On 1st February 2010, the then British government introduced body scanners at Heathrow and Manchester airports. The scanners could see through clothes* to produce an image of the body, violating the religious and personal beliefs and sensibilities of many and also Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights -the right to privacy. The UK government issued a consultation paper for public response to the measure and IHRC responded in July 2010.

In the response, IHRC stated that in addition to the violation of people’s religious beliefs and personal sentiments, that the:

• UK government has failed to provide strong safeguards to prevent data from being saved, transmitted or printed as well as a comprehensive training programme to ensure security staff do not misuse the body scanners;
• body scanners will lead to discrimination against members of the Muslim Community since this procedure will restrict Muslims in practicing their religion and restricts their travel activities;
• government provides insufficient safeguards to stop profiling of passengers, particularly Muslim passengers, as the selection criteria for a scan is neither clear nor open to public scrutiny, therefore individuals identified as being Muslim due to their dress/nationality/ethnic origin or choice of destination will be targeted
• body scanners are unreliable since they will not be able to identify most types of explosives;
• government’s initial aim of the body scanners, will not be achieved since alleged terrorist will use other tactics to avoid the body scanners.

After a concerted campaign led by IHRC, and a court challenge supported by IHRC the scanners were removed from the airports and replaced.  

*The body scanners produce detailed images of a person as if they were unclothed on a computer screen. During the scan, images with intricate details of naked bodies, including the outlines of women’s breasts and the genitalia of both genders, could be seen on a monitor by another person who could be male or female, sitting in a different room.