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FAA Bill Authorizes Surveillance Drones Over US
fyngyrz writes "Congress passed a bill this week that makes it easier for the government to fly unmanned spy planes in U.S. airspace. From the article: 'The FAA Reauthorization Act, which President Obama is expected to sign, also orders the Federal Aviation Administration to develop regulations for the testing and licensing of commercial drones by 2015. Privacy advocates say the measure will lead to widespread use of drones for electronic surveillance by police agencies across the country and eventually by private companies as well.'"
"Eeeee! Teh dronz!" Ahem...
Put the same equipment in a manned aircraft and it's a snoozer.
Some appropriate Beechcraft antenna pron. I like antennae (328X0 represent!):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Beechcraft_RC-12N_Huron_in_flight.jpg
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Exactly. This has to do with unmanned aircraft, which is entirely orthogonal to surveillance aircraft.
Personally, I'd like to see unmanned cargo flights; there's no real reason why every UPS/FedEx plane needs any human beings on it at all. (Of course, I supposed that would have ruined the movie Castaway).
captcha: "airmail". heh.
NDAA and this bill and TSA and Patriot Act and every other power that government is stealing from the people, including preventing people from moving their capital out of the country (if you are a US citizen, just try and open an account somewhere abroad), and a new 450USD fee to renounce your citizenship, which eventually can be made any arbitrary amount, why not USD45,000,000, even the fence on the US/Mexican border, all of this converging into one giant red signal - your country is being turned into a concentration camp and eventually you'll need a permit to move around, a permit to move your capital around, and once your government decides to turn it into a 'socialist heaven', there will be no just price, capital and exchange controls, but they'll 'exchange' your money 1 to 100 or 1 to 1000 or 1 to 10000 or 1 to 100000 to ensure none of you have even nominal dollars.
You still have a choice, you can still vote for Ron Paul and try and stop this before your country is turned into a bad parody of what USSR used to be.
You can't handle the truth.
View from a drone over the US:
- people, looking like ants, moving about their daily business
- drone operator clicks on a button, tags overlay on the image, connecting each "ant" with their phone number, sensed by nearby cell tower geolocation
The 8 foot high walls surrounding my backyard are the only things keeping me from being charged with exposing myself in public when I'm sunbathing in the nude to combat my pasty basement-programmer appearance.
I currently have a reasonable expectation of privacy in my own back yard, even though aeroplanes and satellites pass overhead because they're most likely not actively recording video of the ground.
Will children be prevented from accessing the drone footage? How can you be sure when such young hackers exist today?!
Will they be publishing the planned flight paths of the drones so I can know when my reasonable expectations of privacy have become unreasonable? If not... Why Not? I'm not sure I want children playing in the vicinity of flying machines build by the lowest-bidder of a government contract.
Additionally, I've been working up the plans for a very large parabolic solar reflector, capable of "flash-tanning" me in mere milliseconds, or even acting as a large out door oven. I won't focus the mirrors as high as airliners fly, for obvious reasons; However, I must leave the oven focused far above the ground to prevent children from accidentally burning themselves.
Won't someone Think of the Children?!
Without flight plans for these new low-flying craft, they can't possibly hold me accountable for such accidents involving the drones. I've done my duty by informing the government agencies of my physical address, and herein have publicly exposed my habits. It surely won't be my fault if a drone fails to avoid flying above my home, and gets caught in the path of my new death-ray...
Ok, I understand the concerns about privacy and all but what can a drone do that a well placed spy satellite can't? If they want to have tabs on all citizens in the country the can do that already, from space. Or they can fly manned air craft. The US Federal Government does not need this bill to spy on you and though cost might be an issue does it really look like the Fed cares about how much it spends? What this is about is whither or not local/state governments, or private citizens can use drones. I for one would like to see drone based delivery services, who doesn't want pizza delivered by a small helicopter hovering out your apartment window.