Tuesday, May 8, 2018

Palestinians down an IDF drone with slingshot

https://www.rt.com/news/426012-gaza-protesters-israeli-drone/

"A Palestinian protester near the Gaza border managed to bring down what appears to be an Israeli drone with a rock and a slingshot, a video posted online revealed.
The footage by Press TV shows Palestinians hurling stones at an object which looks like a drone, with a slingshot. A heavy cloud of gray smoke can be seen, while sirens are heard in the background."

pretty good shooting there.  I wonder how high it was.

Friday, May 4, 2018

criminals using drone swarms

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/criminals-used-drone-swarm-disrupt-112600956.html

The FBI's Joe Mazel told a crowd at the AUVSI Xponential conference this week about a particularly organized gang that used drones to interfere with a hostage situation last winter. As Defense One reports, a swarm of small drones descended on an FBI hostage team, performing "high-speed low passes" in an effort "to flush them" from their position. "We were then blind," Mazel added.
The drones weren't just used to disorientate the FBI, though. According to Mazel, they were the crew's eyes in the sky, pushing video to YouTube so the wider group could keep tabs on the FBI's movements. This was an organized operation, too. Apparently, the drones were brought into the area specifically to disrupt the FBI's rescue efforts. Other specifics of the incident remain "law-enforcement sensitive," Mazel said, but this is just one of many more elaborate ways drones are now being used by criminals.
Surveillance is a big part of it. Criminals have taken to watching police stations to identify witnesses and other friends of the law, as well as casing out facilities to find security holes they may be able to exploit in a robbery.

* * * * *

Like any useful tool, drones can be used for good or bad.  It takes rational laws to help avoid the bad.