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UK Government Wants Prisons Geoblocked By Drone Manufacturers (thestack.com)
An anonymous reader writes: A new report from the UK's Ministry of Justice promises to work with drone manufacturers to get prison locations geoblocked as a native feature of the drone, in the face of rising incidents of drone incursion into prison space. The report, which outlines many proposed reforms to the UK's prison system, says that the MoJ will "trial, together with industry, the inclusion of prison coordinates in no-fly zones which have the potential to be programmed into the majority of drones on the market (although we must think carefully about how much information we are willing to put into the public domain and therefore make available to the criminal community)." The last few years have seen increased pressure on government to enforce geoblock zones on drone manufacturers, who have responded to controversial drone incursion incidents with permanent or temporary geoblock software updates.
I am pretty sure we don't have to be careful with how much information about a gigantic facility right next to the highway gets into the public domain.
Instead of locking the drones out of prisons, maybe lock them in?
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
\subject
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
I have a better idea: The police should track the drone's signal back to the person controlling it, and arrest them.
This stuff mostly already exist, and device with GPS (which these would have to have in order to be geoblocked in the first place), has places in the world they won't work. Primarily though they can't go over a certain speed or altitude, this is to avoid commerical GPS units from being used for guided missiles.
This would mean that Drone software would have to be closed source - this would remove the ability to do interesting things. Also: what happens when a new prison is built; or if I buy a drone in Germany ? Will drones have to have, nailed in, the location of every prison (or other no fly zone) in every country in the world ?
Stupid idea, won't work.
It's not like criminal organizations are technologically incompetent these days. They'll just get someone to hack the drone's firmware to disable geoblocking -- or just build their own drones.
In cases like this, "they" always come up with simple, persuasive scenario; crime, terrorism, will nobody think of the children?!!, etc.; to push through this kind of legislation. When the law's enacted, we then find out that it mostly gets used for something entirely different and may actually turn out to be useless for the stated purpose. So... what do you think "they" are really after? What do they want to achieve with having hard-wired and probably secret lists of locations/areas that drones are unable to enter?
Good luck with that.
Firstly there are several different satellite geolocation systems in use that cover the entire world, US has GPS, EU has Gallileo, and USSR has GLONASS. Many receivers can pick them all up, so you'd need them all to agree to not cover UK prisons. Good luck convincing the Russians, and I'd bet you'd have a hard time even with the controlling authorities of the other two.
Secondly, why would drones necessarily need GPS anyway? Just fly them with a camera.
I honestly don't think this solution will work for a couple of important issues. First of all you don't even need a Drone to do a drop. Any RC plane could do it in a flyby. Also there's no reason why you need GPS to operate a drone although it makes it simpler. A drone could be hacked quite easily. Ontop of that not all drone manufacturers are in the UK and there's no reason why anyone outside of the UK would go through the trouble of enforcing these guidelines. Plus there's the problem of how to maintain all that data. Although prisons don't move very often, imagine how would you update all those devices if your prison did move.
Better solution, mount an EMP gun on the roof and shoot them down. (I imagine a prison should be a no-fly zone anyhow.) Or maybe even a sharpshooter with a real rifle. Or maybe the prison should fly their own defensive drones?
correct, police state / corporate fascist ideas are beta tested in the UK before being rolled out in the USA
I think the trouble with Geoblocking drones (and I'm not saying that it shouldn't be done, but pointing this out), is that if we Geoblock for prisons for reasons of security, then we do the same for government buildings, military bases; again, all for likely good security reasons. Then we add banks or other money storage facilities and clearing houses or places likely the target of prying eyes. Then we add primary schools, for the safety of the children. Then how about the universities, because they do sensitive research for the military..and so on and so forth. The question about Geoblocking is: Where do we draw the line?
Can I Geoblock my business or property because I do business with the government?
How far beyond my property line can I Geoblock? Just because you can't fly the drone directly over a prison, doesn't mean I can't fly high enough to get a good look into it.
Awk! Pieces of eight. Pieces of eight. Pieces of seven... ERROR: General Protection Fault. [Paroty Error.]
Why not just get rid of all prisons?
They're archaic and inhumane. We should be rehabilitating criminals with work programs and job training not locking them away.
So you're saying the punishment for murder should be working at McDonalds? Wouldn't that go against the constitution?
"Cruel and unusual punishment"
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Is made in Atlanta, GA, *not* Canada. Can you believe that shiz?
I'm not sure how that is relevant, but Canada Dry was originally made in Canada before it got purchased by an American company.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
That was my first thought too. Pretty easy for hackers to replace the firmware in a drone. Pretty hard to defend against the far cheaper 12 gauge rock salt load which is non lethal (but very painful) and which will easily penetrate a drone's thin plastic skin.
Better yet, iron filings load for drones- short'em out.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Drone receives coordinates. Drone does math to see if coordinates falls within predefined geofences. Drone decides whether it's allowed to continue on its course. At no point is the GPS system involved in enforcing or contributing to this rule.
Just wrapping the top of the drone in aluminum foil would mean it wouldn't have a GPS signal strong enough to use any kind of geo fence, so you would be able to fly it manually wherever you wanted. Jo drone maker is going to make a drone that doesn't fly if it can't pick up GPS, since GPS is already pretty flaky...
Or maybe the prison should fly their own defensive drones?
I think intercept suicide drones are the best idea. But it seems like it would be really hard to detect incoming drones that are mostly plastic... not sure if the motors and battery offer enough material to detect. Maybe just an audio detector though since drone motors/rotors are pretty distinctive.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
That's why you layer security.
Your house probably has a front door lock. Hopefully you have a deadbolt too, on top of that you probably have an alarm sensor on your door if it opens. That's probably not enough so you may have a glass break sensor, a motion sensor, maybe even a security camera. Your alarm is connected to the phone line to call the alarm monitoring company; unless you have a crappy system, you also have a cell backup in your monitoring station to call the monitoring company if the phone line is cut.
Any one of these layers of protection can be circumvented. You add more layers to make it harder to do.
Geoblocking drones is just one layer. There needs to be multiple layers. Yeah, there are ways around it, but it improves the overall security of the prison even if it isn't enough by itself.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
I can build a drone MYSELF for less than a hundred bucks in half a day. You don't need a "manufacturer" to have one.
Birdshot.
Just have a few guards patrolling outside the fences with a shotgun. Load them up with birdshot or rocksalt (we can do some testing for effectiveness) and tell them to pop any drones they see.
If prisons want to keep drones out, then they need to step up their game and do something about it. Trying to hamstring every legally purchases hobby drone is not the way to go.
This signature is false.
In Canada: ... within 5 Nautical Miles (9 km) of any aerodrome (i.e. airport, heliport, helipad or seaplane base, etc.). Because every Hospital in my city (pop 260,000) has a helipad, it means flying a drone within the City Limits is illegal. Not to mention that flying a drone in a populated area is also specifically illegal. ... in any restricted airspace (military bases, prisons, skydiving clubs, and forest fires). ... in any populated area; ... over sporting events, concerts, festivals, and firework shows; ... near moving vehicles, highways, bridges, busy streets, or anywhere you could endanger or distract drivers; ... closer than 150 metres (500 feet) from people, animals, buildings, structures, or vehicles; ... anywhere you may interfere with first responders.
... ..."
You cannot fly a drone:
Violations are covered under a number of statutes, including the Criminal Code, and the range of penalties include throwing away the key.
**********
"
The Criminal Code of Canada describes several offences involving the dangerous operation of aircraft and endangering the safety of other aircraft. Committing such offences is punishable by monetary penalties and/or jail time including imprisonment for life.
-Advisory Circular (AC) No. 600-002
Civil Aviation Resources
General Safety Practices – Model Aircraft and Unmanned Air Vehicle Systems
**********
And yes, I have it on good authority (Federal Prison Staff) that your drone will meet firepower over a Prison, Penitentiary or Psychiatric Hospital.
[2 Prison guards speaking, in British accents]
Guard 1: Wot's that then?
Guard 2: Looks like a drone, doesn't it? It's flying right at us, looks like it's got a package suspended from it. That would no doubt have some contraband in it, wouldn't it?
Guard 1: Well, should we alert the others?
Guard 2: No need. They can't fly over the prison, you see. There's a little bit right in there, which actually stops the thing from flying over any prison. Brilliant, isn't it?
Guard 1: Brilliant! But it looks like it just flew over the wall and into the yard, when is that bit supposed to kick in to stop it?
Guard 2: It did fly over the wall, didn't it? See if you can reach the warden on the radio.
Guard 1: What should I tell him?
Guard 2: Tell him that we're in the wrong place, apparently the prison got moved and we need to know where we're supposed to be.
-fin-
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Flying a drone so it avoids shotgun-equipped prison guards is easy. Real easy:
* Get a "plane" type drone. Like a rc plane but with the camera link. Payload: a bundle with dope/phone/pistol/whatever.
1. Get it up to a nice height well away from that prison. Nobody firing on it yet.
2. Turn off the motor, let the plane glide towards the prison. Nobody hear it coming, and it is too small to see. Nobody firing.
3. Drop the bundle when you see your inmate friend. He is expecting something to go "thump" nearby.
4. Glide away from the prison - or start the motor if too low. Electric motors are not that noisy anyway.
* Get a quadcopter type drone.
1. Fly in so high it is hard to see, and hard to hit with shotguns. This is not very high - shotguns are even considered harmless for people at sufficient distance - just fly higher than that distance.
2. Drop the payload from high altitude, using the down-facing camera for aiming. (Practice this a bit first) A prison yard is a big target.
3. Fly away unharmed
* If they are good, dropping stuff at night.
* If they are good, arrange a diversion. Some prisoners stage a fight while you fly stuff in. Or even have someone fly another drone or two around those guard towers.
Also, if they start shooting, escape by zigzagging. Drones corner well and are hard to hit. And if they hit it? It was just a drone.
Geoblocking is a waste of time. You can build a drone from scratch, using open source software. No geoblock then. Or pay some nerd to build it for you. Or buy from some chinese manufacturer who has the blocking as "an optional extra".
"Drink Canada Dry."
I'm trying, man. I'm (hic) trying.
Have gnu, will travel.
Better yet, iron filings load for drones- short'em out.
That's not likely to actually work more than once or twice. It's pretty easy to protect against that sort of thing, just by potting stuff in epoxy and then wrapping that in foam.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The mission of law is not to oppress persons and plunder them of their property, even though the law may be acting in a philanthropic spirit. Its mission is to protect property.
(Frédéric Bastiat)
"No man's life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session." -- Judge Gideon J. Tucker
The constitution was written by men and men are fallible. Maybe paying restitution to the victim might be a good way to punish criminals?
"No man's life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session." -- Judge Gideon J. Tucker
Instead of Geoblocking why not have the drones land and power off at a designated landing spot. And instead of some massive database in the drones code, just have the hardware respond as a priority to an override signal. That means the prisons can control where they land. In the case of accidental intrusions a fine at the jurisdictions discretion. In the event of a criminal intrusion of a purposeful nature, confiscate the drone, and followup to prosecute the drone operator. So delivery of drugs by quadcopter, then intervention and prosecute. Maybe even have the drone remember its launch point for the authorities to recover for their investigation. So what's the penalty for aiding in a prison break? Delivery of drugs to a prisoner? Delivery of random contraband? Or, put a net over the top of open areas where prisoners can be? Monofilament fishing line nets would be hard for drones to avoid.
- Tjp
I am in wallow with my inner money grubbing capitalistic pig. ... Oink!
It's trivial to build and program your own drone for cheap, with an arduino or raspberry pi.
Do you really think that those criminal won't do it?
Try it! Library of Babel
The constitution was written by men and men are fallible. Maybe paying restitution to the victim might be a good way to punish criminals?
Murder victims might not appreciate being paid after they die. (not that they particulary get much from their killer going to jail)
The problem with fines as punishment is that, most people who commit crimes don't typically have a lot of money in the first place, that's why they turn to crime. Also, one might consider crime an investment. Got no money? Rob a bank, what's the worst that can happen, you have to give it back?
Also, what's the fine for murder? $1million? Some rich people might consider that worthwhile, and some poor people will never have that money to pay in the first place. Or is the fine based on % of income? Someone vandalizes your $30,000k car, but because they're poor, they're only fined $20.
Paying restitution simply won't work for the vast majority of crimes. As much as I hate how bad the conditions in some prisons may be, there really isn't a better alternative. I think the best compromise is a prison system that is based more on reform rather than punishment. Prisoners should be treated like people instead of animals too. Some nations do that, and it does cost more per prisoner, but they tend to have much lower re-incarceration rates.
The choice typically comes down to a punitive prison (like the US) where you pay $X but the average prisoner has a 77% chance of reincareration or a reform based prison where you pay 30% more but maybe only a 15% reincarceration rate.
In the long run treating humans like humans saves you money.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
I think the FAA has greatly underestimated the chaos that will ensue when the air is full of drones that can buzz your house and invade your privacy. So why not allow individual property owners to have their property geoblocked up to a certain altitude, say 500 feet. I can have my phone listed in the federal Do-Not-Call Registry. Why not have a federal geoblock registry to keep the pesky things away?
"He took a duck in the face at 250 knots." -- William Gibson, Pattern Recognition
To be fair, alarms and cameras act as deterrents to break ins - at least to some criminals. It's not naive to think so, it's basic human nature. Criminals are generally looking for easy targets and don't want to be caught. Alarms blaring are contrary to that goal, as are the chances of being seen in real time or ID'd later by cameras. Again, not every criminal will be deterred by the same things, but using layers of security is the right approach.
Murder victims might not appreciate being paid after they die. ... Also, what's the fine for murder?
Murder isn't something that can be repaid; no matter how much the perpetrator offers they can never "make the victim whole". As a meagre start on repaying that debt, however—and as an alternative to the death penalty, which would be justifiable retribution for any case of deliberate murder—someone could be appointed to represent the victim's interests, and whatever the victim might have chosen to do given the resources which would reasonably have been available to them becomes the murderer's obligation to provide in their stead. Supporting the victim's family financially would be one obvious example. If at any point the perpetrator finds this burden too onerous, they can always request that the suspended death penalty be reinstated.
Yes, this is similar to indentured servitude—in the same way that putting someone in prison is similar to kidnapping. The nature of the crime justifies the response. If you don't want to find yourself in this position, don't commit murder.
Or is the fine based on % of income? Someone vandalizes your $30,000k car, but because they're poor, they're only fined $20.
The standard for restitution is always "make the victim whole". To accomplish that you must do whatever is necessary to restore the victim to the state which would reasonably have obtained had the crime never been committed. Someone with no wealth or income damages an expensive car? Their restitution isn't complete until they find a way to fix it. Someone wealthy steals a poor family's last $10, unwittingly causing them to go without food, become ill, and incur significant debt for treatment and/or a long-term disability? They're responsible for mitigating all of that, not just returning the (to them) insignificant $10 which was taken.
Percentage of income is a good start but doesn't go far enough, since the effect of a given loss is not a linear function of income. Taking $1 from someone who only has $10 will have much worse and more immediate consequences for the victim than taking $10,000 from someone with $100,000.
As much as I hate how bad the conditions in some prisons may be, there really isn't a better alternative.
Prison isn't an alternative to restitution at all, unless you're referring to debtor's prison. It does nothing to "make the victim whole." In terms of retribution, most crimes which carry a prison sentence don't actually justify locking the perpetrator up as a proportional response. (Exceptions would include kidnapping and murder, of course, but not much else.) It might be offered as an non-proportional alternative for offenses like assault or theft, provided the victim and the offender both agree to it in lieu of corporal punishment or fines, respectively. The only other argument in favor of imprisonment might be that the prisoner poses an eminent threat of irreversible harm to members of the public, and thus must be restrained to ensure their safety, but if that is the justification for locking someone up then it doesn't make sense to let them out after serving an arbitrary term without clear evidence that they are no longer a threat.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
Geoblocking is a waste of time.
Not only is geoblocking a waste of time, but it's actually an idiotic suggestion, that helps one to identify idiots.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
I can't see this working, because there are many pairs of jurisdictions x,y such that jurisdiction x will not require that all drones and drone control modules have geofencing for prohibited locations in jurisdiction y and vice versa, I don't think drone control modules will have enough memory to store the geofence for every prohibited location on the planet, and even if it did, people would find ways to build controllers without the restrictions. This is just another example of a law that's going to be completely ignored by lawbreakers anyway.