As much as I like drones, the sheer number of them buzzing in the sky has quickly put them on par with houseflies which means they are annoying and potentially dangerous. And that’s not to mention the intrusion of privacy to both everyday folks (not just celebrities, btw) and companies alike. With these new threats looming, they resulted in the creation of a whole new business opportunity: anti-drone technology and the anti-aircraft-like surveillance system you see here, called SkyDroner, is one of the many popping up in the market.
Conceived by Singapore-based TeleRadio Engineering, SkyDroner is a purpose-built surveillance system designed to detect rogue drones and removing them from the sky in a non-destructive way. When an intruding drone is detected, SkyDroner can take control of it (read: hijack) and force it to land, but really, that’s not new. In fact, quite a few companies have been doing it already and with more mobile and handier devices. What really makes SkyDroner stands out is, it can force land the target drone to a specific coordinate where a cage awaits to contain it, preventing the perpetrator from relaunching it again.
Now, one may be asking, “since drone usage is so prevalent and the technology available to take them down is available, what’s stopping the government from taking intruding drones out of the sky?” Well, here’s the thing: according to a report, some countries view the taking over of another drone, “even for defensive purposes,” as an act of hacking and therefore, highly illegal. So, yeah, it is a grey area which, if you ask me, is nothing but loads of bulls. No shit. Surely, those countries are not going wait till their head of states get struck by ill-intent drones before they decide that bringing down rogue drones are not unethical? Geez.
Anyways, lucky for companies like TeleRadio, there are still many countries who aren’t white knights. In the same report, TeleRadio has disclosed that they are “in discussions and testing its device with governments in Asia and the Middle East as demand for anti-drone systems increases.” Yeah, the market is there, alright. Scale it down to fit-for-home size and I am sure celebrities will gladly snap them to keep high-tech paparazzi out of their lives.
Source and image via CNBC.
