Technology
Hundreds of thousands of drones are estimated to become gifts for American consumers this holiday season -- something the Federal Aviation Administration (F.A.A.) has anticipated for months. Despite its lax rules in the past on "hobbyist drones," or drones owned by the general user for recreational purposes, the rise in owner- and user-ship over the next few months has spurred a task force to work on figuring out registration requirements for drones, otherwise dubbed Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS).
Compiled by F.A.A. administrator Michael Huerta and Department of Transportation (D.O.T.) Secretary Anthony Foxx, the UAS Registration Task Force released its recommendations to the F.A.A. on Tuesday “on registration requirements and process for small UAS, including those used for commercial purposes, and all model aircraft.” The F.A.A. says that the members of the task force are comprised of those in the industry with a “range of stakeholder viewpoints, interests and knowledge of the objectives and scope.” The group had a deadline of late November to submit its recommendations so as to provide enough time for implementation around the holiday season.
The entire report details the initial goals and intentions of the task force, but, in short, the suggestions for registration seem to be well within the reasonable scope for a general non-commercial drone user. The task force recommends that users fill out an electronic registration form through the web or application; immediately receive an electronic certificate of registration and a “personal universal registration number for use on all sUAS owned by that person;” and mark the registration number on all drones before operation in the National Airspace System (N.A.S.).
Most consumer drones will likely have to be registered per a recommendation that all drones weighing over 250 grams (0.55 pounds) and less than 55 pounds follow the aforementioned requirements. Some of the other suggestions include: anyone who owns a drone within that frame of weight will have to register as a pilot; registration should be free; and pilots must be at least 13 years old.
Of course the worry here with a potential 400,000 to 1 million drones sold over the holidays in the U.S. -- according to varying consumer reports -- is the danger UAS pose to aircraft and state/federal secured areas. And these issues are not confined to the U.S. In June, a Lufthansa jet nearly collided with a drone as it approached Warsaw’s main airport. The examples of drone interference with aircraft have forced the F.A.A. to take stock of the growing prevalence of the devices, and mark growing regulatory worries over how the government will manage the internet of things.
As Jean Camp, Director of the Security Informatics Program at Indiana University Bloomington pointed out at the Blouin Creative Leadership Summit in September, the internet of things will act on our environment as opposed to users acting on computers, as we have been used to in the past. While drones are not in the same category of devices as, say, FitBit bracelets, they are still new actors in the web of internet-connected devices that present new interference, new possibilities such as for the retail industry, and new vulnerabilities.
