Surreptitious polygraph surveillance.

[Aimee Farr]

In the field. Courtesy of the "I-have-nothing-to-hide" people....

"Go Ahead, Try to Lie"
Discover (07/01); Wright, Karen

The U.S. Department of Defense is attempting to create a
better polygraph machine. The polygraph machine, which was
first introduced almost 100 years ago, is routinely used to
screen thousands of job applicants and government employees
every year, as well as in criminal investigations. In recent
times, however, the device's reputation has suffered from
claims that its use violates people's privacy and that it is
not always reliable. Over the last 24 months, the U.S.
Department of Defense has increased research on alternative
technologies through studies regulated by its Fort Jackson,
S.C.-based Polygraph Institute. Andrew Ryan, chief of research
at the institute, is working with the Johns Hopkins University
Applied Physics Laboratory to create software that can detect
minor variations in biofeedback to tell if someone is lying.
The institute is also looking into technologies that could
augment polygraph testing with techniques that are less
invasive. The U.S. Customs service has been testing a
remote-sensing device for the capture of smugglers, which
measures incriminating inflections, vibrations, and tones in a
person's voice. Muscle tremors might also provide indications
that someone is lying, and these can be detected using a
body-scanning laser, which also determines respiration and
heart rates. The level of blood flow, which can be configured
by measuring skin-surface temperature, might also change when
someone is lying: a recent pilot study using thermal imaging
cameras was able to detect a person lying 78 percent of the
time. (www.discover.com/)
---
Source: NLECTC Law Enforcement & Corrections
Technology News Summary should be cited as the source of the
information. Copyright 2001, Information Inc., Bethesda, MD.
---

If that ever becomes spousal-dateware, I bet they change their mind THEN.

Next, they will figure out a way to do that with keystroke dynamics (and
keystroke dynamic biometrics) and stop people lying on the Internet. The
death of us all!

~Aimee

See Long Beach City Employees Ass'n v. City of Long Beach, 41 Cal.3d 937,
719 P.2d 660 (1986), for a good explanation of why polygraphs are considered
more intrusive than a written or verbal interrogation.