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Last winter, as an FBI hostage rescue team took up an elevated position to assess an unfolding crisis, agents heard the buzz of small drones approaching.
Soon, the tiny unmanned aircraft had the team surrounded, swooping past in a series of "high-speed low passes at the agents in the observation post to flush them," Joe Mazel, head of the agency's operational technology law unit, told attendees of the AUVSI Xponential conference in Denver on Wednesday. The swarm caused the group to lose situational awareness of the target.
"We were then blind," Mazel said, according to a Defense One account of the session at the conference focusing on unmanned technologies. "It definitely presented some challenges."
Also at https://www.theverge.com/2018/5/4/17318080/criminals-drones-swarm-fbi-raid
(Score: 3, Touché) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday May 06 2018, @12:42AM (7 children)
When one can deliver explosives with a drone instead of a suicide vest!
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Snotnose on Sunday May 06 2018, @12:58AM (3 children)
So you get 1-2 lbs of explosives on a drone. Best case you get a hand grenade. Worst case a homemade explosive with nails surrounding it. Either way it's got a relatively small radius of damage. Works nicely if you're in a crowd like a TSA line with soft targets. Works poorly if you're in a crowd of deployed SWAT teams.
Lets see, a $1000 drone with a hard to get explosive with a 10 yard radius, or a $500 car packed with boom-stuff with a 100 yard radius. Granted, it's a bitch to get the car to be controllable via your phone. On the other hand, it's easy to park the car somewhere, make a minor issue, and blow the car when the first responders show up.
Dear TLAs here in the good ol' land of the free: fuck it, knock on my door, search my house, have 20 agents kill 5 hours only to find out the worst thing I have is something in the fridge evolving to sentience. Just don't hurt my cat.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Sunday May 06 2018, @03:28AM (1 child)
It may be easier to get the drone to its intended destination. They are harder to spot, make less noise, and can't be defeated by some of the concrete barriers and spikes that can stop cars. Maybe some special software could be used to fly it very close to the ground or walls to make it harder for standing humans to notice.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by hemocyanin on Sunday May 06 2018, @04:25AM
Most terrorism doesn't go for a specific target so some fragile Rube Goldberged drone is barely a threat compared to that posed by vans and semis jumping a curb.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Knowledge Troll on Sunday May 06 2018, @03:16PM
This is a rather damn good idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlO2gcs1YvM#t=55s [youtube.com]
(Score: 3, Touché) by linkdude64 on Sunday May 06 2018, @09:15AM (1 child)
I thought martyrdom was part of the appeal?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 08 2018, @09:17AM
They are just suicidal brainwashed idiots looking for an easy way to end the pain or inflict misery on others. Ignore them.
(Score: 2) by Hyper on Tuesday May 08 2018, @02:56AM
Next time they will pack net launchers just for this eventuality