Non-visible lasers pose a much bigger hazard than visible. Intense visible light triggers an involuntary defence called the blink reflex whereby we blink before

Non-visible lasers pose a much bigger hazard than visible. Intense visible light triggers an involuntary defence called the blink reflex whereby we blink before the retina absorbs enough energy to get damaged. Lasers outside the visible range don't trigger the blink reflex and can destroy the retina before you know what happened. Lidar operates at relatively low power and relies on very sensitive detection in a very narrow wavelength range to identify reflections.