Welcome back to Legal Geek. This week, we return to the subject of drones with a look at a new patent filing on a system of catching rogue or unauthorized drones, in a manner safe to those of us on the ground below.
https://archive.org/details/LegalGeekEp63
We discussed drones a couple months ago when FAA regulations were about to be increased because these unmanned aerial vehicles are becoming one of the most popular tech toys as well as potentially a big commercial success story for companies like Amazon, etc. Of course, one of the biggest concerns with drones is the unwanted invasion of your property and the associated privacy law concerns with having drones all over the place.
A Michigan Technological University professor and his students have now taken a new stab at solving such rogue drone problems. The professor has released a video on YouTube entitled Robotic Falconry - Drone Catcher System showing a prototype drone catching system in use. This drone catching system is also the subject of a patent application recently filed by the university, although that patent application has not yet been published for public review.
Although I highly recommend looking up the YouTube video by searching for Robotic Falconry, the general operation is simple. A security drone approaches a rogue or unauthorized drone and fires a net at the unauthorized drone to incapacitate the rogue. This net remains tethered to the security drone, so that the rogue drone is captured but does not fall to the ground. The security drone can then land in a secure location, allowing for the disablement and removal of unauthorized drones from an area without jeopardizing safety of humans, animals, or property below the air space, which would be a problem with force-landing or shooting down unauthorized drones.
Much like the new registration requirements from the FAA, these types of innovations are highly important to address the most pressing concerns associated with the rise of drones. Furthermore, anything that encourages incapacitation without destruction and the associated net losses is a good engineering step to avoid drains on society's overall resources.
It will be interesting to see what the legalities will become regarding defense of personal property and airspace with drone catching devices such as this. Property owners already cannot stop commercial airplanes from traveling through the air space well above houses and buildings, according to a 1946 Supreme Court decision entitled United States v. Causby. That decision limited a property owner's actual rights, which were previously everything from the depths to the heavens, to everything under the land and the air space within a minimum safe altitude, which was deemed to be about 500 to 1000 feet in the air. Anything higher than that is public domain air space. However, an update to the property rights rules in the Causby decision could now be merited by drone-on-drone combat brought on by innovations such as Robotic Falconry.
The Bottom Line is, the law often takes a long time to catch up to innovation, which could be bad for companies like Amazon, which want to rely more on drones but obviously don't want to risk losing drones and parcels to devices such as this. But it's an interesting legal question to watch for further development as innovation and popularity continue in this drone field.
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