Beyond body scanners

He was quickly dubbed 'the underpants bomber'. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab tried to blow up a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit on 25 December 2009 by igniting explosive powder sewn into his underwear. He was overpowered by his fellow passengers, although the attempt would have failed anyway, as he had set fire to his trousers, rather than the explosive. Farcical or not, it was the nearest thing to a successful terrorist attack on civil aviation in years. it made big headlines and governments responded by rolling out new, tougher security measures at airports, including the infamous new body scanners.