US working on VR tech for “touchless” TSA patdowns in airports

by

The Transportation Security Administration is exploring the possibility of employing Virtual Reality (VR) and tactile sensations, known as haptic feedback, to perform non-physical body scans on travelers, thereby avoiding physical contact.

As you head to the airport for your flight, it’s necessary to pass through security checks to ensure that no prohibited items are being carried onboard the aircraft you’ll be taking off in.

For quite some time now, the procedure typically requires you to remove your footwear and place it, along with your carry-on items, in an X-ray scanner for inspection. After that, you pass through a metal detection archway, which may trigger additional screening by TSA personnel.

Typically, this process requires someone to physically touch you for a pat-down search, but recent reports indicate they’re developing methods that avoid actual physical contact.

TSA working on touchless way to pat down flyers

404Media reports that the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) and the Department of Homeland Security are investigating a potential technology that enables security agents to perform non-contact scans on airline passengers, allowing them to detect any threats without physical contact.

The provided document describes a wearable gadget equipped with touchless sensors, cameras, and a tactile feedback pad. This technology can be activated using millimeter wave scanning, LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging), or backscatter X-ray technology for its touchless sensor system.

A person places the device on their hand, and when the touchless sensors in the gadget are close enough to an object, they detect the object’s shape for data collection. This shape detection data is processed through a mapping function to create a map of the shape. This shape map is then transmitted to the part of the device that touches the user’s hand, providing tactile feedback that mimics the real-time sensation of the detected shape directly.

404Media reports that Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is developing a system for ‘inspection without touch’, where a tactile feedback device will be used to sense and identify concealed items on a person’s body without any physical contact.

— TopMob (@TopMob) June 5, 2025

The information provided suggests that the DHS is investigating Virtual Reality (VR) and haptic feedback due to two main reasons: first, these technologies maintain privacy during physical scans and frisking procedures; second, they offer a realistic and immersive virtual environment.

According to the article, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has been exploring this technology for quite some time, as they’ve uncovered patent applications that originate from 2022. Nevertheless, it remains uncertain as to whether or when this technology might be implemented at airports in practice.

Read More

2025-06-05 20:19