- Title: ISRAEL: Israeli firm offers walk-through lie detector for air security
- Date: 20th November 2005
- Summary: EXTERIOR OF OFFICE
- Embargoed: 5th December 2005 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Israel
- Country: Israel
- Topics: Science / Technology,Transport
- Reuters ID: LVA2G0JMYGW8IMHUJ2PWCJTDNO8A
- Story Text: A new walk-through lie detector made in Israel may prove to be the last word in airline security. Tested in Russia, the two-stage GK-1 voice analyser requires that passengers wear headphones at a console and answer "yes" or "no" into a microphone to questions about whether they are planning an attack or smuggling contraband.
The software will almost always pick up uncontrollable tremors in the voice that give away liars or those with something to hide, say its designers at Israeli firm Nemesysco. "Everybody knows that the human voice is very susceptible to the emotions, to the emotions experienced. We can always say 'Oh, I'm very excited' (said in a 'happy tone') or 'Oh, I'm very upset or I'm very angry or...' (said in an 'upset tone'). All these things are audible and detecting those when you have no intention to hide your emotions that's very easy and everybody can do that and actually everybody can also fake it just like I did.
But when you talk about security checkpoints then you may understand or may assume that not everybody would like to know that you are stressed or excited or aroused or whatever and so you'll try to control your voice and then instead of becoming excited you'll go 'Oh really...,' you'll push your voice down to the extent that you can hear yourself, applying some type of a bio feedback," said Chief Executive Officer Amir Liberman. "Our system can go much deeper below what you can actually modify in your voice and still detect the excitement," he added.
The GK-1 is expected to cost between 10,000-30,000 U.S.dollars when marketed. A spokesman for Moscow's Domodyedevo airport, which is using a prototype, said that the lie detector has proved to be effective, and that the airport is in principle ready to use it. The September 11, 2001 hijacking attacks by al Qaeda in the United States have led to a slew of innovations designed to detect terrorists before they strike. Liberman said several countries had expressed interest in the GK-1.
"The system is implemented today in Russia airport in Domodyedevo, I hope I spelled it right, where it just finished a pilot phase in which 500 passengers passed through the system and they were all thoroughly inspected and the system proved to be, I would say a hundred percent accurate, it didn't detect any falses. Now I don't want people to understand that the system is indeed 100 percent accurate and it may still fail from time to time and this is why in different locations we will definitely recommend it as an additional layer of security and not as the total security infrastructure," he added, explaining that the first stage of the test takes between 30-75 seconds. Those that fail are taken aside for more intensive questioning and, if necessary, searches.
Liberman said this was necessary as around 12 percent of passengers tend to evince stress even when they have nothing to hide. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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