Homeland Security Funds LED Light That Blinds, Disorients

katzmeow writes "Ryand Singel's Wired blog notes that Homeland security has developed an LED flashlight that uses 'powerful flashes of light to temporarily blind, disorient and incapacitate people.' The idea is to use it to incapacitate people — 'arrest them' — on airlines, borders, etc. without using traditional weapons. The company's president Bob Lieberman says the tool is perfect for confronting 'border jumpers.' 'You don't want to hurt or kill them, just take them into custody,' says Lieberman. 'With this, they don't need to know English to comply.' The 'light saber' can even be scaled up to bazooka size for subduing crowds."

I'm sure...

[robo_mojo (997193)]

that this will never get into the wrong hands. Oh, wait.

Re:I'm sure...

[jollyreaper (513215)]

Why is it that the introduction of a non-lethal, safer-than-shooting-a-gun method of subduing a suspected criminal considered such a bad thing? If I were as paranoid of the government as you obviously are, I'd rather have them weilding a temporarily blinding light than to just save batteries and cram a load of C4 up my rear. Seriously, what's up with you people?

The problem with less-than-lethals is that they were designed with the idea of "at least now there's an option other than shooting someone." That's fair. But the way they're used is "I don't feel like wrestling you to the ground and cuffing you, have some taser." The assumption is because it's called non-lethal (although it should be called less-than-lethal, most of the time) is that the cops don't think there's any risk associated with it. You're not as likely to kill someone with a taser than a gun, but you're still running more of a risk than if you subdued them the old-fashioned way.

I think the operating rule with these less-than-lethals should be "If you didn't have one of these and you would otherwise be shooting them with a gun, that's when you use these. If you would never have resorted to the gun, stick with the nightstick."

Just in:

[by Anonymous Coward]

In Mexico, welding helmet demands have gone through the roof.

Easily countered

[Ceriel Nosforit (682174)]

Self-dimming welder's goggles should be enough to render this weapon useles.

Re:Easily countered

[by Anonymous Coward]

Right! They'll never suspect a thing if i walk into the airport with welder goggles on. Never i say!

You forgot

[wiredog (43288)]

MUAHAHAHAHA!

Re:

[ceroklis (1083863)]

this [toolmonger.com] is even more discreet. They cannot see your face, man !

Re:Easily countered

[juhaz (110830)]

Ordinary sunglasses will probably be enough to render this thing useless, and they're rather less, um, conspicuous than welder's goggles.

Nice

[okinawa_hdr (1062664)]

"subduing crowds"...I don't like the sound of that.

Re:Nice

[tttonyyy (726776)]

"subduing crowds"...I don't like the sound of that.

But given the choice, would you rather be subdued by:

a) rubber bullets
b) tear gas
c) water cannon
d) wall of shields and batons
e) bright lights

I know what I'd chose! :)

Of course we're missing the uber-overlord crowd-suppressor; the rubber bullet firing tear gas cannon super-bright torch baton.

Re:

[somersault (912633)]

I think I'd prefer a couple of bruises to being permanently blinded.. though I've never been hit by a water cannon or rubber bullets, maybe it's not as fun as it sounds? :P

Re:

[MrMr (219533)]

Nice idea for a poll

I'd say
d) If you're on a brick road, but dodging c) back trough their own ranks is also fun.

Re:Nice

[badfish99 (826052)]

I wouldn't like to be subdued by any of them, thank you very much.

But, if you're going to give the police a weapon, there's an argument that a gun is better than any of these. Everyone knows that a gun is lethal, so a policeman is going to think carefully before using it on anyone who is not immediately threatening his life.
But if the policeman has got a simple non-lethal weapon like this, he's got a strong motivation for "subduing" anyone who happens to disagree with him or who doesn't instantly obey his orders. What better instrument of oppression than a police force that is always instantly obeyed for fear of something like this?

Re:Nice

[CmdrGravy (645153)]

I like the fact that it can be used for subduing crowds without having to talk to them, everythings much simpler when you don't have to engage in any dialouge with enemy.

Since I'm not a USAian

[codeButcher (223668)]

... nor have plans to "become" one, let me be the first to say:

You should welcome your light-bearing overlords.

(Hmmmm, isn't that something like "luciferian" in Latin??)

Mandatory MST3K quote, plus scepticism

[Ancient_Hacker (751168)]

From "The Mole People":

"ARGGGHHH! Light just slightly brighter than what we're accustomed to!"

No, seriously, this sounds really lame. SWAT teams already do this, successfully, with "flash-bang" grenades. Or you could use a big-ol' magnesium flashbulb. No need for new yet wimpy LED's.

Not New

[vic-traill (1038742)]

This is not a new concept. I recall hearing about this class of device twenty years ago when I worked the door at a couple of bars - always wished I had one (it's a hard way to make cash to fund your education, letting people beat on your head so you can learn to make a living with self-same head). Never saw one though.

Here's a reference from 2005 to such a device, with a different name. I don't know if it is the same company, or a different development: http://www.defense-update.com/products/s/sabershot .htm [defense-update.com]

meh

[slobarnuts (666254)]

That's what we were missing all along. A flashlight. Trust a flashlight to cure all of societies ills. They've been touting and developing crap like this for years. Every time someone takes taxpayer money to develop a Friggin Laser Beam or light that 'blinds and disorients', someone puts out an article about it, discovery channel runs some cheap filler reruns of 'omg non-lethal', a couple years later, you hear nothing else about it. Lasers would be alot more effective than this crap though, at least you can focus the light into a narrow beam. LEDs, not as effective at a fair enough distance, even with a 'built in range finder'.

Epilepsy warning?

[ParaShoot (992496)]

The LED Incapacitator uses a range-finder to measure the distance to a target's eyes and then unleashes continually changing, multi-color light pulses that both blind and disorient the person.

How long until this triggers an epileptic seizure in some poor unfortunate - and worse still, would whoever's wielding it be able to tell the difference between the potentially life-threatening seizure and the normal reaction?

It's not only guilty people that get arrested...

[WIAKywbfatw (307557)]

"Won't someone PLEASE think of the poor epileptics! BULLSHIT!!! We're under no obligation to coddle people caught in the act of breaking the law."

Brilliant! Because we all know that everybody who's arrested is guilty, don't we? After all, it's only guilty people that get arrested, right? Innocent people never get stopped and detained, do they?

Idiot.

Why do you think courts exist? Law enforcement officers, in the heat of the action, aren't judge and jury. They don't determine if someone has broken the law or

Re:No guarantee of safety when breaking the law

[arth1 (260657)]

Yes, but "reasonable force" is a fluid term. In the UK, it apparently means shooting an unarmed guy, then when he's on the floor, step on his arms and shoot him in the head, over and over again.
A better term would, in my opinion, be "minimal force". At least that doesn't expect police men to be reasoning beings.

Regards,
--
*Art

Re:No guarantee of safety when breaking the law

[TheLink (130905)]

There were actually two main incidents.
1) the killing of Jean Charles de Menezes
2) the lying and cover up of 1) by the british authorities (which to me is a bigger danger to everyone else in the UK).

While you can try to claim 1) to be an isolated incident, I don't think you can consider 2) to be one since there is no assurance that such lying and cover ups will not happen again, and so that makes incidents like 1) more likely.

There was no repentance, there was no real coming clean. The police continued trying to justify/defend what they did.

It's just like the CxOs of a company getting caught doing the wrong thing, then issuing a statement "Oh, we made a mistake, we're sorry, BUT actually blahblahblah", then later on your find out that blahblahblah was a lie, then they say "oh we're sorry, but actually blahblahblah2". Where blahblahblah2 is also a lie. So on and so forth.

If you do not know the truth about something, you don't make false statements publicly for nothing.

That sure does not bring to mind "isolated incident".

I do have a higher opinion of the UK police than other police forces around the world that I'm aware of, but that's not saying much nowadays. If they continue as is, they'll just be like the cops elsewhere i.e. lesser/necessary _evils_.

To those who are about to defend the other police forces (there are good cops etc etc). Don't waste time trying to convince me, go find and jail the bad cops. Clean your hands or it'll be hard to use those hands to clean other stuff.

Re:No guarantee of safety when breaking the law

[soren100 (63191)]

Jean Charles de Menezes died because many things wen't wrong that shouldn't have been allowed to go wrong.

No, he died because police officers jumped on top of him and fired 7 bulllets into his head. Then they lied about the details to make the actions seem much more reasonable. The only reason that the horrifying truth came out was because outraged individuals risked their jobs and their freedom to make the truth known. The police still claim that the multiple CCTV cameras covering the incident were all malfunctioning at the time.

If you're going to use an example then at least use one that's typical rather than one that's unique.

Unfortunately police brutality and consequent coverups to avoid the consequences of the brutality is unfortunately very typical. Each case is unique, but the overall pattern is far too predictable.

The gunning down of a 92-year-old grandmother in a botched drug raid [wikipedia.org] was also a unique case, and so were the accompanying lies attempting to justify the actions and make them seem reasonable.

Here's a map of the details of all the "unique" botched paramilitary raids [cato.org] in America.

The original claim stands true. "Reasonable force" is a fluid term, and far too many innocent people die from police mis-application of "reasonable force".

Move along ...

[MarkoNo5 (139955)]

... there's nothing to see here.

How to deal with Johnny Foreigner

[fantomas (94850)]

"With this, they don't need to know English to comply"

My word sir, you Yankees are becoming more like the true heirs to the British Empire as every day passes! Well said sir, Johnny Foreigner is a semi-savage, and can't speak a word of the King's English (or President, or whatever you colonists have these days). Don't be fooled by his suit, you'll find it's a cheap imitation and close examination will prove that the buttons on the cuffs are fake and the pockets have been cut at the wrong angle. Shine a torch in their faces, and shout in God's own language NICE and LOUD and SLOWLY. They'll understand then, by George!

Re:

[gjbivin (204168)]

Johnny Foreigner is a semi-savage, and can't speak a word of the King's English (or President, or whatever you colonists have these days).

I'm not sure what language our President speaks, but it certainly doesn't seem to be English.

Universal Language

[kaleco (801384)]

'With this, they don't need to know English to comply.'

Ah yes, the universal language of violence.

Decapacitating crowds...

[St1086lichnaya (1128983)]

Because crowds need to be subdued, obviously... If they ain't happy, it's the govt's obligation to find out what it's doing wrong!

This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[coder111 (912060)]

As far as I remember, intrenational laws of war forbid using weapons that blind beople.

And this WILL blind people. If used from too far away, it won't be efficient so they'll make it more powerful, then used from close range it will make permanent injuries to the eyes. Similar like tasers aren't supposed to kill people, but they do.

As far as I remember, there was a project in the military to make a similar weapon, using UV laser, but it was scrapped because it was against the international law.

Of course there are precautions that can be used against this weapon, propper googles should do it, but not everyone will have them.

--Coder

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[somersault (912633)]

"Of course there are precautions that can be used against this weapon, propper googles should do it, but not everyone will have them."

You certainly can find all manner of amazingly useful things on google these days :)

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[NVP_Radical_Dreamer (925080)]

Let me be the first to say

The GOGGLES THEY DO NOTHING!!!!

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[MrMr (219533)]

As far as I remember, intrenational laws of war forbid using weapons that blind beople.

No problem there: The US has not (yet) officially declared war on itself, so using this on US citizens is perfectly fine for the time being.

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[d3ac0n (715594)]

And this WILL blind people.

I'm sorry, but I have to call BS on this one. While I realize that it's oh so fashionable amongst the intelligentsia so make all sorts of wild accusations against the United States as the very incarnation of Cthulu, it just rings hollow here.

First of all, what causes people to go blind while looking at Lasers? well, let's check Wikipedia shall we? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lasers#Laser_safety [wikipedia.org]

the money quote is here:

At wavelengths which the cornea and the lens can focus well, the coherence and low divergence of laser light means that it can be focused by the eye into an extremely small spot on the retina, resulting in localized burning and permanent damage in seconds or even less time.

(emphasis mine)

The reason lasers can blind is due to the nature of the laser itself, being a highly coherent and concentrated beam of light, which the cornea can further concentrate to dangerous levels. LED's, while very bright, are of a highly INcoherent and diffuse nature. Now, there may be some TEMPORARY blindness caused by the overall light intensity, also known as Flash Blindness ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_blindness [wikipedia.org] ) but nothing permanently damaging. Also, as someone else mentioned above, there is a range-finder on the thing designed to adjust the intensity based on the range of the target.

So what we have here is a non-lethal weapon designed to harmlessly incapacitate an individual, allowing law enforcement to take them into custody without exchanging gunfire or risking serious injury or loss of life. Frankly, that sounds like three things to me:

a) A good overall idea
b) Something the UN would really go for (why kill when you can humanely capture?)
c) NOT something that an Eeeevil entity would do, unlike the way the US is commonly characterized on /. and other places. (Maybe the US isn't so evil after all?)

Remember, calm logical thinking is your friend, knee-jerk reactions are not.

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[yani (50270)]

So what we have here is a non-lethal weapon designed to harmlessly incapacitate an individual, allowing law enforcement to take them into custody without exchanging gunfire or risking serious injury or loss of life.

You are completely missing the point. Your last comment completely describes what the Taser is meant to be, but the whole point is that once someone in authority has a means to "subdue" a person with what they think is a method that cannot result in any permanent physical damage, they lose control, and inevitably cause more damage than would have been done with a lethal weapon which has clear and serious consequences. We've seen this with Tasers already.

Picture it, one crowd is protesting with a police force armed with lethal weapons, and non-lethal weapons that leave bruises, the other is protesting with a police force armed with LEDs. The first is not going to fire on a crowd except in self-defense, to do otherwise would be crazy, it would also be a bit difficult to go around and give everyone a bashing. The second is getting impatient and gets out an LED bazooka, and decides to put the brightness up a bit because it's a bright day, oh and they aren't sure if everyone had their eyes open the first time, so they fire it a few times just to be sure.

Or more likely, a middle-eastern looking youth is spotted in a library on a university campus, when asked for his student ID he says he doesn't have it, and won't leave. Someone calls security, security approaches him and tells him to leave. The youth says he won't leave, the security personnel get pissed off and pull out their handy LED weapon, and hold it a centimeter or so from his eye. They repeatedly flash him as he shouts out at them.

As for your claim that a very bright light source with a relatively high divergence from a large distance can not cause permanent damage, I think you need to look directly at the Sun a bit more.

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[yani (50270)]

See how it works now? Some police are good, some are bad, and you can generally tell which are which by the societies they live in.

I wish I lived in your world. In the real one there is no such distinction and psychology tells us that in a position of authority often the worst comes out in even the best people, the Stanford prison experiment (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_expe riment [wikipedia.org]) is one of the more famous examples of this.

Oh, and let's not get into the differences between THE SUN, a gigantic nuclear blast-furnace bright enough to light up the entire damn SOLARSYSTEM and be seen from BILLIONS of miles away, and an LED light about the size of a pea that runs off a AA battery. Just like the "pointing a laser at your eye" argument the OP made, it's an apples and oranges comparison that is neither germane nor logical.

It's an extreme example, but your post implies that only a laser can permanently blind, while this is obviously not true.

There really should be a down-mod for "stupid, illogical thinking" I think it would apply well to your post.

What a logical and clever thought. Thanks.

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[pla (258480)]

On the other hand, All police forces everywhere are so amateurish, so untrained and ignorant that they will automatically behave in the most irresponsible and dangerous manner possible when given a non-lethal alternative weapon.

Well gee, that pretty much describes the modern history of the Taser (and before that, pepper spray), doesn't it? "It doesn't kill, so we can aim directly for the balls and fire away over and over". Completely passive student giving you lip? Zap the motherfucker. Some damned hippies refusing to clear the way for the bulldozers? Hold 'em down and apply pepper spray directly to their eyes with a q-tip. Some punk won't pull over? Blind him from the helicopter ("oops, how could we have known he'd hit that bridge truss doing a buck-ten?")

Keep in mind that the folks who decide to work as cops (not necessarily talking about detectives here) don't usually do so due to their extensive education. They look physically intimidating (most places have minimum height requirements) and generally got off on beating random people up in their youth (ie, bullies). Give these guys a weapon that doesn't automatically result in an inquiry when used, and they'll use it as often and at the highest intensity (including "improvised" higher-than-normal settings) possible.

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[Cyberax (705495)]

Just for your reference: I've spent once about 2 months blindfolded after I got by a powerful search floodlight (we were sailing in canoe down the river and accidentally came too close to a military base).

Doctors said that it's a fairly common reaction on very bright light. I was lucky to recover almost completely. Not all are.

LEDs count as Laser's now too

[Cassini2 (956052)]

I think you are missing the point that the laser safety regulations are busily being modified to include LED light sources. LED's, while non-coherent, can be focused sufficiently to create similar effects. It is all about how much light energy is hitting a person's retina. The effect can be created with any light source of sufficient intensity. Both a very bright focused LED and a laser can (temporarily) blind people.

Read your sources

[Nazlfrag (1035012)]

You first quote wikipedia stating how coherent light can damage eyes. Agreed, by all accounts it does. You then incorrectly infer that this means incoherent light is safe. You missed the other money quote [wikipedia.org]:

Some sources such as NATO and the U.S. Department of Defense state that "flash blindness" can be temporary or permanent.[2] [dtic.mil]

Even considering using devices that could cause permanent blindness is evil. Sometimes the US is characterised correctly.

Re:

[Ajehals (947354)]

Is the prohibition only for using such weapons on soldiers of recognized nations who are signatories themselves?

As I understand it, things like the Geneva convention are binding on the signatory regardless of who they are fighting against. Wasn't the whole idea to minimise the horrors of war to some degree and to guarantee that the "war crimes" perpetrated in the past would not be perpetrated in the future? On top of that I would have thought that applying a standard to war fighting would ensure that your actions are morally justifiable, if a given action is not justifiable (and you have agreed that is it not by si

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[Jeremiah Cornelius (137)]

But they ALREADY have an LCD that blinds and confuses.

It's called "Cable Television".

Re:This is against Geneva or Hague convention

[mikael (484)]

There was a tactic developed by James Maskelyne [maskelynemagic.com] towards the end of World War II, that allowed the Suez Canal to be defended against German fighter pilots. He basically took a searchlight and placed a set of tin reflectors on top of the search light, which were then made to rotate rapidly. This had the effect of creating rotating cartwheels of dark and bright patches of light in the area around the searchlight. Any pilot who flew above this area would become disorientated due to the mismatch between the perceived motion from the brains centres of balance and the visual cues seen through the aircraft windscreen (optic flow [centeye.com]).

I would guess that this portable system creates enough glare in the eye to make moving bands of light appear on the retina. With a wide enough beam, this will disorientate an entire crowd.

Re:Vlad calls it the evil color

[arivanov (12034)]

Actually the opposite.

Guns can be detected even if they are disguised. It is difficult to hide a chamber, rounds, etc from an X-Ray (not impssible, just difficult). Now this will be trivial to disguise like anything you want starting from a mobile phone and finishing with accessories normally sold in Ann Somers or Agent Provocateur.

So while the "good" guys (quotes quite intentional actually) may want to have this look like a gun...

Re:Vlad calls it the evil color

[An dochasac (591582)]

"There's one wavelength that gets everybody," Lieberman said, according to the newsletter. "Vlad calls it the evil color."

And if the psychophysical effects are limited to a single or range of wavelengths, these effects are easily blocked with Dichroic Filter Sunglasses. [wikipedia.org] Or better yet, Peril Sensitive Sunglasses. [hhgproject.org]

The good news if the DOD is again looking for creative ways of wasting money, this obviously means they are nearly finished with the cleanup from two wars. Couple hundred billion here, couple hundred billion there and pretty soon you're talking about real money!

/me darkens peril sensitive shades.

Re:Close your eyes.

[PopeRatzo (965947)]

Great idea. Take a moment what a crowd of Mexicans running frantically North with their eyes closed and their arms in front feeling their way.

I don't know about you, but the way I'm imagining it would look is freakin' hilarious.

When you think about it for more than a moment, it's really not all that funny.

Re:Close your eyes.

[tgd (2822)]

Dude, seriously. Do you not understand what the original poster was saying?

They're not blinded by some eye-burning laser or something, the whole joke was that they were running across the border with their eyes closed so they couldn't be zapped by this thing.

This isn't a joke about blinding people, its not a joke about injuring people or burning their eyes out. Its a joke about a bunch of people running around committing a felony with their eyes closed.

And if you've never seen a bugs bunny cartoon with rake gags, then perhaps the entire thing from the beginning to the end went over your head.

Re:Does it work if...

[someone1234 (830754)]

Yes, it would work, but it wouldn't have much effect on the victim.

Re:Mirror.

[Legion303 (97901)]

We're glad you asked. Mirrors will soon be banned for private use by the "Anti-Terrorism Mirror" amendment to the Patriot Act this fall.

Re:How 'bout...

[Hijacked Public (999535)]

Most good welding helmets now use auto-darkening glass. The tint is light enough to see the piece being worked on until the arc is struck, then it darkens enough to protect the eyes.

I have a relatively cheap one, but it has adjustable darkening, adjustable delay, and goes from light to full dark in 1/10,000th of a second. Some of the better ones have can tell if the light is from an arc or a grinding wheel and adjust their tint accordingly. Pretty cool stuff.

I;m a good test case for incapacitating light as I am kind of a fan of high powered flashlights, and my eyes are on the photosensitive side. If I'm dark adjusted and I accidentally shine a Surefire M6 at my face I almost immediately become sick to my stomach. My cheap welding helmet can cut that beam down to pretty much nothing though.

Re:Yes, but ...

[compro01 (777531)]

can you run Linux on it?

yes, but it would have to be a light distribution.