ATSC, a British company, reportedly sold inoperative explosive detectors

09:36 GMT, January 25, 2010 defpro.com | Bad news for the British company, ATSC Ltd: in a televised report, BBC 2 revealed last week that the reference-card based explosive detectors sold by the company to the Iraqi government did not work properly. According to BCC 2, the device, sold under the name ADE651 for $18,000 to $66,000 per unit, has been recently tested by Cambridge University's Computer Laboratory. The university found that the ADE651 merely contained anti-theft tag sensors used to prevent theft from retail stores and that was not capable of detecting explosives of the type claimed by the company.

Following the report, the Iraqi government ordered a commission be formed to investigate the defective bomb-detection device that Baghdad bought from the British firm. Further, the British government announced a ban on the export effective today. In fact, Iraq’s interior ministry had been warned by its inspector general, Aqeel al-Turaihi, not to buy the explosives detector two years ago. Al-Turaihi told the ministry before the purchase that the device was “inoperative” and expensive. What’s more, Turaihi told Reuters that "there was corruption associated with this contract and we referred to this and submitted our report to the Minister of the Interior.”

The Iraqi ministry ignored all warnings and purchased some 1,500 ADE651 detectors at a total cost of some $85 million (€60.1 million), according to BBC information. Now the inoperative devices are being held responsible for numerous casualties caused by assaults with explosives at busy checkpoints in Baghdad. According to news reports, Iraqi lawmakers have demanded that security forces stop using the detectors. However, some officials still defend the device, claiming it has successfully detected many bombs and munitions caches.

Now, competitors fear that their handheld detection solutions might be placed under general suspicion. In particular, German-based unival group GmbH felt the need to distance itself from ATSC, since its HEDD1 handheld explosive detection device resembles the suspect ADE651 detectors.

In a press release the company noted: “Against this background, unival group would like to pro-actively inform its clients and distributors that the HEDD1, along with all previous generations of our handheld explosive detection devices, are completely different from reference-card based devices, as our systems work on the patented Magneto-Electrostatic-Detection (MED) principle. That is, they are active devices that modulate a specific magnetic field detecting only the modulation of the special bond balance (energy) between Nitrogen and Oxygen found in -NO2/-NO3 and H2O2 compounds, which are part of almost all conventional, military and also liquid explosives.”

The antenna that both systems use to indicate the source of detected explosives has linked the two devices in the general perception of not providing explosives detection. However, the Managing Director of unival, David Vollmar, explains that “even though the antenna is often criticised for making HEDD1 a rather analogue device, it allows the device to remain handheld and independent from a continuous power-supply, making possible real-time and stand-alone detection of explosives.”

In his assessment of the fraud case, Vollmar told defpro.com that unival believes “the reference-card based devices have been created by a group of people who initially tried to copy our technology but failed to reproduce the Magneto-Electrostatic-Detection method. This is why they only copied the general shape of the device and had to add another method, which they believed would be close to our approach. The result has been disastrous and they have created a massive scam, which is despicable.” unival, which will begin testing the HEDD1 with German authorities in early February, claims its device has already proven successful in detecting TNT explosives, detonating cord, grenades and various types of ammunition.

Beyond a doubt, introducing an inoperative detection device in this sensitive market would be a most criminal act, as many lives depend on the reliable detection of any explosive threats. Consequently, according to British officials, police in the Avon and Somerset Constabulary have arrested the owner of ATSC Ltd. However, he was released on bail shortly after his arrest. No company official was available when contacted by defpro.com today and the website of the company is reportedly “under repair”. The investigations to be conducted by the Iraqi interior ministry will hopefully prove whether the ADE651 has been involved in and proven to be ineffective in preventing attacks by insurgents in Baghdad.


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By Nicolas von Kospoth, Managing Editor 
 

Having researched the capability of these types of products and reading all the conflicting data and the recent development of the in-effective UK Product and the purported fraud of that device. I have also reviewed the Independent Navy report concerning the Sniffex and SniffexPlus product line. After thorough research of the documentation I took it upon myself to go to Bonn, Germany and test the device for myself and to discuss the negative information currently in the media and the actual information from testing by other Law Enforcement, Military and Government Agencies provided by Unival Group coupled with my own testing of the device. I admit that I was skeptical of the technology prior to my visit to Germany. During my own testing, using double blind technique, I was able to correctly identify boxes containing explosives from those not containing explosives. I then went outside where there were multiple explosive types hidden in various locations including, trees, beside planters and in vehicles both stationary and moving targets and was able in all cases to detect explosives and isolate and find them from areas where there were no explosives present. I was able to achieve a 100% positive detection using the HEDD1 and had no false positives. In my opinion this device is very much different than those used during the testing done 5 years ago and are certainly not the same type of product sold by the UK company and should not be considered in the same class of product. In my testing the HEDD1 device had a 100% success rate. I would suggest to not believe the any current information in the media concerning old testing but to schedule a test using your own scenarios in your environment to prove the technology for yourself.

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Created: 2010-02-03 16:16:22

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Updated: 2010-09-02 21:48:11

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Updated: 2010-09-02 20:44:21

The mentioned blogspots unfortunately refuse to look at this issue with the necessary elaborateness and remain at their one-sided and unobjective behaviour. As a German company with very strict liability standards, we will not claim anything that we cannot fulfill! It is my understanding of intelligent assessment procedures that you create your opinion after serious data collection and serious testing. This is what all our clients have done so far, prior to any decision making. The last 4 years we have been working very hard to improve the technology and related working scenarios in order to make it the most reliable device that we can produce at this moment. So I can say with best conscience that we have a genuine device that is currently unique with its capabilities for real-time and covert detection of explosives! Presentation and testing of HEDD1® takes place under real-life scenarios with blind-tests that are set-up from our clients. In this set-up we clearly define what we can achieve and what we cannot achieve. It is then up to every potential client to decide whether these capabilities can create improved security standards or not. We train our clients within pre-defined scenarios and clearly limit the use of the device to these scenarios. I would like to remind you that only a couple of days ago Munich airport was closed due to a false alarm from a trace detector creating enormous economical damage (similar things happened in the US recently). Up to today there is no perfect explosive detection technology available and it is therefore widely accepted that a good security standard can only be achieved with multi-level system of complementary technologies. HEDD1® is a tool that needs to be used in line with complementary technologies. There is a big project being funded from EU that is now working with the same technological approach, so these are facts that you have to consider, if you want to address things on a correct way.

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Created: 2010-01-26 17:03:31

It might be imprudent to trust any information provided by Mr. Vollmar. He was involved with the similar SniffexPlus. The Sniffex was shown to be a scam in the U.S. and the SniffexPlus was the later German version. These devices seemed to work by tricking people who did not know how the ideomotor effect could cause them to unconsciously point the antenna. In addition to the identical appearance of all these devices, they all make the same chemical detection claims. HEDD1 differs mainly in its explanation of how it supposedly works. Changing the explanation of how the identical-looking and acting HEDD1 works should not be sufficient reason to ignore the similarities to the fraudulent devices. As with any other product, no matter what sales pitch is used, buyer beware. Before purchasing anything with such wonderful claims, conduct an independent, scientific, double-blind test. For more info, see these links: http://sniffexquestions.blogspot.com & http://explosivedetectorfrauds.blogspot.com

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Updated: 2010-01-26 09:32:10