Consumer drones are coming, and they will change everything

Re:Consumer drones are coming, and they will change everything by ChuckMcM on Sunday December 01, 2013 @02:11PM (#6828690)

So much more they could have said but did not. When do we see the first set of drones that fly into AT&T Park and land on a ledge somewhere letting someone outside the park watch the game? When do we have a drone at 399' run out of charge and fall down doing property damage or injuring someone and the owner never claims their drone back? When do we get Papparazi chasing celebrity weddings with drones? (I believe I read a report of this already, at least on the property of a celebrity). Fly it up to the roof of your target at night and then just settle in for a day's worth of filming? And of course when will we have a bad actor use a drone to assassinate a world leader or opposition leader, flying up to them and detonating a small directional charge.

Yes, they are going to change everything and it will be equal parts good and bad. I expect them to end up being illegal for non law enforcement to own.

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Re:Consumer drones are coming, and they will change everything by evanrich on Sunday December 01, 2013 @03:21PM (#6829107)

Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen paint a pretty scary picture for drones in their book The New Digital Age. They predict a similarity between how terrorists and guerrilla warriors use cheap consumer technology now, such as cell phones in IEDs, and how they might use drones in the future as their prices continue to drop. "Imagine [a drone] that is fitted with a homemade bomb on its undercarriage, producing a whole new level of domestic terror that is just around the corner."

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Re:Consumer drones are coming, and they will change everything by jotm on Sunday December 01, 2013 @04:17PM (#6829379)

It would be rather easy to attach a proper gun to the drone, with a targeting system and auto firing mechanism (already put in real world use in civilian hands: http://tracking-point.com/ ; http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/01/17000-linux-powered-r...). Sure, the tech needs to be smaller, but that' won't be a problem soon.

Now that's a scary assassination tool, and if properly camouflaged you can't stop it until it's too late (or drone flight is completely banned).

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Re:Consumer drones are coming, and they will change everything by Futurebot on Sunday December 01, 2013 @05:15PM (#6829652)

How about insect-sized assassination drones? http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2013/06/wha...

Excerpt:

"Not bee drones, rather drone drones, with military and terrorist capabilities. There is already a (foiled) terror plot using model airplanes. How easy would it be to stop a mechanical “bee” which injects a human target with rapidly-acting poison?"

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Re:Consumer drones are coming, and they will change everything by ChuckMcM on Sunday December 01, 2013 @05:37PM (#6829752)

Well you can fantasize of course :-) Actual small flyers with both useful range and telemetry are still science fiction. The number to watch is the energy density / energy consumption ratio. Dragonfly like devices can currently get airborne and fly a few 10s of meters, but that is without any cargo capacity at all.

Not that someday it won't happen, rather that today you could carry a 12 ga shotgun shell around with a camera that lets you see where you are. All of that tech is 'off the shelf' today. Hence the more immediacy of the change.

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Re:Consumer drones are coming, and they will change everything by reeses on Sunday December 01, 2013 @02:32PM (#6828809)

There is a mechanism in place in almost any country to regulate aviation based on location, craft capabilities, and operator certification based on supervised experience.

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Re:Consumer drones are coming, and they will change everything by jotm on Sunday December 01, 2013 @04:20PM (#6829387)

DIY drone makers could care less if they really want to do some damage. Buy some junk on eBay, have half a brain and you get yourself a flight worthy drone.

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