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Category: Full Body Scanners

  • How To Most Effectively Utilize Full Body Scanners In Correctional Facilities

    Full body scanning makes security checking in correctional facilities a much faster, safer, and easier process.

    Still, unless they are properly used, full body scanners for corrections may not be as effective as they are intended to be.

    For any facility to utilize its scanners to the fullest, these important tips must be implemented to ensure the best use of this powerful security equipment.

    Fully incorporated into a security program, their cost is well justified for how they improve prison safety in a multitude of ways.

    1. Proper Image Analysis – Designed to create detailed images that detect everything from drugs and weapons to specific body parts and human tissue, it is essential that advanced full body scanning be done correctly for them to create quality images that can be accurately screened.
    2. Continuous Training and Reporting – Employees using full body scanners for corrections must undergo specialized and continuous training on their full body scanning machine and software as well as be kept up to date on software changes to ensure proper and safe use of this equipment. Likewise, supervisors in charge of this equipment should maintain regular reports to analyze the success of their scanning program and make corrections as needed to increase effectiveness.
    3. Policies and Protocols – To keep a high level of accuracy and scanning success, facilities should create policies on the use of full body scanning equipment according to the manufacturer’s safety and operational instructions as well as protocols that serve their facility best in terms of building security and contraband detection.
    4. Use of Advanced Features – Regardless of how technologically advanced that full body scanners for corrections may be at a facility, the advanced features offered by each unit should be well understood and implemented as part of an effective security screening policy. Those features are designed to make scanning easier and safer and do little good if they are not used or used incorrectly.
    5. Regular Upgrading – Like all other technology, full body scanning technology is upgraded from time to time, whether in terms of software for existing unit or the development of more advanced, more capable units. Software upgrades should be implemented on time as soon as they are available and new, more advanced equipment upgrades made as soon as financially feasible.

    Full body scanning for corrections is proven to be one of the most effective means of detecting contraband and keeping prisons safe.

    For these machines to actually do their jobs correctly, full body scanners for corrections must be utilized properly, updated regularly, and all employees kept well trained on this equipment.

  • Image Quality And Interpretation When Scanning For Contraband

    As detecting contraband like weapons, drugs, and other prohibited items becomes more and more challenging, detection technology for corrections must continue to advance in stride.

    With an end goal of designing full body scanners for corrections that are all around faster, simpler, and more accurate, this involves ongoing development, especially where image quality is concerned.

    A clearer, more defined image produced by a scanner allows security personnel using these machines to do their jobs more accurately, and with greater safety for everyone involved.

    X-Ray Scanning is Not Foolproof

    Though full body scanners are much more essential in a correctional facility than a metal detector, producing an actual x-ray image of the person undergoing scanning, interpretation of those images is not foolproof.

    A person must still inspect the image generated by the scanner and determine whether any objects present are contraband, body parts, or another item altogether.

    This leaves a certain margin of error, no matter how small that margin is becoming.

    Full Body Scanners Solve Many Problems

    One of the most effective ways that margin can be shrunk is through the development of full body scanners for corrections with higher image quality.

    Detection technology that uses medical grade or higher image quality is no longer an option, but rather, a necessity for fast, safe, hands-off contraband detection.

    Scanners that can detect the difference not only between physical items, bone and tissue but also between tiny packets of illicit substances and tissue, and can display them in enough detail that a human can make this determination have become a critical element in the fight against drug contraband in prisons.

    Scanning Software Had Also Improved

    Coinciding with the development of better image scanning capabilities is also the development of scanning software that can take on more of the burden of actually interpreting exactly what has been imaged.

    Smarter software means less guesswork by those tasked with determining what the details in a high definition image reveal.

    Though this technology is separate from the image scanning technology itself, it still requires the highest definition imaging capabilities possible.

    Does Your Security Scanning Equipment Need Upgrading?

    Collectively, the better the quality of the image produced by full body scanners, the easier it is for both humans and software to make accurate determinations on what those images depict.

    As this detection technology for corrections facilities continues to improve in leaps and bounds, it is more important than ever that facilities continue to upgrade their security scanning equipment.

    In doing so, the amount of contraband getting past scanners and the number of hands-on searches that must be performed will continue to decline.

  • How Full Body Scanners with Color Help Detect Contraband

    Detecting contraband on a person is an ongoing challenge that correctional facilities continuously fight.

    As more facilities move away from physical searches and outdated scanning technology toward using newer, state-of-the-art security x-ray systems, that challenge has resolved somewhat yet finding certain contraband such as drugs remains difficult.

    Screening with color is the latest advancement in detection technology body scanning and a viable option when the focus is on hard-to-detect contraband like illegal drugs.

    Difficulty of Accurate Detection With Older Full-Body X-Ray Systems

    The problem with even some top-tier full-body x-ray systems that produce highly-defined imaging is that these images must still be interpreted by a human.

    Something as small as a little packet of an illicit substance can very easily blend in with the shadows and highlights of clothing and body parts or appear as a questionable area on the image that still leaves a question and further investigation is still required.

    So although the latest body scanning systems have greatly improved security scanning and vastly reduced the need for body searches, the need for those searches could be further reduced if there were a way to determine what each questionable part of the digital image actually is.

    New Developments Offer Color Differentiation

    Recent developments that address this issue specifically include security x-ray systems that utilize high-definition scanning combined with color screen highlighting to make finding drugs easier.

    A newer system highlights in red outlines suspect areas on the image that could potentially be contraband, pinpointing areas that require more attention, speeding up the scanning process and making it more accurate.

    Even Newer Devices Detect Organic vs Inorganic Material

    A second system goes even further with advanced detection technology body scanning software that can differentiate between organic and inorganic materials and can decipher the image by measuring x-ray absorption to determine object density.

    Items like clothing, electronic devices, weapons, and other items, and then items that are not human tissue and not any of the other categories (such as drugs) can all be individually identified.

    Each category of materials is then color-coded to be plainly visible to the operator exactly what they are looking at.

    A Big Win for Correctional Facilities

    Using these amazing new developments in detection technology body scanning, correctional facilities can now gain the ability to prevent nearly all contraband of any type from entering the facility.

    Advanced security x-ray systems that utilize extra-high definition density scanning plus color-coded threat labeling make the job of security screening faster and easier for operators and more reliable overall for catching even the most minute items trying to pass through the facility doors.