I keep droning on and on!- Police Drones

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**Easy E**

I read this little article in Saoln.com by Glenn Greenwald

Excitement over America’s use of drones in multiple Muslim countries is, predictably, causing those weapons to be imported onto U.S. soil. Federal law enforcement agencies and local police forces are buying more and more of them and putting them to increasingly diverse domestic uses, as well as patrolling the border, and even private corporations are now considering how to use them. One U.S. drone manufacturer advertises its product as ideal for “urban monitoring.” Orlando’s police department originally requested two drones to use for security at next year’s GOP convention, only to change their minds for budgetary reasons. One new type of drone already in use by the U.S. military in Afghanistan — the Gorgon Stare, named after the “mythical Greek creature whose unblinking eyes turned to stone those who beheld them” — is “able to scan an area the size of a small town” and “the most sophisticated robotics use artificial intelligence that [can] seek out and record certain kinds of suspicious activity”; boasted one U.S. General: “Gorgon Stare will be looking at a whole city, so there will be no way for the adversary to know what we’re looking at, and we can see everything.”

As of the 2010 year-end report from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), there were already “more than 270 active authorizations for the use of dozens of kinds of drones” (35% held by the Pentagon, 5% by Homeland Security and others by the FBI). Employing them for domestic police actions is following the model quickly being implemented in surveillance-happy Britain, where drones are used for “the ’routine’ monitoring of antisocial motorists, protesters, agricultural thieves and fly-tippers, in a significant expansion of covert state surveillance.”

You can find the entire article here, this was just the intro. http://www.salon.com/writer/glenn_greenwald/

Now, what are peoples thoughta and opinions about using drones in a non-military domestic capacity, and where can you see drone technology expanding to in the non-military field?

**Jihadin**

It works. I see no issue of Law Enforcement using drones unless they start mounting Hellfire missiles.

**George Spiggott**

Easy E wrote:I read this little article in Saoln.com by Glenn Greenwald

...following the model quickly being implemented in surveillance-happy Britain, where drones are used for “the ’routine’ monitoring of antisocial motorists, protesters, agricultural thieves and fly-tippers, in a significant expansion of covert state surveillance.”

I don't doubt that we're surveillance happy, but fly tipping? Really?

I see this as a good way to save costs, these things have got to be cheaper than helicopters.

**Frazzled**

Jihadin wrote:It works. I see no issue of Law Enforcement using drones unless they start mounting Hellfire missiles at me.

Corrected your typo.

If its cheaper than guys in helicopters than who cares?

**SagesStone**

I think drones with hellfire missiles would make a great chav deterrent.

As they are they're fine, nothing wrong with having an expendable pair of eyes for more riskier situations and the cost to run compared to a helicopter has to be extremely insignificant.

**Jihadin**

Its a cheaper to operate a drone then an aircraft

**Ahtman**

Unless they are just constantly monitoring 24/7 with no reason I don't really see this being much worse than putting a chopper in the sky.

**Frazzled**

Depending on the drone, it would be a lot quieter too. Having been the fun subject of a police helicopter endlessly circling while I tried to sleep more than once, I can say thats a big deal.

**AustonT**

Jihadin wrote:It works. I see no issue of Law Enforcement using drones unless they start mounting Hellfire missiles.

I do.

Ahtman wrote:Unless they are just constantly monitoring 24/7 with no reason I don't really see this being much worse than putting a chopper in the sky.

And that's why.
UAVs give you the ability to provide persistent and uninterrupted surveillance without much possibility for detection. Gorgon Stare isn't a UAV it's an imaging system mounted on a UAV, specifically to answer the soda straw nature of UAVs. Without a wide area system a UAV has the tendency to stare at one location, if they are found through random surveillance and then stared at, they fail the fourth amendment reasonable expectation of privacy. The use of UAVS by USCBP in law enforcement is very different than urban law enforcement which is difficult to impossible without ground queing and not nearly as effective as manned assets, depending on how fancy or basic your police force uses it probably wouldn't be cheaper either. I can't see the most cost effective UAVs in use above urban centers, because they aren't safe. Those with redundant systems that I can see in use are markedly more expensive, not including the sensor system itself which may cost more than another helicopter.
TLDR
Drones over your city, not anytime soon.

**Frazzled**

How is it different then a helicpoter?

**AustonT**

Frazzled wrote:How is it different then a helicpoter?

Which part?

**Frazzled**

The surveillance part. I mean manned helicopter. If there aren't helicopter drones at thi point, I don't see a reason for there not being them in future.

**notprop**

Drones are cool, helicopters are old hat.

Damn it Fraz it's sooo obvious!

**Jihadin**

Well...I know the Apaches would fly near towns at night with their FLIR on (Ft Bragg) Southern Pines being one....at night...

**AustonT**

Frazzled wrote:The surveillance part. I mean manned helicopter. If there aren't helicopter drones at thi point, I don't see a reason for there not being them in future.

There are.

The thing that gets under estimated is how wide human vision is, and combined with natural and trained inquisitiveness is what makes airborne surveillance so effective. A UAV is like covering one eye and looking through a soda straw in the other. Even in the widest field of view your ability to see and detect is Extreemly limited. You can expand the sensor suite but only with exponentially increasing costs.
With a manned helicopter you can but don't require a sensor to upgrade that wide human field of view, in an unamnned system you are limited to just the sensor.
When you start to talk about costs.
The average police chopper runs about 2M, plus fuel, pilots, ground crew, and sensors
The average cost of a drone with redundant systems comes in around 5M (including aircraft, control system, and antenna) which may or ma not include the price of the sensor (it probably doesn't) plus fuel, operators, and ground crew. You could go cheaper but then your talking about a relatively good chance of putting a dirt dart in someones home.

Does that answer what you were asking?

**Melissia**

George Spiggott wrote:I see this as a good way to save costs, these things have got to be cheaper than helicopters.

This.

As long as they're used in the same way helis are, I'm fine with them.

**Easy E**

Plus, I think the plan is to just have them loiter around and look for "suspicious behavior". Kind of like the blimps in Gotham City.

I have no doubt such a technique will catch "criminals" , but how many innocent fish will get pulled in with such a wide net? How many of those "criminals" will actually be prosecuted?

I don't know the answer.

**Frazzled**

Innocent fish? What? Its no different then now. A helicopter is no different than a whole lot of cops walking around.

**AustonT**

Easy E wrote:Plus, I think the plan is to just have them loiter around and look for "suspicious behavior". Kind of like the blimps in Gotham City.

I have no doubt such a technique will catch "criminals" , but how many innocent fish will get pulled in with such a wide net? How many of those "criminals" will actually be prosecuted?

I don't know the answer.

Yes because drones use tractor beams to apprehend people, and because its automated no need to Mirandize them either, just put them in the live well until the robot judge sentences them.

**George Spiggott**

I was just thinking how blimps would probably be cheaper. Bung some solar panels and some batteries on there and it will stay up there forever, for free (possibly).

**AustonT**

George Spiggott wrote:I was just thinking how blimps would probably be cheaper. Bung some solar panels and some batteries on there and it will stay up there forever, for free (possibly).

One of many blimp systems in use. There are more but I dot know the names of all the systems, some are visual seniors and not radar.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tethered_Aerostat_Radar_System
This what you had in mind?

**George Spiggott**

AustonT wrote:One of many blimp systems in use. There are more but I dot know the names of all the systems, some are visual seniors and not radar.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tethered_Aerostat_Radar_System
This what you had in mind?

What I had in mind was a little more like this

:

Certainly free roaming, with advertising space to lower costs.

**Easy E**

AustonT wrote:
Easy E wrote:Plus, I think the plan is to just have them loiter around and look for "suspicious behavior". Kind of like the blimps in Gotham City.

I have no doubt such a technique will catch "criminals" , but how many innocent fish will get pulled in with such a wide net? How many of those "criminals" will actually be prosecuted?

I don't know the answer.

Yes because drones use tractor beams to apprehend people, and because its automated no need to Mirandize them either, just put them in the live well until the robot judge sentences them.

Yeah, because no one would be watching the info the drone was feeding and routing cops to where the suspicious activity that the Drone detected, right? Sure.

The drone won't do any apprehending. Instead, they will be a source of information used to route cops to the "suspicious behavior" to apprehend/interrogate the suspect. Of course, "suspiscious behavior" does NOT equal guilty.

Do I honestly need to draw a freakin' picture?

**Kanluwen**

Suspicious behavior is just that: suspicious behavior.

And while it does not "equal guilty", it certainly does not equal innocent either.

**Rented Tritium**

Easy E wrote:
Yeah, because no one would be watching the info the drone was feeding and routing cops to where the suspicious activity that the Drone detected, right? Sure.

The drone won't do any apprehending. Instead, they will be a source of information used to route cops to the "suspicious behavior" to apprehend/interrogate the suspect. Of course, "suspiscious behavior" does NOT equal guilty.

Do I honestly need to draw a freakin' picture?

The regular rules for reasonable suspicion and probable cause would still apply, so we're not talking about them having any more power than they do with a helicopter.

**AustonT**

George I dont see your picture can I assume it's something similar to the Goodyear dirigible?

**Frazzled**

Kanluwen wrote:Suspicious behavior is just that: suspicious behavior.

And while it does not "equal guilty", it certainly does not equal innocent either.

Agreed. Whats the issue? Again, its no different from having cops all over or people with phones calling it in.

**Rented Tritium**

I think it would be a smart idea to have an extra layer of constitutional enforcement JUST IN CASE a drone operator unilaterally decided to push the envelope. I'd be happy to see a law that raised the requirements for using drone evidence just slightly. Not so much that you're losing cases or anything, but just enough that a few extra eyes need to check it first.

I don't think it would hurt and it would make most people feel better about them.

but legally, it's just a helicopter. The exact same powers and restrictions as your local PD's helicopter.

**AustonT**

Rented Tritium wrote:
Easy E wrote:
Yeah, because no one would be watching the info the drone was feeding and routing cops to where the suspicious activity that the Drone detected, right? Sure.

The drone won't do any apprehending. Instead, they will be a source of information used to route cops to the "suspicious behavior" to apprehend/interrogate the suspect. Of course, "suspiscious behavior" does NOT equal guilty.

Do I honestly need to draw a freakin' picture?

The regular rules for reasonable suspicion and probable cause would still apply, so we're not talking about them having any more power than they do with a helicopter.

Oh so the legal system remains intact? No Robojudges? Weird.
You probably should draw some pictures, I hear it's therapeutic.

**Frazzled**

Rented Tritium wrote:I think it would be a smart idea to have an extra layer of constitutional enforcement JUST IN CASE a drone operator unilaterally decided to push the envelope. I'd be happy to see a law that raised the requirements for using drone evidence just slightly. Not so much that you're losing cases or anything, but just enough that a few extra eyes need to check it first.

That wouldn't be needed. If they stuck a camera in everyone's face, the only usable evidence would still have to pass constitutional muster.