to board a flight from Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport on Dec. 25 wearing packs of chemical explosives concealed in his underwear.

Although Amsterdam has been conducting a test pilot of full-body scanners since 2006, the armed passenger was not scanned by one of the devices before boarding his flight to Detroit. European Union regulations do not currently allow mandatory use of the equipment.

The scanners are currently being used in about 19 US airports, though the Transportation Security Administration has plans to deploy about 300 more. The machines are used on a voluntary basis only; passengers can opt to have a full-body pat down instead of being scanned.

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(Agencies)

Vocabulary:

fleshmob: 來源于flashmob（快閃族）一詞，此處用flesh替換flash表示，參與快閃活動的人是“赤膊上陣”，我們暫譯為“裸聚”。

（中國日報網英語點津 Helen 編輯）