The TSA openly lies about what they do. The last time I checked, they still have those signs up in airports saying their scanner machines can't store or transmit images, when it ends up their RFP specified that they be able to do both those things. When confronted, they admitted that the ability does exist, but totally only in testing mode, so I'm sure they're telling the truth this time. The signs still say the ability does not exist years later. I believe the sample image they show is also misleadingly poor and leaked images show that it's much closer to taking naked pictures than they admit.
I believe the images the officers see now are just illustrated figures with areas of them highlighted. But the actual data the machines produce can be assembled into naked-looking images, so potentially they are still generating such images and sending them to a database somewhere.
The TSA openly lies about what they do. The last time I checked, they still have those signs up in airports saying their scanner machines can't store or transmit images, when it ends up their RFP specified that they be able to do both those things. When confronted, they admitted that the ability does exist, but totally only in testing mode, so I'm sure they're telling the truth this time. The signs still say the ability does not exist years later. I believe the sample image they show is also misleadingly poor and leaked images show that it's much closer to taking naked pictures than they admit.
I believe the images the officers see now are just illustrated figures with areas of them highlighted. But the actual data the machines produce can be assembled into naked-looking images, so potentially they are still generating such images and sending them to a database somewhere.