7 ms·

Wow, they got there before Amazon.

jamessb 12y ago
This is not the first instance of drones being used for smuggling - previously, a fixed-wing drone carrying cigarettes across the Russia-Lithuania border was intercepted in May 2014: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/russians-capture-cigarette-smuggling-drone/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/russians-capture-... (Plus the April 2014 US case mentioned in the parent article)
jonathantm 12y ago
Not quite the same thing. But that does give me an idea. Order drugs locally via website, have them delivered via drone... like an express and localized Silk Road...?
- Sanddancer 12y ago
  Drones are too expensive for local deliveries. The current method of dropping it in a street corner mailbox works rather well for packages up to 8 ounces, which covers pretty much anything you'd be selling over a website.
- deeviant 12y ago
  Yep, that sounds about right. Between bitcoin, an anonymous brokerage such as silk road, and drone delivery, the dealers would be pretty hard to track down.
  - pavel_lishin 12y ago
    I think it would be easier to track them than current Silk Road/whatever dealers. You don't need a physical address to ship drugs out, but you definitely need a physical location from which you're launching drones - and unless you're throwing in a free drone with every delivery, you need to recover them after the delivery is completed.
    - CamperBob2 12y ago
      Launch/recover it from a van, parked at a random location each time. Seems simple enough.
      - pavel_lishin 12y ago
        Until the police follow your returning drone back to your van, jotting down the license plate numbers, and/or pulling you over later.
        CamperBob2 12y ago
        Good luck following it across Lake Washington.
        deleted 12y ago
        [deleted]
    - logfromblammo 12y ago
      I think you overestimate the difficulty of setting up dead drop locations. Were I in a law-scoffing mood, I would first set up hidden cameras in several prepared locations and let them record for a while. After reviewing the footage for unusual traffic, I would place the UAV at one such site by hand. After I left, it would fly to a second site, drop payload, and proceed to a third for later recovery. If I really took it seriously, I would have several pre-programmed abort procedures, and a sachet of thermite powder with an electrically-triggered magnesium igniter affixed to the control electronics. You don't actually need to recover the drone if your margins are high enough, but you do absolutely need to ensure that it doesn't end up intact in the wrong hands. I might try to design a UAV with a largely disposable, mostly-printable airframe and an ejectable/destructable control module.
      - pavel_lishin 12y ago
        I think you underestimate the consequences of getting caught! Your plans are reasonably valid at first - you still need to deliver the drugs to the launch location, but that's a current problem with deliveries anyway. However, that third location is going to be the problem - if your authorities were really in a mood to capture you, they could track the drone back to your recovery site, and either wait for you to show up, or set up a camera to get you collecting the drone on tape. Note that they could use a drone of their own for this, too, and theirs can fly higher and probably have a better camera, so you'd have to be pretty diligent to make sure you aren't 'followed'. And if you're attaching remotely-controlled explosive/incendiary devices onto your drone, then your risk factors have just gone up by a degree I can't even begin to estimate. I think a capacitor that would short out the electronics and memory would be enough, as long as you're careful about not getting any fingerprints or DNA samples on there. This is fun to think about, though! I suppose that if I were to do this, I'd have my drone go somewhere with only one aerial entrance that I'm surveilling, to make sure no other drone/person follows it in (e.g., train/subway tunnel, storm drain, etc) that has many different entrances/exits that I could use to recover the drone - if there are enough of these, I could go in and recover my drone before the police could reasonably place each one under surveillance/show up in person. But there's surely not an infinite supply of these even in a big city.

This is not the first instance of drones being used for smuggling - previously, a fixed-wing drone carrying cigarettes across the Russia-Lithuania border was intercepted in May 2014: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/russians-capture-cigarette-smuggling-drone/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/russians-capture-... (Plus the April 2014 US case mentioned in the parent article)

jonathantm 12y ago

Not quite the same thing. But that does give me an idea. Order drugs locally via website, have them delivered via drone... like an express and localized Silk Road...?

Sanddancer 12y ago
Drones are too expensive for local deliveries. The current method of dropping it in a street corner mailbox works rather well for packages up to 8 ounces, which covers pretty much anything you'd be selling over a website.
deeviant 12y ago
Yep, that sounds about right. Between bitcoin, an anonymous brokerage such as silk road, and drone delivery, the dealers would be pretty hard to track down.
- pavel_lishin 12y ago
  I think it would be easier to track them than current Silk Road/whatever dealers. You don't need a physical address to ship drugs out, but you definitely need a physical location from which you're launching drones - and unless you're throwing in a free drone with every delivery, you need to recover them after the delivery is completed.
  - CamperBob2 12y ago
    Launch/recover it from a van, parked at a random location each time. Seems simple enough.
    - pavel_lishin 12y ago
      Until the police follow your returning drone back to your van, jotting down the license plate numbers, and/or pulling you over later.
      - CamperBob2 12y ago
        Good luck following it across Lake Washington.
        deleted 12y ago
        [deleted]
  - logfromblammo 12y ago
    I think you overestimate the difficulty of setting up dead drop locations. Were I in a law-scoffing mood, I would first set up hidden cameras in several prepared locations and let them record for a while. After reviewing the footage for unusual traffic, I would place the UAV at one such site by hand. After I left, it would fly to a second site, drop payload, and proceed to a third for later recovery. If I really took it seriously, I would have several pre-programmed abort procedures, and a sachet of thermite powder with an electrically-triggered magnesium igniter affixed to the control electronics. You don't actually need to recover the drone if your margins are high enough, but you do absolutely need to ensure that it doesn't end up intact in the wrong hands. I might try to design a UAV with a largely disposable, mostly-printable airframe and an ejectable/destructable control module.
    - pavel_lishin 12y ago
      I think you underestimate the consequences of getting caught! Your plans are reasonably valid at first - you still need to deliver the drugs to the launch location, but that's a current problem with deliveries anyway. However, that third location is going to be the problem - if your authorities were really in a mood to capture you, they could track the drone back to your recovery site, and either wait for you to show up, or set up a camera to get you collecting the drone on tape. Note that they could use a drone of their own for this, too, and theirs can fly higher and probably have a better camera, so you'd have to be pretty diligent to make sure you aren't 'followed'. And if you're attaching remotely-controlled explosive/incendiary devices onto your drone, then your risk factors have just gone up by a degree I can't even begin to estimate. I think a capacitor that would short out the electronics and memory would be enough, as long as you're careful about not getting any fingerprints or DNA samples on there. This is fun to think about, though! I suppose that if I were to do this, I'd have my drone go somewhere with only one aerial entrance that I'm surveilling, to make sure no other drone/person follows it in (e.g., train/subway tunnel, storm drain, etc) that has many different entrances/exits that I could use to recover the drone - if there are enough of these, I could go in and recover my drone before the police could reasonably place each one under surveillance/show up in person. But there's surely not an infinite supply of these even in a big city.