In November, Google settled on undisclosed terms to end a copyright lawsuit with the Belgian press organizations Sofam and Scam over the scanning of articles and photographs for inclusion in Google Print.

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At worst, it brings to mind a hustler who thrusts their card aggressively in your face with barely a hello uttered, all the while scanning over your shoulder for someone more important.

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Scanning over a wide area, though, is challenging because of the amount of territory that must be reviewed, the limited field of view of the human eye, and the effects of fatigue.

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Additionally, the scanning technology itself has been upgraded to handle faster pass-over rates, meaning that scanning an A3 sheet can be done smoothly and quickly.

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This little miracle involves using tiny chip-mounted diffraction gratings and laser light passed over them via a scanning mirror.

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At one of the checkpoints, a scanning machine resembling a car wash passes over a lorry delivering building materials.

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But as we speak, I notice a British soldier standing watch over us, his rifle at the ready, carefully scanning the base.

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While the level of radiation is extremely low, some studies have found that over time a small number of cancer cases could result from scanning millions of people a year.

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