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US Police Consider Flying Drones Armed With Stun Guns (digitaltrends.com)
Slashdot reader Presto Vivace tipped us off to news reports that U.S. police officials are considering the use of flying drones to taser their suspects. From Digital Trends:
Talks have recently taken place between police officials and Taser International, a company that makes stun guns and body cameras for use by law enforcement, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday. While no decision has yet been made on whether to strap stun guns to remotely controlled quadcopters, Taser spokesman Steve Tuttle said his team were discussing the idea with officials as part of broader talks about "various future concepts."
Tuttle told the Journal that such technology could be deployed in "high-risk scenarios such as terrorist barricades" to incapacitate the suspect rather than kill them outright... However, critics are likely to fear that such a plan would ultimately lead to the police loading up drones with guns and other weapons. Portland police department's Pete Simpson told the Journal that while a Taser drone could be useful in some circumstances, getting the public "to accept an unmanned vehicle that's got some sort of weapon on it might be a hurdle to overcome."
The article points out that there's already a police force in India with flying drones equipped with pepper spray.
Tuttle told the Journal that such technology could be deployed in "high-risk scenarios such as terrorist barricades" to incapacitate the suspect rather than kill them outright... However, critics are likely to fear that such a plan would ultimately lead to the police loading up drones with guns and other weapons. Portland police department's Pete Simpson told the Journal that while a Taser drone could be useful in some circumstances, getting the public "to accept an unmanned vehicle that's got some sort of weapon on it might be a hurdle to overcome."
The article points out that there's already a police force in India with flying drones equipped with pepper spray.
of law enforcement
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Nice False Dichotomy you found there lying on the ground. Should we report it to the police? The same police that have been shown to -regularly- use excessive force when they know they aren't being filmed... ??
Or how about the police that has militarized to the point where they are an occupying force?
Or how about police in neighborhoods that regularly target minorities?
I guess you're not a minority (neither am I), don't live in one of those types of neighborhoods (neither do I), and don't care about the plight of your brothers and sisters. (I do).
And about 'why' it is a false dichotomy... because there is obviously a middle ground between giving the police 'new toys' and giving them pillows.
Hard on criminals is not necessarily hard on crime. More to the point it's not when cops shoot criminals, it's when cops shoot alleged criminals.
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
If these drones can accurately stun someone, why not make them autonomous, feed their video to an AI familiar with the law and then stun anyone who breaks a law? Oh, wait, because that's pure fucking insanity. But, it's also the direction we are rapidly heading. It will start with drones as backup/expendable less-than-lethal devices and progress pretty quickly to autonomous law enforcement drones. I keep hearing that the average person breaks the law several times a day so, it should make for a really exciting society!
Been predicting this for some time along with others. This is the first signs along with the robot blowing up a gunman with a bomb.
Not really a revelation, more of an inevitability. And certainly not a conspiracy theory - governments worldwide are already discussing this future openly...and assumedly otherwise.
The apologists will, as always, talk only about the benefits and how it will help against the "bad guys" (i.e. not them) until it is too late as per usual.
Ahuxley, I appreciate the thought that went into that, but all that isn't necessary.
Just put a couple of car batteries in a drug house to power a brute-force broadband R.F. noise generator and broadband amplifier to be kicked on when the lookout gives the signal a raid is incoming.
Not only no remotely-controlled drones, no police radios, no cellphones, nada. If it ain't wired together it ain't talking, at least within a few blocks. No tactical comms, no calls for backup, no alerts about fleeing suspects, no calls for med-evac for wounded.
And, it's a lot cheaper, far easier to make, and less labor-intensive.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
The problem is that rather than filling the non-lethal role they were originally intended for, these things often instead end up being misused. Tasers for example were initially introduced for use where lethal force would have otherwise been used. What happens then is that you get mission creep and before you know it, even unarmed passively-resisting protestors are viewed as fair-game. Taser-armed drones are likely to be no-exception.
As predicted by Larry Niven in 1972 short story, Cloak of Anarchy.
http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/...
Someone at police headquarters had expected that. Twice the usual number of copseyes floated overhead, waiting. Gold dots against blue, basketball-sized, twelve feet up. Each a television eye and a sonic stunner, each a hookup to police headquarters, they were there to enforce the law of the Park...
Within King's Free Park was an orderly approximation of anarchy. People were searched at the entrances. There were no weapons inside. The copseyes, floating overhead and out of reach were the next best thing to no law at all.
http://www.larryniven.net/stor...
I understand, but I think the risk is that it becomes too easy to use these non-lethal (but very painful) devices when the police are not in any real danger. They could become the quick solution to too many problems. Eventually they might also have lethal weapons.
I think that one of the keys to reducing police brutality is a better connection to the people that they are supposed to be serving, and I think drones weaken that connection.
Would you like the police to turn a blind eye to the crimes? Look at what happened in Baltimore when police stopped patrolling.
I'm not the person you're replying to, but perhaps rather than the either/or scenario, we could go back to first principles.
sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
Yeah, but now the one guy in your gang smart enough to hook all that shit up right is in federal prison, and when the rest of you get out of your State prison and start things back up, you don't have any of that anymore.
It "works" one time, but the SWAT team still arrests everybody.
Yeah, they'll be used for barricaded hostages and terrorists and such. Just like SWAT teams.
Do you have ESP?
to track runaway vehicles instead of chasing them.
This is the first signs along with the robot blowing up a gunman with a bomb.
The robot didn't do anything. The police controlling the robot used it to deal with the guy remotely so they didn't have to lose any more lives approaching a guy who was promising to do more killing. How is that a single bit different than shooting him from 500 yards away? It's not. Not a bit.
The apologists will, as always, talk only about the benefits and how it will help against the "bad guys"
Why should someone apologize for telling the truth? If it was your job to deal with an armed, violent person, and you were handed a tool that allows you to do that with less of a chance of you being killed while doing your job, are you really saying you wouldn't use that tool? Let me guess, you think it's unfair for the police to wear body armor, right? Yeah. Right.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Automated "peacekeeper" drones are like the most iconic representation you can get for scifi/cyber distopia. They're the poster boy, easily.
So if you want us feeling (even more) like everything is turning into 1984, Fahrenheit 451, etc. by all means carry on.
Drone have no life on their own to be endangered. Therefore they will never have any occasion to use them, so why bother arming drones.
If they are intended to be use in non-life threatening situation, then it's torture. Torture drone. Great.
Taser armed drones are actually less worrying to me than the fellow they killed with the robot bomb. In the latter case, killing a suspect is justified when the police are under deadly threat. Arguably, if the sniper is contained and they can take their time jerry rigging a drone bomb, they could also take their time to come up with something that doesn't circumvent due process. I don't know enough details about that situation to say they weren't justified, but it is easy to see how the implications are a little troubling. However, if they had been able to taser that fellow with drones then he'd have been able to stand trial.
they could have put anything on the robot.
they chose to use a bomb, instead of CS (tear) gas or any of a number of other options that would have ended the situation without further loss of life.
by that logic of yours, we should replace all police with robots as in Elysium or any of a number of other scifi stories.
why risk anyone's lives? lets just use robots to decide everyone's fate and enforce the laws.
the reason is because putting humans in the mix, putting them at risk, is part of the safeguard against abuse of power.
your logic is the logic that justifies saving police lives at the cost of all others.
being a police officer is dangerous, though not in the top 10. and it should be. it is by nature a risky profession. some days you interact with normal everyday citizens who just went a lil too fast. others you interact with actual dangerous criminals. that's the nature of the job when it comes to enforcing the law in relation to the nations citizens...all of them, normal or dangerous.
there are far too many police who think they're supposed to be warriors.
THEY ARE NOT.
that flawed mindset largely comes from ex-military who transitioned but forgot they aren't at war with America's citizens.
I've actually been told by various officers that the view of them as guardians is dangerous and emperils theyre safety.
that is garbage.
police are not warriors.
they absolutely ARE guardians.
and part of being a guardian of the public is protecting ALL OF THE PUBLIC, including the dangerous ones, to the best of your ability.
and if that doesn't sit well with you, then don't become one.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
several counties out in bumphuck Oklahoma have MRAPS now.
and the boonies of Oklahoma aren't the only place this is happening.
MRAPS.
Mine Resistant Armored Personnel Carriers.
like we used in Iraq to protect from IEDs.
why do counties with a population of 5,000 people and 300,000 cows need MRAPS, let alone SWAT teams?
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
oh irony
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
for those who don't click the link:
The nine principles were as follows:
1.To prevent crime and disorder, as an alternative to their repression by military force and severity of legal punishment.
2.To recognise always that the power of the police to fulfil their functions and duties is dependent on public approval of their existence, actions and behaviour, and on their ability to secure and maintain public respect.
3.To recognise always that to secure and maintain the respect and approval of the public means also the securing of the willing co-operation of the public in the task of securing observance of laws.
4.To recognise always that the extent to which the co-operation of the public can be secured diminishes proportionately the necessity of the use of physical force and compulsion for achieving police objectives.
5.To seek and preserve public favour, not by pandering to public opinion, but by constantly demonstrating absolutely impartial service to law, in complete independence of policy, and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by ready offering of individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing, by ready exercise of courtesy and friendly good humour, and by ready offering of individual sacrifice in protecting and preserving life.
6.To use physical force only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient to obtain public co-operation to an extent necessary to secure observance of law or to restore order, and to use only the minimum degree of physical force which is necessary on any particular occasion for achieving a police objective.
7.To maintain at all times a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and that the public are the police, the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
8.To recognise always the need for strict adherence to police-executive functions, and to refrain from even seeming to usurp the powers of the judiciary, of avenging individuals or the State, and of authoritatively judging guilt and punishing the guilty.
9.To recognise always that the test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, and not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with them.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
How effective can it be when you can take it out with a stick or a rock?
dangerous jobs have risk.
don't like it don't become one.
So, you'd be in favor of cops not being allowed to wear body armor. Because, after all, the job is risky, and it's not fair to give them any sort of advantage that might save their lives while they're acting on your behalf and dealing with someone who wants to kill them.
Your absurd false dichotomy (the police must either allow themselves to be killed, or they are baby killers) shows that you are either pretending to have given this no actual thought, or you really can't muster the critical thinking skills to think this through. Here's an idea: go, right now, today, and ask your local city/county cops about their ride-along program. Do it for a week or two, in a rough urban area. Report back.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Partly because of the paralysis and partly because of the sellout in Congress, laws governing the use of technology in law enforcement have fallen way behind. My knee-jerk reaction is to say "no weaponized UAVs within our borders", but that's just not realistic. LE won't just standby while bad guys weaponize theirs, nor should they. But so far we haven't even gotten control of handheld Tasers. Instead of being used in place of deadly force, they're being used in place of physical restraint or even passive noncompliance, as if they never result in injury or death, which they most certainly occasionally do. I'd say a starting point would be to create federal legislation specifying when Tasers can be used, and it should be pretty restrictive. Then that can be extended to included remote-controlled vehicles. Will such laws preclude the unwanted use of weapons on drones? Of course not. But those doing so may be caught, fired, and prosecuted.
Become a politician.
You are being ripped off every second of every day, so that advertisers can help rip you off even more tomorrow.
Well, what's your alternative? Send more human cops in so they can get shot dead by a terrorist who's heavily armed? Sending in a robot with a bomb was a bit extreme, but under those circumstances, it was warranted. If they had had a flying Taser drone, that would have been preferable (maybe, depending on your POV), as it's less-than-lethal and most likely would have incapacitated the shooter instead of killing him.
For extreme situations, I don't see what the problem is here, and a flying Taser makes perfect sense as something to have for such cases. Police have had special weapons for a long, long time: SWAT teams ("SW" is for "special weapons") have been around since the early 1980s, and they're normally only brought out in extreme cases. The fact that they've been overused in recent years in some localities is a failure of governance, but the answer isn't to take all the guns away from all police because then you'll have really serious criminality problems and no police at all; the answer is to get some better politicians, namely at the local levels where they have direct oversight over police departments.
no, that's bulls***, and you damn well know it.
the only person who has brought up opposing cops having body armor is YOU .
you cannot make a rational argument based on telling others what they think, on putting words in their mouths.
also, its neither a false dichotomy, nor do I think (nor did I suggest) that police must allow themselves to be killed.
that is not what I said, but your illequipped brain is apparently incapable of proper reading comprehension, so do not even try to pretend to think that between us you are the intellectual. all evidence points otherwise.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
again: NO ONE has said, or implied, the words you are trying to put in their mouths. .
stop trying to tell others what they think, and read what they have actually said, using what little reading comprehension skill you have.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.