"Minority Report" in real life...

Found this at The Blaze:

Straight out of Minority Report a new Homeland Security program would subject Americans to pre-crime interrogations and physiological scans to detect people who are intending to commit a terrorist act at sports stadiums, malls, airports and other public places has moved closer to being implemented after the FAST program passed its first round of testing at an undisclosed location in northeast US.

The system uses a computer program that studies physiological indicators of a person, such as heart rate and the steadiness of a person’s gaze, and then uses the data to make a judgment on whether that individual has “malintent”.

(End of story. My comments follow.)

Actually the inference to the method of crime prevention in "Minority Report" is wrong. In that movie the authorities relied on the precognitive abilities of three adolescents, not a computer program checking biological indicators.

Regardless, the main thrust of the brief article is correct. We've already got jerks at the TSA treating anyone out of the slightly ordinary as guilty until proven innocent (unless of course theres a muslim involved). How much more arrogant will they become when a supposedly infallible machine singles some poor schmuck out? Newsflash: Machines are piss poor indicators of criminal intent and/or culpability. As an example, polygraphs are NOT allowed as evidence in a trial.

Speaking of polygraphs and their inclination to error, I recall an incident that happened while I was still on active duty. Someone had compromised an advancement exam, in the course of the investigation they gave a number of test takers a lie detector test. One of my guys was fingered, flunked the polygraph and had to be interviewed by Naval Investigative Service (NIS, now known as NCIS).

If anyone was absolutely, positively innocent it was my man "George". He was that sort of guy. But there was no way, no how I was trusting him to the tender mercies of NIS. To say they had a reputation for browbeating intimidation is an understatement.

So down to their office he and I went. The agent who interviewed him was taken aback when I followed "George" through the door. Evidently he didn't expect him to have backup from the command. Turned out I had to wait outside, but "George" was in and out so fast they could have used a revolving door on that room. He was grateful for my presence and from what I've been told it probably made the difference between a quick Q&A session or a long time spent being grilled hard for no damned good reason.

But who wants to bet the TSA schmuck manning a piece of the latest & greatest technology is going to believe anyone it singles out might actually be innocent?

Excuse me now, the wife bought me a copy of Orwell's "1984". For some reason I feel the need to refresh my memory of it.