October 1, 2018 | International, Aerospace
By: David Koenig, The Associated Press
An aviation bill Congress is rushing to approve contains a little-noticed section that would give authorities the power to track, intercept and destroy drones they consider a security threat, without needing a judge's approval.
Supporters say law enforcement needs this power to protect Americans from terrorists who are learning how to use drones as deadly weapons.
They point to the Islamic State terrorist group's use of bomb-carrying drones on battlefields in Iraq, and warn that terrorists could go after civilian targets in the United States.
Critics say the provision would give the government unchecked power to decide when drones are a threat. They say the government could use its newfound power to restrict drone-camera news coverage of protests or controversial government facilities, such as the new detention centers for young migrants.
The provision is tucked in a huge bill that provides $1.7 billion in disaster relief and authorizes programs of the Federal Aviation Administration, which regulates drones.
The House approved the measure Wednesday by a 398-23 vote, and the Senate is expected pass it on to President Donald Trump's desk in the coming days. The White House signaled support of the drone provision in July.
Sen. Ron Johnson, a Wisconsin Republican, introduced the Preventing Emerging Threats Act this year. It would give the Homeland Security Department and the Justice Department power to develop and deploy a system to spot, track and shoot down drones, as unmanned aircraft are called. Officers would have the authority to hack a drone operator's signal and take control of the device.
The bill was never considered on its own by the full Senate or the House. Instead, in private negotiations that ended last weekend, it was tucked into a "must-pass" piece of FAA legislation.
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen wrote in a recent op-ed that the threat of drone attacks "is outpacing our ability to respond." She said criminals use drones to smuggle drugs across the border, but worse, terrorists like the Islamic State are deploying them on the battlefield.
"We need to acknowledge that our first and last chance to stop a malicious drone might be during its final approach to a target," she wrote.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement this week that the measure "would finally give federal law enforcement the authority we need to counter the use of drones by drug traffickers, terrorists and criminals."
The National Football League's top security executive recently endorsed the bill's intent but said it should go further by letting trained local police officers intercept drones. The official, Cathy Lanier, a former Washington, D.C., police chief, said the NFL is alarmed by an increase in drone flyovers at stadiums.
Opponents including the American Civil Liberties Union argue that the proposal gives the government unchecked power to track and seize drones without regard for the privacy and free-speech rights of legitimate drone operators. It exempts the government agencies from certain laws, including limits on wiretapping.
The bill provides no oversight or means to question a government decision about what is a "credible threat" and what is an "asset" or "facility" in need of protection when drones are nearby.
News organizations are increasingly using drones. They deploy them to cover natural disasters like the recent flooding from Hurricane Florence and also controversies such as the Trump administration's construction of new camps for migrant children who were separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.
"Being able to see footage of protests, the size of protests, being able to see facilities like those at the border is useful — those are newsworthy events," said India McKinney, a legislative analyst for the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Without a specific means to protect First Amendment rights — something not in the bill — "it's entirely feasible to think that the DOJ or DHS could just decide that a drone owned by a news organization provides a credible threat and then destroys the footage," she said.
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David Koenig can be reached at http://twitter.com/airlinewriter
March 18, 2022 | International, Aerospace
"We are poised to go ahead and take a significant step forward" in teaming autonomous drones up with piloted fighters and bombers, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said March 9.
March 18, 2024 | International, Aerospace
June 11, 2019 | International, Land, Security
By: Jen Judson WASHINGTON — After evaluating two active protection systems in a demonstration late last fall and determining neither were the right fit for the Stryker, the Army is now evaluating how to protect one of its critical combat vehicle. “Unfortunately for Stryker, we have not found a system that is suitable for the platform,” Col. Glenn Dean, Stryker project manager told Defense News in a June 7 interview. The Army has found interim APS for both its Abrams tank and Bradley infantry fighting vehicle but has struggled to find one for Stryker. The service has moved quickly to field combat vehicle protection against rocket-propelled grenades and anti-tank guided missiles while it develops a future system. The service originally considered Herndon,Virginia-based Artis Corporation's Iron Curtain APS for Stryker, but decided in August 2018not to move forward in fielding it to Stryker units. In an effort to expand its search for an appropriate system, the Army then decided to host a demonstration in late fall last year of two additional systems: Rafael's Trophy VPS and Rheinmetall's Active Defense Systems. Signs the demonstration wasn't proving fruitful cropped up in March, when the service said they'd need extra time — an entire year — to evaluate options for Stryker. Dean said the Army was hoping they'd see promise in one of the systems at the end of the demonstration and be able to carry it through more complex characterization for better evaluation in order to make a decision. But as the demonstration wrapped up, the Army decided neither would work. “Both Rheinmetall and the medium-weight Trophy, both have maturity challenges, but the bottom line is that they turned out to not be a suitable fit for Stryker,” Dean said. “We did see some potential in systems,” Dean said, adding, “it is our desire to continue to evaluate them further so we can understand them at a greater level of detail.” Neither system received the same level of testing as Rafael's Trophy on Abrams, IMI's Iron Fist on Bradley or Iron Curtain, Dean said, and the systems could end up being the right fit for some future effort to outfit other vehicles such as the Next-Generation Combat Vehicle program's Optionally Manned Fighting Vehicle, Mobile Protected Firepower and the Armored Multipurpose Vehicle, “none of which we have identified APS solutions for yet,” Dean said. Through continued evaluation “maybe we will eventually learn something that brings us back to Stryker,” he added. Unlike Bradley and Abrams, Stryker is a relatively light-weight platform, Dean said. “It has challenges in its space, weight and power integration. It has proven difficult for us to find a system that is entirely suitable for integration.” And while no operational APS system evaluated so far seems to work for Stryker, the Army is still looking into ways to protect it as its value on the battlefield only increases with the addition of bigger guns and more expensive weapon systems. Under the Vehicle Protection System (VPS) program office, the Army is working on reactive armor improvements focused on Bradley and AMPV, but that could be of particular value for Stryker, Dean said. The Army's laser warning program that is tied to the Modular Active Protection System (MAPS) program could also contribute to Stryker protection. MAPS is a system under development with the Army featuring a common controller into which hard-kill and soft-kill protection can be plugged. And the Army will be conducting a demonstration with layered hard-kill and soft-kill protection capability later this year as part of culminating exercise for its MAPS program, according to Dean. “The soft-kill may ultimately prove to be particularly well suited for Stryker,” Dean said. Those soft-kill systems are jammers and smoke systems that help obscure and tend to take up relatively little space and are less expensive then hard-kill APS that require the reloading of countermeasures. The service is also studying what it may need for a future APS and plans to initiate a program in the late part of the next fiscal year, which could also be an opportunity to develop something more suitable for Stryker, according to Dean. While the Army does have plans to protect its combat vehicles from rockets and missiles, in a June 6 letter sent to Army Secretary Mark Esper, a group of 13 House lawmakers expressed concern the service isn't doing enough to outfit its current fleet with APS and asked the Army to explain why it hadn't requested any further funding for APS upgrades in the budget According to Dean, for Abrams and Bradley, “we are resourced to meet the requirements that we have on an urgent basis to outfit a limited number of brigades. We are doing analysis right now to support development programs of record in active protection.” He added, “What we are buying is not the end of APS activity, but it is the urgent requirements we have been given.” https://www.defensenews.com/land/2019/06/10/active-protection-systems-demo-hits-dead-end-for-stryker-army-evaluating-next-steps/