Mail Threats

On February 21, 2021, in Germany at the Lidl headquarters, a mail Improvised Explosive Device (IED) detonated injuring several employees. The reality is that each month across the world a mail type IED threat is encountered. This does not even include the number of "white powder" mailings that occur each and every day. Mails threats are a very common occurrence worldwide and the targets are typically not the kind of organizations you would envision as being a high profile target. The incident in Germany is a perfect example of how the mail threat can affect any company no matter what you do. The key is being prepared for this type of threat and implementing a viable mail screening program at your company.

Types of Mail Threats

Mail threat can be broken down into 3 basic categories:

• Explosive mail threat: A improvised explosive device (IED) that is typically designed to function once it is opened (victim-activated). These types of mail threats can use either explosive or incendiary material and are triggered once the package/letter is opened. Prior screening of mail coming into your facility is key to detecting this type of threat.

• Chemical/Biological threat: Any substance designed or intended to cause death or serious bodily injury through the release, dissemination, or impact of toxic or poisonous chemicals, or their precursors, such as mustard gas, nerve agents, and sarin gas. A biological mail threat is any substance involving a disease organism, such as smallpox, botulinum toxin, anthrax, and ricin.

• Hoax mail threat: The most common is a white powder being sent in the mail designed to threaten or intimidate the person of the company that it is being sent. These nonlethal powders must be treated as a real threat until they can be cleared as safe by valid assessment tools. These can any be a hoax IED threat but white powder incidents are the most common worldwide.

The range of people and groups that are targeted by mail threats is not always politically motivated. In many cases, these attacks can be personal and directed toward an indivdual person or company. The bomber reasoning will vary but most mail attacks are very similar to the incident in Germany where a business or company is on the receiving end of a mail attack or threat.

Mitigating a Mail Threat: What can you do?

The best tool for any business or company that wants to develop a mail screening program is to deploy an x-ray system. The x-ray is the most effective tool for screening mail and provides the most effective method for potentially detecting a mail-type threat. Depending on the size of your orgnazation and the amount of mail you are processing will determine the size of the x-ray system you need. It is also important to ensure that the systems are going to provide you the software features that will enhance mail threat detection.

Small Office X-ray systems:

If you have a limited amount of space and are not dealing with very large and bulky packages a conveyor type x-ray system is not the ideal tool. These systems require an entry and exit to process the mail and will take up a large amount of space even with the very small versions (tunnel size 50cm x 30cm). The other problem with these small systems is they typically come with a very low KV generator that provides very poor penetration and image quality. A much better mail scanning system for a small office is the 3DX-RAY AXIS?-CXi Screening System.

Unlike other cabinet-style x-ray systems, 3DX-RAY AXIS?-CXi Screening System comes with a 120 kV generator and high-resolution detectors for a very high-quality image. The system is also the only unit on the market of its type that can do full materials discrimination imaging. Other systems only provide black and white images that do not allow you to identify materials based on color. The systems also can detect white powder in a regular envelope very accurately due to the system's ability to adjust the kV output of the x-ray generator. No other system on the market has this ability coupled with 3DX-RAYS very accurate materials imaging that shows you if the material is organic, inorganic, or a metal.

As you can see in the above image a high grey scale only tells you that you might have some kind of powder in an envelope but with 3DX-RAYS materials discrimination imaging you can see that the powder turns orange and this means it is an organic material. If the material would have turned green that would have negated it being a biological material like anthrax.

The system can also provide you the ability to detect an improvised explosive device (IED) threat or even a Chemical IED type threat. The 3DX-RAY ThreatSpect software details all of the different types of materials in the package and provides more information as to what you are seeing over systems that only provide greyscale imaging. In the below image you see a chemical mail threat and the advanced imaging capabilities of the 3DX-RAY AXIS?-CXi Screening System.

The 3DX-RAY AXIS?-CXi Screening System also provides the ability to detect very common mail threats like Razor Blade letters and even a mail bomb. As you can see in the below images with the 3DX-RAY AXIS?-CXi Screening System your ability to screen your mail will be greatly enhanced with this system deployed.

If you would like to know more about the 3DX-RAY AXIS?-CXi Screening System so you can provide an advanced tool to screen your mail reach out to us at the below for more information.