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The next worst case scenario is autonomous drones, that do not require radio or gps inputs. Navigation can be done with crude inertial navigation systems and ad

The next worst case scenario is autonomous drones, that do not require radio or gps inputs. Navigation can be done with crude inertial navigation systems and advancing AI can identify and fly to targets with increasing accuracy. Causing general chaos or exploding in crowds will not require AI though. The only counter measure against those will then be an EMP system, Blinding lights to disable cameras, etc. The next evolution for public speakers or gatherings would probably be completely online.

sudosysgen 6y ago
SLAM is already functional for drone navigation, more or less. As for blinding lights, that can be fixed by using many different sensors and wavelengths, as well as high-quality optics and imaging sensors with high flare resistance and high dynamic range. As for EMPs, a drone that isn't remote controlled could feasibly be put in a Faraday cage. I'd make a prototype, but I don't really want to contribute to future assassinations. There just aren't any good countermeasures, I'm afraid. I'd imagine fully online works well but even that is seriously limited.
- kumarvvr 6y ago
  Well, that scary to hear.
  - sudosysgen 6y ago
    It really is. I came to this realization on the way back from a robotics competition, I was editing pictures I took with my new camera. I was reading articles about improvements we could make to SLAM, and editing pictures I took on the trip. When I realized that I had so much dynamic range that was able to completely remove haze and flaring from incredibly bright objects very close with a very middling lens, and combining that with the very impressive results in optical SLAM, it certainly gave me pause. Since then I've done quite a bit of research on this and I haven't been able to find any kind of usable countermeasure. Hanging out on photographers forums, there's people who have been able to edit out details by substracting up to seven stops, with current consumer tech and optics, and improvements are coming every few months. Canon just demonstrated a sensor with 20 stops of dynamic range. Coupled with IR sensors, far UV sensors, and different wavelength filters to filter out lasers, there's really not much that can be done anymore. Except for kinetic or directed energy approaches, but they are incredibly expensive and incredibly vulnerable to saturation.
    - kumarvvr 6y ago
      You cannot have active measures against an intelligent swarm of drones. If drones are wired to explode in case of landing or power failure, active measures cannot be taken when the drones are over crowded areas or near high profile targets. The alternative would be to destroy them from far away areas. And that is really really hard. I guess we have to come up with special guns and ammunition that can create a wall of destruction for drones.
      - Spooky23 6y ago
        Of course you can. There’s always an escalation to beat the latest weapon. There’s a myriad of possibility. Flak guns, modified chaff, glue, directed energy, hunter killer drones, etc.
        onion2k 6y ago
        kumarvvr's point was that you[1] have to consider the collateral damage of shooting down drones. If you make an enemy drone crash there's a possibility that it could crash in to a school or a hospital. That would be bad. [1] The person defending something, not you. Your comment makes it clear you believe in defence at any cost.
        Spooky23 6y ago
        When you need to defend, it's too late. If you're at a point where you need to take specific action in defense of a drone, you are already have crossed the rubicon where you are in conflict, and the outcome of that action may include harm to others. Any other constraints around the application of violence is wishful thinking at best -- there are too many variables in these scenarios. The obvious solution that will happen is heavier licensure requirements and criminalization of unlicensed operation. You'll have toys and professional devices, and there will be a presumption that a drone is bad unless proven otherwise.
      - sudosysgen 6y ago
        Good point.
- mdorazio 6y ago
  There are plenty of countermeasures, but they're all active countermeasures - ex. a couple guys with shotguns, trained falcons, or your own anti-drone drones.
  - sudosysgen 6y ago
    Yes, but kinetic countermeasures scale really badly. The definition of "drone" is also quite flexible here, a couple guys with shotguns, falcons, or your own anti-drones work fine against a few slow drones, badly against a few dozen slow flying drones, not at all against a few hundred slow flying drones, are essentially useless against one jet-powered drone (microjet engines are very cheap!) don't have a hope against a dozen fast flying drones, and are non-existent to a few hundred fast flying drones. You'd pay around 2500$ for a 60lbf jet engine, and around 3000$ tops for the rest of the drone. That's around 5500-6000$, so for a hundred drones you'd pay 600 000$, or about 60% of the cost to train one soldier, and around one 0.8 millionths of the yearly US defence expenditure. For 100 drones. That means with the US defence budget you could make 120 000 000 such drones. Sure, against the current crop of electric consumer drones, it's not much of an issue. But there's the tech to make a 500km/h drone that's fully autonomous and encased in a Faraday cage for less than 10 000$ a piece. That scares the crap out of me.
    - kumarvvr 6y ago
      For a state backed terrorist organization, the cost of drones could be even lower. Mass production and very low complexity of engineering will make it easy and cheap to produce drones. Add to that, the cost of failure and innovation is also very less, consequently, the use of drones will increase exponentially. Just imagine what destruction a terrorist can create if he can launch a 100 drones, from miles away, to attack a filled stadium.
      - visarga 6y ago
        This drone craze is all because we have better batteries today. They should have thought of that when they invented such dangerous tech. /s (Law of unintended consequences)
ashtonkem 6y ago
You forgot one: shotguns. The most reliable means to take out a drone might be some good old fashioned birdshot.
- dvdkhlng 6y ago
  And what about good old water cannons? I can't imagine how the drone's rotor would be able to generate predictable lift when hit by a lot of water.
  - sudosysgen 6y ago
    Water cannons have a very limited range. Not good for saturation attacks.
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    Water canons would work too, but only for fixed positions. Shotguns are pretty light, and can do double duty against more common threats simply by swapping out the ammunition from birdshot to buckshot.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
meheleventyone 6y ago
Netting seems like the cheap, reasonable option.

sudosysgen 6y ago

SLAM is already functional for drone navigation, more or less. As for blinding lights, that can be fixed by using many different sensors and wavelengths, as well as high-quality optics and imaging sensors with high flare resistance and high dynamic range. As for EMPs, a drone that isn't remote controlled could feasibly be put in a Faraday cage. I'd make a prototype, but I don't really want to contribute to future assassinations. There just aren't any good countermeasures, I'm afraid. I'd imagine fully online works well but even that is seriously limited.

kumarvvr 6y ago
Well, that scary to hear.
- sudosysgen 6y ago
  It really is. I came to this realization on the way back from a robotics competition, I was editing pictures I took with my new camera. I was reading articles about improvements we could make to SLAM, and editing pictures I took on the trip. When I realized that I had so much dynamic range that was able to completely remove haze and flaring from incredibly bright objects very close with a very middling lens, and combining that with the very impressive results in optical SLAM, it certainly gave me pause. Since then I've done quite a bit of research on this and I haven't been able to find any kind of usable countermeasure. Hanging out on photographers forums, there's people who have been able to edit out details by substracting up to seven stops, with current consumer tech and optics, and improvements are coming every few months. Canon just demonstrated a sensor with 20 stops of dynamic range. Coupled with IR sensors, far UV sensors, and different wavelength filters to filter out lasers, there's really not much that can be done anymore. Except for kinetic or directed energy approaches, but they are incredibly expensive and incredibly vulnerable to saturation.
  - kumarvvr 6y ago
    You cannot have active measures against an intelligent swarm of drones. If drones are wired to explode in case of landing or power failure, active measures cannot be taken when the drones are over crowded areas or near high profile targets. The alternative would be to destroy them from far away areas. And that is really really hard. I guess we have to come up with special guns and ammunition that can create a wall of destruction for drones.
    - Spooky23 6y ago
      Of course you can. There’s always an escalation to beat the latest weapon. There’s a myriad of possibility. Flak guns, modified chaff, glue, directed energy, hunter killer drones, etc.
      - onion2k 6y ago
        kumarvvr's point was that you[1] have to consider the collateral damage of shooting down drones. If you make an enemy drone crash there's a possibility that it could crash in to a school or a hospital. That would be bad. [1] The person defending something, not you. Your comment makes it clear you believe in defence at any cost.
        Spooky23 6y ago
        When you need to defend, it's too late. If you're at a point where you need to take specific action in defense of a drone, you are already have crossed the rubicon where you are in conflict, and the outcome of that action may include harm to others. Any other constraints around the application of violence is wishful thinking at best -- there are too many variables in these scenarios. The obvious solution that will happen is heavier licensure requirements and criminalization of unlicensed operation. You'll have toys and professional devices, and there will be a presumption that a drone is bad unless proven otherwise.
    - sudosysgen 6y ago
      Good point.
mdorazio 6y ago
There are plenty of countermeasures, but they're all active countermeasures - ex. a couple guys with shotguns, trained falcons, or your own anti-drone drones.
- sudosysgen 6y ago
  Yes, but kinetic countermeasures scale really badly. The definition of "drone" is also quite flexible here, a couple guys with shotguns, falcons, or your own anti-drones work fine against a few slow drones, badly against a few dozen slow flying drones, not at all against a few hundred slow flying drones, are essentially useless against one jet-powered drone (microjet engines are very cheap!) don't have a hope against a dozen fast flying drones, and are non-existent to a few hundred fast flying drones. You'd pay around 2500$ for a 60lbf jet engine, and around 3000$ tops for the rest of the drone. That's around 5500-6000$, so for a hundred drones you'd pay 600 000$, or about 60% of the cost to train one soldier, and around one 0.8 millionths of the yearly US defence expenditure. For 100 drones. That means with the US defence budget you could make 120 000 000 such drones. Sure, against the current crop of electric consumer drones, it's not much of an issue. But there's the tech to make a 500km/h drone that's fully autonomous and encased in a Faraday cage for less than 10 000$ a piece. That scares the crap out of me.
  - kumarvvr 6y ago
    For a state backed terrorist organization, the cost of drones could be even lower. Mass production and very low complexity of engineering will make it easy and cheap to produce drones. Add to that, the cost of failure and innovation is also very less, consequently, the use of drones will increase exponentially. Just imagine what destruction a terrorist can create if he can launch a 100 drones, from miles away, to attack a filled stadium.
    - visarga 6y ago
      This drone craze is all because we have better batteries today. They should have thought of that when they invented such dangerous tech. /s (Law of unintended consequences)

ashtonkem 6y ago

You forgot one: shotguns. The most reliable means to take out a drone might be some good old fashioned birdshot.

dvdkhlng 6y ago
And what about good old water cannons? I can't imagine how the drone's rotor would be able to generate predictable lift when hit by a lot of water.
- sudosysgen 6y ago
  Water cannons have a very limited range. Not good for saturation attacks.
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  Water canons would work too, but only for fixed positions. Shotguns are pretty light, and can do double duty against more common threats simply by swapping out the ammunition from birdshot to buckshot.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

meheleventyone 6y ago

Netting seems like the cheap, reasonable option.