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posted by martyb on Monday February 13 2017, @01:49PM   Printer-friendly
from the drones-with-shotguns dept.

This year, the world saw a long-theorized weapon in action: a commercial drone, like a person might find at Best Buy, dropping a bomb on a target in Iraq. These drone bombers, used by the ultra-violent quasi-state ISIS in Iraq and Syria, are the flashiest combination of modern technologies with the modern battlefield. Cheap, camera-carrying robots, put to nefarious ends by a group that could never otherwise dream of fielding an air force. Dropping grenades isn't the deadliest thing an insurgent group can do with a small flying robot, but it leads to a very important question: What, exactly, is the answer to such a drone?

[...] Here is just a short sample of the more out-there anti-drone tools: net guns, drones carrying nets, squads of drones with nets, drones with net guns, and a smart anti-drone bazooka that fires, you guessed it, a net at a drone (we liked that last one). There was a vaporware drone concept that ensnared the propellers of other drones with wire. A Russian firm floated the concept of a microwave gun, to fry the electronics of hostile drones. And most famously, there are the Dutch police eagles, trained to snag a drone from the sky.

Part of the problem for law enforcement, the Pentagon, and other entities trying to protect against drones is that they're cheap. Workable quadcopters cost as little as a couple hundred dollars. Is there a way to knock drones out of the sky that's just as cheap as the drone itself?

Source

http://www.popsci.com/how-to-stop-a-drone


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  • (Score: 2) by donkeyhotay on Monday February 13 2017, @04:33PM

    by donkeyhotay (2540) on Monday February 13 2017, @04:33PM (#466642)

    That's what I was thinking; ECM. Commercial drones use known frequencies and have to be controlled remotely by radio signal. Jam the signal, and whoever is controlling it can't get to their target. Now, if you're talking about drones that are programmed to fly to a specific GPS coordinate to bomb a fixed target, there is only so much you can do. But in modern warfare, there are not many fixed targets.

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  • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday February 13 2017, @07:07PM

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Monday February 13 2017, @07:07PM (#466708) Journal

    A target may only need to be a fixed target for, say, 15 minutes.

    My non-expert non-military opinion is that it is likely in modern warfare that plenty of targets are not moving for short periods of time. It may only take 15 minutes or less for a bad guy to send a drone to your location once your position is known. No remote control needed. Call it a "ballistic drone". The good news is that the drone might also be able to return to it's sender. Or park somewhere and later signal for retrieval.

    --
    People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
    • (Score: 2) by donkeyhotay on Thursday February 16 2017, @10:00PM

      by donkeyhotay (2540) on Thursday February 16 2017, @10:00PM (#467982)

      The guy launching the drone would have to work fast, be close, and be willing to possibly expose himself, but yes, that is definitely a possibility. Things move fast in modern warfare, but not that fast. It is perfectly conceivable for a unit to be in the same place for 15 minutes (and usually even longer, I daresay).

      For decades, ground forces have relied on air support and artillery support. Aircraft, for example, loiter overhead for hours waiting to be called in, if needed. Drones sort of become a poor man's air support. It's cheap; it's portable; it might even be reasonably effective.