When an airline passenger goes to an airport checkpoint, there are a lot of different things they can be told to do. Passengers can be screened, padded down and now, swabbed?

That’s right, just recently it was announced that the Transportation Security Administration will soon give airline passengers random swabbings. This swabbing will be done on the passengers’ hands at checkpoints and at airport gates to test them for traces of explosives.

Previously, airports would screen and swab carry-on luggage and other objects as they searched for traces of explosives. However this was later compared to searching for a needle in a haystack. This is because there is almost an endless stream of luggage coming into the airport everyday.

Now, after the failed Christmas Day bombing on Northwest Flight 253 to Detroit, the Transportation Security Administration has begun swabbing passengers’ hands instead. After all, passengers’ hands that have handled some kind of explosive bomb could be contaminated by explosive materials.

Homeland Security’s Janet Napolitano said that the point is to make sure that the air environment is safe. Everyone knows that al-Qaeda and other terrorists continue to think of aviation as a way to attack the United States. One way to keep people safe is by using new technology.

Most experts seem to agree that swabbing hands is a good move by the Transportation Security Administration. Even privacy advocates say that they support the new swabbing protocols, provided the agency tests only for security related objects and does not discriminate when it selects people to be tested. Thus, this seems to be one new measure that most people seem to be fine with.