Drones For Them But Not For Us?

WASHINGTON – U.S. drone rules are in danger of creating a world in which corporate and government forces seize the technology for themselves and block the public from accessing the technology, according to a new American Civil Liberties Union report out today. Journalists and the public are increasingly using drones to monitor government abuses, including the Trump administration’s efforts to go after immigrants, protestors, and people recording ICE abuses, and this attempt to force transparency has not gone unnoticed by the administration. As the paper details, there has been a marked increase in the Trump administration’s attempts to control what the public does or doesn’t see via drone, with numerous reports of immigration agencies using drones to record people in the streets, while trying to simultaneously block communities from using the technology to monitor the government’s actions. “The Trump administration’s attempts to censor videos and discredit news reporting on its lawless deportation campaign shows the serious consequences of a government that thinks it gets to watch us, but not allow the people to watch the government. That is exactly backwards,” said Jay Stanley, senior policy analyst with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy and Technology Project. “From mapping ICE raids to recording police behavior and photographing abuses, drones are a powerful tool to hold government agencies, law enforcement officials, and big corporations accountable. It’s vital that lawmakers act now to ensure this technology can be used to empower the people, not just further enrich the people in power.” The ACLU examines five areas where drones are starting to tilt power away from the people and the press, including: over-broad security measures; expensive import bans; a removal of local democratic control over how drones are used; the technology’s use for surveillance and intimidation; and the failure to give the public visibility into who is operating drones they see over their homes and communities. It also explains how the Trump administration’s actions are part of a much wider trend within the drone world to make regulatory decisions that give government and corporate interests the privilege to be an eye in the sky. The general consumer might not be thinking about the technology and how access to it impacts our rights, but corporations, law enforcement, and government agencies are highly focused on what this technology can do for them, and are already pressing members of Congress and regulators to build a world that suits them best. To stymie this expanding civil liberties problem, the ACLU also lays out recommendations for policymakers, including: Ensuring that federal government authorities to ban and interdict drones are narrowly defined, include checks and balances against misuse, and offer due process for drone operators who are targeted, while also granting localities wide authority to ban and limit drone flights within their jurisdictions. Enacting privacy rules that apply to commercial drone operators while ensuring that all regulations comport with the First Amendment. Creating an infrastructure that gives members of the public on the ground the ability to identify the operator of any government or corporate drones flying overhead as well as access to information about the operators’ activities and privacy policies. As the paper notes, “Drones can watch us — sometimes closely enough to see the pores on our skin — and we should be able to watch them back.”