Drone Program Aims To 'Accelerate' Use Of Unmanned Aircraft By Police

The Department of Homeland Security has launched a program to "facilitate and accelerate the adoption" of small, unmanned drones by police and other public safety agencies, an effort that an agency official admitted faces "a very big hurdle having to do with privacy."  The $4 million Air-based Technologies Program, which will test and evaluate small, unmanned aircraft systems, is designed to be a "middleman" between drone manufacturers and first-responder agencies "before they jump into the pool," said John Appleby, a manager in the DHS Science and Technology Directorate's division of borders and maritime security. Appleby provided program details to a friendly audience at the Counter Terror Expo here last week. Just days before, the Federal Aviation Administration had issued new rules to streamline licensing for government agencies seeking to operate lightweight drones. The DHS program "is meant to aid the user community in making informed decisions" about buying drones, said a DHS spokeswoman. She said the department can help law enforcement agencies "better understand what this technology can contribute in areas such as real-time law enforcement operational support; special event response; crime scene situational awareness; border security; fire/wildfire detection; and disaster evaluation and initial response." It may be a few years before these automated eyes fill the sky, but privacy advocates, lawmakers and civil liberties groups are already worried about potential abuses.  Indeed, an ACLU report released this past December said, "Our privacy laws are not strong enough to ensure that the new technology will be used responsibly and consistently with democratic values." It warned of a coming "'surveillance society' in which our every move is monitored, tracked, recorded, and scrutinized by the authorities." A preview of that came in 2007 when Houston police not so secretly tested an unmanned aircraft that the department hoped to use, among other functions, in issuing speeding tickets. More recently, a police SWAT team in Grand Forks, N.D., deployed a borrowed DHS Predator drone to assist in making the first arrest of an American using pilot-less airborne surveillance.  The FAA has already authorized police in a handful of cities -- including Seattle; Arlington, Texas; North Little Rock, Ark.; Gadsden, Ala.; and Ogden, Utah -- to fly drones. But with those numbers set to soar, at least two pundits have suggested an individual who shot down a surveillance drone would become a "hero" to some. Once "the bottleneck has passed and every police department does indeed have eyes everywhere, our notions of privacy under the Fourth Amendment and reasonable searches … will need to be reevaluated," wrote University of North Dakota aviation law professor Joseph Vacek in a 2010 law review article, "Big Brother Will Soon Be Watching--Or Will He?" "It seems the state will have the power, both constitutionally and technologically, to continually monitor its citizens from above."...more