How long would the security check take if you decline the body scanner at the airport?

So pure in theory if you ask for an alternative method of investigation, then probably a minute. There should be a manual metal detector at each control point and you will be completely manually scanned once. So say, stretch out hands from the front, turn around and the whole thing from the back again. If necessary, take out shoes and have them checked.

Actually – even purely theoretically – you would even have the right of the legislator.

I once tortured the big gockel machine of searching with the page from EU law. Look here:

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32015R1998

This is the interesting place:

—
Passengers have the right to refuse control with a safety scanner. In this case, the passenger shall be controlled by an alternative method comprising at least one manual search in accordance with Appendix 4A to Commission Implementing Decision C(2015) 8005.
—

So much for theory.

In practice, the whole story looks different. The security bodies in Germany have usually transferred this task to private security companies in which the employees are often underpaid, revised and not sufficiently trained – at least this is often my impression. This quickly leads to unnecessary debates and suspicions, and then you have to expect to see your entire baggage completely searched and you are often in control for 20 minutes.

I only know too well from my own experience. However, I have no objections to body scanners, I have often had sensitive EPROM modules with me in the past, which can get bitflips through ionizing radiation and would be damaged and have asked for manual control without ionizing radiation. What is usually no problem at airports in Japan and is appropriately friendly leads to debates in Germany about why, why, why…

From health aspects, these whole body scanners are not a problem. The presentation of the raw data on the screen, on which the person appears as similar contours as naked, is also not permitted in Germany. Only the personnel are shown diagrammatically with zones that are to be checked manually.

Or look at the control zones beforehand and place yourself where no whole body scanners stand.