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Add: - Get hacked - Kill under order

cm2187 10y ago
I am actually surprised that we haven't seen assassinations by drones yet (I mean non USAF drones). Consumer drones can't carry a big payload, but I'd guess they can carry enough explosive to kill someone. And even someone super protected like a US president would be helpless facing 5 drones travelling at 50km/h coming his way. I guess most terrorists are dumb and all recent attacks in the west have shown to be low tech, but I'd rather not count on that to protect us. But in the US it's fine, since the drones have to carry a license number. That will protect us!
- cornchips 10y ago
  "drones don't kill people, people kill people" - AUVSI, in the future
  - cm2187 10y ago
    I am not arguing that drones should be banned. But I'm just surprised it hasn't happened already.
    - Leon 10y ago
      I think you are right; and what you're saying reminds me of a story from Malcolm Gladwell about the 1981 Traveller Trillion Credit Squadron tournament [1] that Doug Lenat won. He used some type of genetic algorithm (he never released his source) to find that swarming the challenger with many small boats would dominate as a tactic. Miniature swarms, which drones are cheap enough and more than capable for, are not a tactic that people are use to. I fear that a swarm could be terrible in its destruction if used to hurt people, individually targeted or for mass harm. [1] http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/05/11/how-david-beats-goliath#/9 http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/05/11/how-david-beats...
      - deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
      - CamperBob2 10y ago
        Same idea as Gen. Paul Van Riper's strategy in the Millennium Challenge war games ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002 ). He spammed the enemy with cheap speedboats and motorcycles, forcing the organizers to rewrite the rules to make the game "fair."
        cm2187 10y ago
        I guess a cloud of drones can probably be shot down with some sort of EMP. It's unclear to me how to ensure the EMP is powerful enough to go through the shields of the drone without damaging the systems of the warship it protects.
        deleted_soon 10y ago
        Both of these articles are fascinating - underdogs with clearly superior strategies dominate, and rather than learning from that, the powers that be just change the rules to prove themselves right. How shortsighted
- CamperBob2 10y ago
  Agreed, and I can't imagine why you were modded down. It's certainly true that most terrorists are complete dumbasses, but not all of them are. In this case, the scenario includes technology that can carry out asymmetric warfare without placing the bad guy in any personal peril, allowing fanatics other than the suicidal variety to play the game. I don't think there's much that can (or necessarily should) be done to mitigate the risk, but I'm sure that efforts will be made soon enough.
- sukilot 10y ago
  Disney film crews, can take down drones, Secret Service can too.
  - cm2187 10y ago
    Ha ha. The Secret Service is not nearly as vicious as Disney film crews...

I am actually surprised that we haven't seen assassinations by drones yet (I mean non USAF drones). Consumer drones can't carry a big payload, but I'd guess they can carry enough explosive to kill someone. And even someone super protected like a US president would be helpless facing 5 drones travelling at 50km/h coming his way. I guess most terrorists are dumb and all recent attacks in the west have shown to be low tech, but I'd rather not count on that to protect us. But in the US it's fine, since the drones have to carry a license number. That will protect us!

cornchips 10y ago
"drones don't kill people, people kill people" - AUVSI, in the future
- cm2187 10y ago
  I am not arguing that drones should be banned. But I'm just surprised it hasn't happened already.
  - Leon 10y ago
    I think you are right; and what you're saying reminds me of a story from Malcolm Gladwell about the 1981 Traveller Trillion Credit Squadron tournament [1] that Doug Lenat won. He used some type of genetic algorithm (he never released his source) to find that swarming the challenger with many small boats would dominate as a tactic. Miniature swarms, which drones are cheap enough and more than capable for, are not a tactic that people are use to. I fear that a swarm could be terrible in its destruction if used to hurt people, individually targeted or for mass harm. [1] http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/05/11/how-david-beats-goliath#/9 http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/05/11/how-david-beats...
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
    - CamperBob2 10y ago
      Same idea as Gen. Paul Van Riper's strategy in the Millennium Challenge war games ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002 ). He spammed the enemy with cheap speedboats and motorcycles, forcing the organizers to rewrite the rules to make the game "fair."
      - cm2187 10y ago
        I guess a cloud of drones can probably be shot down with some sort of EMP. It's unclear to me how to ensure the EMP is powerful enough to go through the shields of the drone without damaging the systems of the warship it protects.
      - deleted_soon 10y ago
        Both of these articles are fascinating - underdogs with clearly superior strategies dominate, and rather than learning from that, the powers that be just change the rules to prove themselves right. How shortsighted
CamperBob2 10y ago
Agreed, and I can't imagine why you were modded down. It's certainly true that most terrorists are complete dumbasses, but not all of them are. In this case, the scenario includes technology that can carry out asymmetric warfare without placing the bad guy in any personal peril, allowing fanatics other than the suicidal variety to play the game. I don't think there's much that can (or necessarily should) be done to mitigate the risk, but I'm sure that efforts will be made soon enough.
sukilot 10y ago
Disney film crews, can take down drones, Secret Service can too.
- cm2187 10y ago
  Ha ha. The Secret Service is not nearly as vicious as Disney film crews...