Running head: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need Stricter Control

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need

Stricter Control
Cheung Chun Pong

April 11, 2015

Running head: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need Stricter Control

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need Stricter Control

Introduction
As technology keeps developing, the law and regulation need to keep up
swiftly in order to maintain social order and security. An unmanned aerial
vehicle (UAV), as known as a drone, landed on the White House lawn without
authorization this January (Shear & Schmidt, 2015) brought attention to the
public about the current security loophole against this new technology. Some
may claimed that it is not exactly a new technology as people use model
aircrafts for decades now, and UAVs or drones are just new names for them;
however, I would like to argue that the recent technology allows UAV to
vertically take-off and landing (VTOL), attached with a synchronized camera,
and connected with GPS is a lot different than a man flying a remote
controlled aircraft 10 years ago.
Firstly, the ability to VTOL allows the operator to no longer be
restricted by the use of a long runway. In other words, the operator may use
it everywhere he/she wants to now. Secondly, the attachment of a
synchronized camera allows the UAV be out of the sight of the operator, as
well as the sight of the public from knowing who and where the operator is.
Therefore, even if the operator broke some laws with the UAV, it is very hard
to locate the person and bring him/her to justice. Moreover, the video
recording may also raise some privacy issue. Finally, some UAVs nowadays
have built in GPS system and well-designed software system, allows them to
fly without a person operating UAVs during the flight. The operator only need
to pre-set the route, flying speed and altitude for the UAV on a smart device
and it will simply follow the instruction (DJI innovations, 2014). That makes
everyone who knows how to use a smart device the ability to fly a UAV. As
UAVs are designed more user-friendly, more people buy them and
manufacturers make more of them to satisfy the market. The most popular
UAV now in the United States is called the Phantom made by the DJI
Innovations, a Chinese company specialized on manufacturing commercial
and recreational UAVs for aerial photography and videography. The sale of
Phantom has increased around three to five times year-over-year since 2009;
moreover, in the New York City B&H Photo store sells as much as 200
Phantom every day (Koebler, 2014). With so many UAVs in the sky, control
measures on UAVs must be reviewed and revised to ensure better control on
public safety, individual privacy, and criminal activities.
Current UAVs regulations
A proper control measures ensuring public safety should be well-balanced
with individuals freedom. Clear guideline of measures and reasons behind
should be given to public to gain their consent. Here are some examples of
individuals freedom affecting the public safe with UAVs: 34-year-old
American flew his Phantom carelessly or recklessly towards a building in

Running head: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need Stricter Control

midtown Manhattan, and it crush-landed from a 20 feet away from another

person (Hoffer, 2013); people shot fireworks at their UAVs with fireworks, and
some even strap fireworks directly on their UAVs on the Independence day
(Koebler, 2014); this year, more than 60 reports to the Federal Aviation
Administration (FAA) of sighting UAVs fly on or near the path of commercial
airliners, causing some of the commercial airliner pilots to alter course (CBS,
2015). These are some of the example of the reckless practices of UAVs
public and the FAA concerns on. The current FAA guidelines for noncommercial UAVs are that (CEA, 2015): 1) UAVs cannot be flown above 400
feet. 2) Pilots must keep their UAVs insight at all time, not just keep in sight
with a synchronized camera 3) Do not operate near people or crowds. 4) Do
not fly within 5 miles of an airport. 5) Do not fly at night. However, these
standards are just voluntary guideline, not enforceable regulation. Therefore,
the FAA is forced to enforce the safe use of UAVs without clearly
established, codified regulations (Gettinger, 2014). A common regulation
the FAA use is reckless flight of an aircraft to tackle unsafe use of UAVs;
however, this regulation was originally created to regulate aircraft pilots.
Therefore, some people may question that if it is really suitable to regulate
the operation of small UAVs with a 10-tons airliners under the same
regulation. After all, it requires hundreds hours of training and flight hours for
a pilot to operate an aircraft and to learn the flight regulations. It seems
unfair to comparing a pilot fighting an airliner to a teenager flying a UAV
which he/she just got as Christmas gift. Nevertheless, the FAA should speed
up on making new regulation controlling the reckless operations of UAVs. The
penalty of reckless flying of a UAVs should have a deterrence effect. After all,
it only take one reckless operator of UAV flying into the engine of an Airliners
to create a huge disaster.
The raising trend of operating UAVs also raises issues about violation of
individual privacy. Due to the highly mobilize ability and the usually attached
recording camera, people are afraid that UAVs may invading their privacy.
For example, Lisa Pleiss who lives in Seattle freaked out when spotted an
UAV flying outside her window (Sterbenz, 2014). She lives on the 26th floor
in an apartment and was not expecting anything that may invade her
privacy. She was afraid that the operator may had captured some indecent
photo of her not dressing properly at her home and she called the police. Her
fear is understandable, as she was in a circumstance which she expect a
reasonable degree of privacy. With the UAVs in the air, fences and walls are
no longer able to provide sufficient protection for privacy; moreover, some
people think that UAVs may also raise the issue on trespassing. Just how far
up from the ground the air space is controlled by the house owner? Would
UAVs be considered trespassing if it fly over my house (Madrigal, 2012)? Is
there anything I can do if I do not want a UAV hover over my property? The
current law in many places do not have clear guideline on issues like that.
How about UAVs used by journalists? Can they take video with UAVs in the
name of press freedom without any limit? How about police use of UAVs to
surveillance a suspect? Is a warrant needed to do so? Even though The UAVs

Running head: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need Stricter Control

may fly and take video of public places legally, can someone just simply fly
his/her UAVs and record a public area 24/7 without explaining his reason to
public? These are the questions public may have concern on. Answers and
clear guidelines from the officials are expected to provide to public; and if
the current law and regulation cannot answer these questions, a revision of
the law and regulation is required.
Criminal activities with the use of UAVs is a foreseeable issue. In fact,
criminals had been using UAVs in assisting their illegal activities since 2011,
according to Latin Time (Lopez, 2014). The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA)
reported that there were as much as 150 trips of drug smuggling across the
Mexican and American border in 2012. Although the DEA spokesman claimed
that, This method will only allow a small amount of drugs to be flown at a
time and, coupled with the ease of detection, does not make this method
very profitable to these drug trafficking organizations (Bever, 2014), I think
that we should be aware of the fact that UAVs technology is improving every
year. Criminals do not only use UAVs to smuggle drugs across border, they
also use it to smuggle items into prison. On April 2014, officers found a small
UAV crushed outside of a South Carolina prison (Phillip, 2014).
Marijuana, cellphones and tobacco were attached on the UAVs. The ability to
smuggle items into prison with UAV certainly raise security concern of public;
moreover, the possibility to attach explosive on UAVs for terrorist attack is
even more terrifying. The New York Police Department (NYPD) claims that the
technology has advanced enough for UAVs to carry explosive, chemical
weapon or firearms (Hopkins, 2014). NYPD is actively seeking ways to stop
potential attack from UAVs attached with weapons. The current radar system
cannot detect small UAVs as their size is too small. NYPD are trying to
develop technology that may allow them to take control of UAVs as well as
scan the sky for UAVs during big events that may attract crowds (Hopkins,
2014). Before that technology is developed, we are still vulnerable from
potential attack of UAVs.
Conclusion
As the issues regarding UAVs is increasing every year, the loopholes created
by UAVs regarding public safety, individual privacy and criminal activities
needs to be dealt with by tightening measures as soon as possible. I believe
the most effective ways to control the UAVs technology is from the
manufacturers side. The government can make restrictions on the import of
UAVs according to their air safety measures to control the unintended use of
the UAVs. For example, the current guideline for hobbyist UAVs is to fly below
400 feet; however, there are recent report from the FAA that UAVs are
sighted 9000 feet in the air, flying in the same airspace as commercial jets
(CBS, 2015). If the government only allow UAVs has the ability to fly no
more than 400 feet be imported, then similar case like that will not happen.
Similarity, the government can also work with the manufacture and create
no-fly-zone with the use of Global Positional System (GPS). The DJI

Running head: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need Stricter Control

innovations is already implementing the system of no-fly-zone, to target

usage of UAVs near airport and across borders by GPS (Kakaes, 2015). This
will not stop entirely of the unintended use of UAVs, but will certainly make it
more difficult for reckless operating and criminal activities. Moreover, a clear
regulation on the use of hobbyist, commercial and governmental UAVs must
also be implemented. The development of technology in detecting and
controlling UAVs need to be speed up to keep up to target criminal and
terrorist activities with UAVs. As the use of UAVs are rapidly increasing, the
government need to spend more resources to deal with the related and
foreseeable issues to achieve better control on public safety, individual
privacy and criminal activities.

Running head: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need Stricter Control

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Running head: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles need Stricter Control

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