Scent of a man: Odor-killing machine for hunters may aid terrorists

retailers that sell it within miles of New York City’s metro rail and subway systems. There are no limits to the number purchased, and there is no record of a sale unless the buyer purchases a warranty.

Winter writes that one of the partners of Ozonics LLC, who asked to have his name withheld, said he had received numerous calls from local and federal law enforcement about the device. He said Ozonics’ founders, all of whom have medical or chemical or science backgrounds, formed the company in 2007 to provide hunters with a way to mask their body odor while hunting. The idea was to make a portable product that could be placed in the field above a hunter’s head so that animals would not detect the scent of a human.

When they applied for their patent, he said, they made sure to include their concerns about the product’s potential impact. “People always ask, “If it fooled the deer’s nose then what other kind of noses could it fool?”” he said. “This can be used for nefarious purposes that can be very dangerous,” he said. “A terrorist can use this to mask any number of illegal activities.”

Explosive detection is highly specific and targeted, and dogs are trained to pick up specific scents undetectable to humans — particles so small they are measured in parts per billion or trillion. In that way, ozone products could render an explosive element undetectable by the standard metrics used in explosive detection.

Winter quotes Mike White, the director of training for Michael Stapleton Associates and a former head of the NYPD bomb squad, to say that the device could work in ways that were never intended. “The odor device could reduce your probability of detecting the sample because it doesn’t mask the odor, it removes it,” he said.

Still, he does not consider the ozone product a real threat, because detecting odor is only one method for discovering explosives. While bomb squad dogs are sniffing around, there is usually another kind of test taking place at the same time. So, even if an explosive device makes it past the dogs, it is unlikely to evade the other tests being conducted at the same time. For example, authorities who accompany the dogs often carry handheld electronic detection devices as well.

Former NYPD detective Dr. Charles Lieberman, a professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of New Haven, agrees that these ozone products just confirm what is already known: bomb sniffing dogs are more effective when used in conjunction with electronic devices. “I. Charles Faddis, a former CIA operations officer who was the head of the CIA’s weapons of mass destruction terrorism unit, agrees that these products are not a sure way to evade detection and that they just highlight the ongoing problems with the current state of airport and subway security.

“The biggest issue with dogs is that there are never enough of them,” he said. “No matter what we’re talking about, there’s never going to be enough screening.”

Plus, there are so many other more serious issues related to securing New York’s vulnerable subway system. “They don’t even have working cameras in the subways,” White said.