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Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story from Bruce Schneier's blog:
Do not fall for the “hype” - anti-drone technology is very much a joke currently.
I’ve done a walk through on why RF jammers are at best more of a last resort than crossing your fingers when you do not have advanced intel.
First of a lot of drones when they loose control go into a “short path flight” back towards what they think is their “start point”. It takes no great brains to realise that if you change the real start point co-ordinates for the attack point co-ordinates you know where the drone is going to try and land at…
Secondly you can only jam a frequency successfully in two ways,
1, Know the actual frequency
2, Put kilowatts of power up.Radio receivers work on “energy in a bandwidth” to control RC aircraft back in the 1970’s you could use as little as 1kHz bandwidth at the upper end of the HF band. That technology still works today.
Now if you need to jam from 1MHz to more than 6GHz to jam you would effectively need more than 6,000,000,000/1,000, more than 6 million times the power at the drone mid point with respect to the operator who could without much difficulty push 100watts into an antenna that makes it directional and more like 1kW is being used.
What most of these “drone-jamers [sic]” do is work on “known control frequencies” that it is “assumed” an attacker will use.
Changing the frequency to be well out of any likely band is not that difficult…
Slightly less easy is changing the way the data is transmitted from the operator to the drone. One trick the jammer designers rely on is recognising the data format being used and try[sic] to get a jamming margin by faking the control data rather than jam it.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 10 2021, @03:17AM (12 children)
> Put kilowatts of power up.
wut
What would it take to jam the mobile phone network, or the GPS system? Only a couple of watts. And those are links with FEC/Forward Error Correction, which I'd /assume/ Drone control would have some of as well.
Even if 'killawatts' were needed, it'd only need to be kW of *EIRP* (Effective Isotropic Radiated Power-- just Google it or become a Ham) ... so 100W into a 20dB gain Yagi antenna directed at the target is just that.
(janrinok is getting as bad as martyb for posting bait...)
(Score: 5, Informative) by janrinok on Wednesday November 10 2021, @05:48AM (6 children)
I am fully aware of EIRP - the whole point of this site is to generate discussion, not to simply be spoon fed with stories. I was employed for a considerable period of time as an electronic warfare specialist.
While your comment is valid - it does not address the issue being discussed. It is now trivial to produce an effective drone weapon using a relatively small amount of explosive. If in doubt then read the full story link which explains a recent attack on a political figure. There have also been reports of drones being flown in places where they pose a risk to general aviation. While some of these reports have been discredited others have been verified and are accurate. In none of these cases, where military counter drone technology has been employed, were any drones prevented from operating.
To counter an unknown drone operating on an unknown frequency would require barrage jamming of some description covering all possible usable frequencies. The article itself quotes 1Mhz to 6Ghz as a figure to work with as an example - nothing more. That is how the extremely high powers were calculated in the blog. Directional antennae are fine if you know which direction to point them in. Without them, the jamming itself would result in disruption at least locally of lots of other radio transmissions thus making its use of extremely limited practicality. There is nothing to suggest that a user would limit himself to a legally authorised frequency - as far as I am aware the ITU has not allocated any specific frequency or frequency bands for terrorist use [wikipedia.org]. GPS would remove the need for any RF control in some cases.
The various methods which would be practical to defeat drones which use RF as a control link are all countered by other suggestions on how they can be easily overcome. Most require that the defending forces have prior knowledge of an enemy drone being used and having some measure of information regarding the controlling data itself - something that they will probably not have for the type of attack described in this article. This is simply another example of measure/counter-measure/counter-counter-measure that is seen in any EW problem.
This piece was chosen under the 'Random' topic - it is there for the community to make of it what they will. It does not claim to be an authoritative document on the topic. You more than many in our community, with your specific technical knowledge, could have made a more positive contribution to the discussion. However, you chose to blame me as the editor for quoting the article chosen for discussion. If you care to check, information in blockquotes is ALWAYS quoted directly from the published link. The editor is specifically required to quote articles accurately and he or she is not to add any personal bias or express any opinions within the edited source unless such additions are necessary and clearly marked as the editor's own views. This is something that we very rarely do in practice, and is usually only to clarify a point being made in the quoted source.
Adding personal bias to a story is a major reason that many submissions are rejected.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Wednesday November 10 2021, @06:57AM (4 children)
Are there laser links that are practical for longish range drone control, provided clear line of sight?
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 4, Interesting) by janrinok on Wednesday November 10 2021, @12:18PM (3 children)
I do not have any current knowledge of the practicality of using lasers in this way, but I would think it too difficult to achieve by anyone without a significant degree of investment and technical expertise.
Using a laser would imply that the laser would have to be pointing directly at a moving drone, and the drone itself would have to avoid any sudden change of direction in any of 3 dimensions if communication is to be maintained. (It could manoeuvre directly towards or away from the source of the laser beam but this is not a realistic option). The requirement to accurately track the drone and the equipment required to do this in real time would leave the operator extremely vulnerable to detection and counter-attack. Therefore this is not a trivial problem to solve although it is theoretically possible. It would also mean an increase in weight of the drone (thus potentially reducing its payload) and the loss of manoeuvrability would reduce the drones ability to survive in a hostile environment.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by pTamok on Wednesday November 10 2021, @08:11PM (2 children)
If jamming lasers were easy, I suspect the Vietnamese would have done it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser-guided_bomb [wikipedia.org]
So LOS with a laser illuminator will allow a drone to home in.
If you think GPS is reliable (and there are good reasons not to when dealing with high value targets), then JDAM (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Direct_Attack_Munition) works; and you can combine the two (as used in Iraq: https://defense-update.com/20070827_laserguidedjdamdebutsiniraq.html) [defense-update.com]
Add the ability to frequency hop and/or spread spectrum and/or add a pseudo-random signature to a signal, preventing an illuminator from working is hard. The illuminator can, of course, be a different drone.
Defending against drones operated by anyone with a modicum of resources and intelligence is hard. Very hard.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Wednesday November 10 2021, @11:48PM (1 child)
I don't think the OP was asking about using laser as a target designator (which is certainly beyond the capabilities of general terrorists) but rather as a method of communicating with the drone itself which is what I was replying to, perhaps mistakenly.
For guidance purposes for the final stages against an identifiable target then I would think that a standard camera would be far easier to employ as the technology for this is readily available.
(Score: 1) by pTamok on Thursday November 11 2021, @12:09AM
I wouldn't be confident in saying laser illuminators are beyond the capabilities of (general) terrorists.
That said, using optical communication with a drone shouldn't be difficult. Laser radiation has several features: collimation, coherence, narrow spectrum. You don't need to follow a drone with a laser-pointer spot (difficult), but decollimating the laser slightly gives you a fairly wide 'cone' you can point in the general direction of the drone to be picked up by the right detector.
If you think about aircraft lights (which are not lasers), they are easy to pick up at night from long distances away. The narrow spectrum of lasers allows a detector to pick up an emitter easily, and LED lasers can be turned on and off at very high bit rates.
https://www.osapublishing.org/oe/fulltext.cfm?uri=oe-20-9-9919&id=231999 [osapublishing.org]
Some interesting engineering is required, but laser control of a drone is well within a graduate electronic engineers competence. Luckily, few people of malevolent intent are graduate electronic engineers.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Frigatebird on Wednesday November 10 2021, @08:04PM
According to janrinok's sig, it is always his fault.
(Score: 4, Informative) by sjames on Wednesday November 10 2021, @08:02AM (4 children)
IF you are sure of what fairly narrow bands need to be jammed, yes. If you are trying to jam 500KHz through 5 or 10 Ghz, you'll need a lot more power.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 10 2021, @06:11PM (3 children)
You don't need a whole lot of energy if you want to jam it with a Louisville Slugger.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 11 2021, @12:59AM
A Louisville Slugger weighs more than a kilogram, which E=MC^2 reveals to be approximately a hydrogen bomb.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 11 2021, @04:24PM
That was my first thought. If there's a drone bearing explosives within 1 meter of me, my best option is to smack it with a baseball bat.
P.S. Wile E. Coyote would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Thursday November 11 2021, @05:25PM
If you want to jam a terrorist drone. raspberry is a good choice.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Frosty Piss on Wednesday November 10 2021, @03:30AM (3 children)
“Hi! I’m not really an expert in drones, or radio controlled anything, but I play one on Soylent News.
Thinks, bro.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday November 10 2021, @09:42AM (2 children)
So do I, and I can tell you as an expert that it's sharks carrying lasers, not drones carrying explosives, that we should be worrying about.
(Score: 2) by inertnet on Wednesday November 10 2021, @10:38AM (1 child)
I'm an expert in band names and I think "Drone Jam" beats "Drones Carrying Explosives".
(Score: 2) by driverless on Wednesday November 10 2021, @11:01AM
Ever since Congratulations On Your Decision To Become A Pilot [discogs.com] I think there's not much further you can go in the way of band names.
(Score: 4, Informative) by bmimatt on Wednesday November 10 2021, @05:06AM (3 children)
No, I didn't RTFA, but I've read the summary.
"Drones Carrying Explosives" has nothing to do with the summary, which would better be titled with something like: "Jamming drones is harder than you think", or even "It's not that easy to jam a drone".
Not as fear inducing as the summary really is, methinks.
Does everything need to induce fear to be 'interesting' these days?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 10 2021, @05:12AM
Tell that to Bruce Schneier.
Actually, the summary is comments on Schneier's snippet.
(Score: 2) by Barenflimski on Wednesday November 10 2021, @05:27AM
That is a rhetorical question, right?
(Score: 5, Informative) by janrinok on Wednesday November 10 2021, @06:02AM
The article that this title comes from is the very reason for Bruce Schneier's blog story, and is taken from his blog discussion. It was an attack on a political figure using a drone carrying explosives.
He isn't concerned with drones being a nuisance in public places, or any of the pointless controls that some governments have chosen to enforce upon the use of hobbyist drones.
(Score: 2) by Barenflimski on Wednesday November 10 2021, @05:25AM
Energy weapons baby! Lets take that 1kw and put it into a directional microwave. Fry the drone first and the operator after that. If that doesn't work, get out your 1kw x-ray gun and finish them off. If they're still moving, blind them with a 1kw lazer. You'll melt their retina's with that baby.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by legont on Wednesday November 10 2021, @06:37AM (4 children)
For a very long time throughout our history military offense was way more expensive than defense. The usual ratio of solders killed was 10/1. Pure monetary expenses were similar. It made the world safer as it was a hard decision to attack.
It appears that with new technologies offense is actually way cheaper than defense. A Chinese supersonic missile can't get to a US aircraft carrier. However it's 10-20 times cheaper than defensive response per missile so China can easily win here by sending hundreds of them. A cheap drone can attack a good defense perimeter, it seems. A scrip kid can attack a sophisticated network.
This makes the whole world less stable; very much less stable. We need new ideas.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by mhajicek on Wednesday November 10 2021, @07:03AM (1 child)
Fermi paradox hurdle: as technology advances, it becomes easier and easier for smaller groups and individuals to kill more and more people.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 10 2021, @10:14PM
It makes a good example for us all of how little effort would be required to disrupt or seriously impact the world with a biowarfare agent produced through either gain of function breeding, or CRISPR based modifications to viral payloads until you get one that works. If released in a large enough region in a fashion that wouldn't be easy to discover (pressurized aerosol canister in a garbage can in a busy location, or a dumpster near a high traffic area) suddenly you have a major pandemic running whose origin might not be dicernable from a naturally occurring infection.
As stated, the offensive methods are becoming easier and easier with each new technological leap, while the defensive methods are harder and harder to defend again. There is a reason NBC are the three big anti-war weapons people protested against. All three are easy to produce with access to the right technology. In nation state hands they are easy to mass produce, putting the entire world at stake, and in smaller groups hand they are all methods capable of causing grievous harm to other societies, without necessarily leaving a direct trace of who was responsible should those individuals not wish to take credit.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by janrinok on Wednesday November 10 2021, @12:28PM
You make a very good point. It is also true that many more people outside of our own community have also reached the same conclusion and, while defences are being improved, they are often if not always behind the offensive advances. Nobody could sell a defensive system for a threat that does not yet exist.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday November 11 2021, @03:00AM
That's incorrect. The poorly armed, incompetent defender has always been way more expensive than the well armed, competent attacker - because they lose wars. There are endless examples of this in action.
The problem is the weakness of the defensive response and the centralization of the asset being protected not some property of the supersonic missile.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday November 10 2021, @02:51PM (6 children)
I often wonder why folks don't realize that drones needn't necessarily fly. They can also swim, hop, roll, slither, or possibly even brachiate. That significantly expands attack vectors. If you could, much like a rat could, swim up through a sewer pipe and emerge from a toilet, wouldn't practically any facility be vulnerable?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 10 2021, @04:24PM
Part of the attraction for terror wrists is that a regular quadcopter is COTS hardware.
The US and Israeli militaries will be the ones using the exotic drones. They might even be able to afford antimatter to use as the bomb.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Mockingbird on Wednesday November 10 2021, @09:50PM
I see what you did, there. On the facility.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 10 2021, @10:46PM
Those other avenues can all exist, but are less likely to be created by hobbyists as there aren't pre-built kits they can just go buy and assemble. On the other hand, it's now trivial to get flying drones off the shelf, reprogram some software, add a payload, and away you go.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by coolgopher on Thursday November 11 2021, @12:22AM
Thank you for introducing me to the word brachiate. Somehow it had escaped me until now.
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Thursday November 11 2021, @01:55AM (1 child)
Especially if one lives in someplace like New York City where the sewer system connects to every drain in the city. If you live in the country and your drains are connected to a septic system with a leach field on one's own property, then if you wanted to send a bomb via the toilet you might have to get past your target's dogs first.
"It is easier to fool someone than it is to convince them that they have been fooled" Mark Twain
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday November 11 2021, @03:02AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 11 2021, @04:03PM (1 child)
plant more trees. worked for the vietcong.
maybe, in the future, we'll need personal shields (dune, asimoves foundation) or for important people, suicide bodyguard drones: a swarm of drones that "suicide" into anything approaching (teh bomb drone) from wrong direction at to great a speed.
as for radio jamming, best not to talk about it ... more junk adding to junk.
(Score: 1) by pTamok on Friday November 12 2021, @09:55AM
To follow your Science Fiction references, suicide drones: Iain M. Banks: Culture novels: knife missiles (In Use of Weapons the drone Skaffen-Amtiskaw carried 3 internally)