DJI Unveils Technology To Identify and Track Airborne Drones (suasnews.com) 61
garymortimer shares a report from sUAS News: DJI, the world's leader in civilian drones and aerial imaging technology, has unveiled AeroScope, its new solution to identify and monitor airborne drones with existing technology that can address safety, security and privacy concerns. AeroScope uses the existing communications link between a drone and its remote controller to broadcast identification information such as a registration or serial number, as well as basic telemetry, including location, altitude, speed and direction. Police, security agencies, aviation authorities and other authorized parties can use an AeroScope receiver to monitor, analyze and act on that information. AeroScope has been installed at two international airports since April, and is continuing to test and evaluate its performance in other operational environments. AeroScope works with all current models of DJI drones, which analysts estimate comprise over two-thirds of the global civilian drone market. Since AeroScope transmits on a DJI drone's existing communications link, it does not require new on-board equipment or modifications, or require extra steps or costs to be incurred by drone operators. Other drone manufacturers can easily configure their existing and future drones to transmit identification information in the same way.
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because you failed to use them responsibly.
How do you know that the AC you're responding to failed to use drones responsibly?
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...and this:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2017/10/05/federal-officials-investigate-drone-collision-army-helicopter-collision-near-new-yoeast-staten-islan/736537001/
As far as I know this is the first collision of a RPAS and a manned aircraft with a material evidence.
However, it is a bit suspicious, since the DJI is a Chinese company, which is years ahead of its competitors (including the US ones). I mean there are millions of DJI quads all over the world, and still the collision happened with the US military helicopter. It looks kind of too convenient.
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It was a general you
I know. I was snarkily trying to make the point that the general "you" is not appropriate in that context.
If drone operators did not want this requirement, which is being legally mandated, they had their chance and blew it.
Again, you're talking as if drone operators made no efforts about this stuff -- which is not even remotely true. You can't blame "drone operators" in the general sense. You have to blame the specific drone operators that misbehave.
The market will do its job. (Score:2, Interesting)
Manufacturers of flight controllers and radio systems will invariably provide an opt-out option, because where there's market demand, there's a market player.
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DJI owns the entire ecosystem. You cannot simply replace the DJI controller with some aftermarket one as they are tightly integrated. The only way to opt-out is to not use a DJI drone.
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HobbyKing to the rescue.
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Seems like it would be in their interest to toss a few million into open source projects
That's a few million tax dollars they don't need to spend. DJI drones are not military. The government uses them for non-critical activities, and putting a few million dollars into building special ones just for them would be a complete waste of money.
Disclaimer: I work with (not at) a government agency that uses a lot of DJI drones, and none of them are "most needed" (critical) uses. They're cheap research tools.
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DJI drones are used by the military and other government departments for surveying etc. A few million is a drop in the ocean
I know what they are used for. Non-military operations. They aren't strapping hand grenades on them and taking out gun emplacements, for example.
That "few million" you claim is a "drop in the ocean" would be a large part of the USGS budget, or any other government agency, and it is unlikely any agency would try to get it past the funding sources given the existence of COTS solutions already available.
The main purpose is to make the community gravitate away from proprietary to open source.
The funding for USGS, USACE, etc, is not there to "make a community gravitate", it is to get a job done. "
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That "few million" you claim is a "drop in the ocean" would be a large part of the USGS budget, or any other government agency, and it is unlikely any agency would try to get it past the funding sources given the existence of COTS solutions already available.
It's still a tiny amount of money and the US has the likes of DARPA (budget 3 billion) for handing out grants for things like this. And defeatism is hardly the correct attitude when there is a clearly identifiable problem with an achievable, remedial solution.
The funding for USGS, USACE, etc, is not there to "make a community gravitate", it is to get a job done. "A few million dollars" is a very large expenditure, and it is just not going to happen.
Agencies provide funding for all kinds of projects. Don't be so defeatist. It is clearly in the USA's interest to not use software produced by an adversary and open source is the easiest, most cost effective way they can avoid doing that.
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It's still a tiny amount of money
Not to the agencies that are using the UAS. A few million dollars is a large part of their budget.
And defeatism is hardly the correct attitude
You've never worked with a government agency, I see.
when there is a clearly identifiable problem with an achievable, remedial solution.
Except there is no clearly identifiably problem. The agencies that use DJI, for example, aren't using them for military purposes. If DJI decides to ground their aircraft tomorrow, it's not a huge deal. Nobody dies because they couldn't perform a military support mission. A day's work in the field is delayed. It happens. They buy a different UAS and move on. T
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This is absolute bullshit (Score:4, Insightful)
So DJI is selling a backdoor device to "authorized parties" which can intercept the private telemetry of any of their aircraft. That is some bullshit right there.
So right now it's limited to telemetry downlink packets. How long until they allow these parties to see the video downlink? How long until they let them take over the command and control uplink?
Requiring hobby aircraft to beacon their telemetry in the clear (similar to ADS-B in commercial aviation or APRS in amateur radio) would be a whole other matter.
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Agreed. This is my problem with the whole appliance philosophy. You purchase an "appliance" (smart watch, personal NAS, hobby drone, etc.) based on the advertised capabilities and features at the time-of-purchase. Now the company you bought it from decides to alter the deal (cue the Darth Vader breathing noises). Now, through all but mandatory firmware updates, those features and capabilities are changed and you have extremely limited control on them. Better yet, they abandon the platform to a third pa
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I expect it to happen if drone operators continue to do stupid stuff that interferes with aircraft. I'm sorry, but there are too many stupid people playing with drones to have forced this because they clearly can't regulate themselves. Imagine the outcry when people die because of some stupid drone operator hitting an aircraft at some critical point. They have already caused mid-air collisions and have interfered with emergency responders.
Here's a case that resulted in damage to the helicopter:
https://www.b [bloomberg.com]
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Here's another good article on a study of what sort of damage could be caused to commercial aircraft from hitting drones:
https://news.aviation-safety.n... [aviation-safety.net]
Notably:
Non-birdstrike certified helicopter windscreens have very limited resilience to the impact of a drone, well below normal cruise speeds.
The non-birdstrike certified helicopter windscreen results can also be applied to general aviation aeroplanes which also do not have a birdstrike certification requirement.
Although the birdstrike certified windscreens tested had greater resistance than non-birdstrike certified, they could still be critically damaged at normal cruise speeds.
Helicopter tail rotors are also very vulnerable to the impact of a drone, with modelling showing blade failures from impacts with the smaller drone components tested.
Airliner windscreens are much more resistant, however, the study showed that there is a risk of critical windscreen damage under certain impact conditions:
It was found that critical damage did not occur at high, but realistic impact speeds, with the 1.2 kg class drone components.
However, critical damage did occur to the airliner windscreens at high, but realistic, impact speeds, with the 4 kg class drone components used in this study.
The construction of the drone plays a significant role in the impact of a collision. Notably, the 400 g class drone components, which included exposed metal motors, caused critical failure of the helicopter windscreens at lower speeds than the 1.2 kg class drone components, which had plastic covering over their motors. This is believed to have absorbed some of the shock of the collision, reducing the impact.
The testing and modelling showed that the drone components used can cause significantly more damage than birds of equivalent masses at speeds lower than required to meet birdstrike certification standards.
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So right now it's limited to telemetry downlink packets. How long until they allow these parties to see the video downlink? How long until they let them take over the command and control uplink?
That's entirely dependant on how much parties are willing to pay for access. It's money, it's always money.
Helicopter Wire Strikes (Score:2)
There is the technology to conduct the cables underground, but it is more expensive than hanging wires in the airspace. It is a really serious problem, which concerns medical, military, police, etc. aircraft.
Dealing with this problem requires investing in the research and development, rebuilding infrastructure. It is much easier to make noise about RC model aircraft hobby.
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I'm bemused by the "Don't track me!" posts, as other powered aircraft are indeed tracked to a very comprehensive level.
I'd guess though that ADS-B requires higher power transmissions than you'd want from a small device with minimal onboard power. Not to mention that ADS-B transponders cost more than many DJI drones.
Something that automagically translates from the DJI protocol into ADS-B updates that can be sent to aircraft is however a great idea.
At least DJI recognise the challenge and are seeking to do so
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They're far from the only ones to try to do something, a lot of startups are in that space, vying to be the one the solution that becomes the standard. DJI are pretty much the only one visible because of their size.
GUTMA (https://gutma.org/), of which DJI is a member, is the association trying to coordinate those efforts.
From what I understand, Aeroscope is not part of this GUTMA effort, and just a proprietary solution. They want to be the ones to set the standard that will be mandated (it will happen soone
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"Other drone manufacturers can easily configure their existing and future drones to transmit identification information in the same way." I couldn't find any doc or protocol definition or public API or anything, so that's statement is dubious.
If/when it becomes a requirement, there will be documentation. If DJI patents it, then there will probably be a price to get the documentation, but since DJI is part of a consortium I doubt they will do that without granting free licenses.
It also means that the drone or the base station has an internet connection, which is not a given.
Uhh, no. Transmitting location/identification data in the control stream does not require either end to have internet. It will require having multiple-band receive capability in the monitor, but that's not hard.
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How do you transmit the location to the server without an internet connection?
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If you are talking about some ADS-B beacon to retransmit the data, well, then, the system that picks up the location (AeroStat or whatever it is called) would relay it to the ADS-B transmitter.
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It's mostly Wifi that is used for communication between the GCS and the drones. Again, if you're in a quarry or in the fields, you won't have an open network to connect to.
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Again, if you're in a quarry or in the fields, you won't have an open network to connect to.
You seem to be stuck thinking that broadcasting the UAS location using the control channel requires an "open network" to connect to. Sorry, that's just not a requirement. I've flown these things, and they fly just fine without an "open", or closed even, network. If they're flying, they have a location to transmit back to the controller, and that's what the Aero-thingy is picking up. No network is needed.
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Why not just require all drones to have an ADS-B transmitter on them? The protocol is stupid simple could probably be done in software on the drone's microcontroller and then tack a 1,090 MHz transmitter onto some GPIO pins.
Old avionics guy here. One reason that would make it difficult is that an FAA-standards-compliant ADS-B transmitter would use quite a bit of power (7 watts is minimum ADS-B pulse transmitter output power, so greater than 7 watts) relative to most small drones and add a not-insignificant amount of weight/mass to the drone as well as additional power requirements. I'm not even sure it would be possible to equip the smaller drones with ADS-B Out capability to meet current FAA standards and still have the drone
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Hot air balloonist + antenna guy here.
In the UK, the discussion about requiring tracking of all aircraft has made it as far as the Civil Aviation Authority conducting a public consultation on whether we should all carry transponders. I think this is eventually going to include small UAVs (I reserve "drone" for full-scale aircraft that can bomb people from altitude).
For powered aircraft, aside from the initial cost, this isn't too much of an issue - power and weight aren't massive deal-bre
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An ADS-B transponder is a chunky, heavy (and expensive) unit.
It's not a transponder, it is a transmitter. The information is broadcast at a regular interval, not polled for by the ground station. The 1090ES system does use the existing radar transponder hardware to transmit the signals ("extended squitter"), but the 978UAT uses separate hardware. Yeah, people call it the wrong thing. Big surprise.
The size of the hardware is dropping rapidly, just like the size of GPS receivers has dropped significantly since the creation of that system.
Rather, the issue is the massive amounts of power loss while the signal propagates over the air,
The ADS-B signals lose power
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Seems like an exception for low power use would be easy, something pumping out half a watt to a watt would likely be visible for several miles to make nearby aircraft aware,
According to the document I linked to, intended minimum a/c-to-a/c range is 20 miles. That may sound like a lot, but at jet-aircraft speeds, 20 miles goes by in a few seconds. The other limitation is with other aircraft's antennas & ADS-B receivers being designed around receiving signals from 7-watt and above transmitters.
Suffice it to say there's a significant amount of engineering and research, not to mention FAA rule-making/standards-defining, to be done before it's ready for hobby-drone prime-time.
S
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That may sound like a lot, but at jet-aircraft speeds, 20 miles goes by in a few seconds.
Jet aircraft are limited to 200 knots in the altitudes that a UAV will be flying, at least the DJI model UAV.
The other limitation is with other aircraft's antennas & ADS-B receivers being designed around receiving signals from 7-watt and above transmitters.
Ummm, what? What difference does it make to the antenna if the 7 watt ADSB signal comes from a UAV or a manned aircraft?
Suffice it to say there's a significant amount of engineering and research, not to mention FAA rule-making/standards-defining, to be done before it's ready for hobby-drone prime-time.
The engineering has already been done, and the only rule-making the FAA needs to do is to mandate it for UAV above a certain minimum weight.
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There are more than DJI drones involved if ADS-B is required, and there's little to prevent a UAV operator from sending the UAV as high as it can go, possibly placing it in general airspace. Even at 200 knots with a reduced-power ADS-B drone transmitter and reduced range, that could still present a short time window for an aircraft to react. There is also signal blockage from ground clutter that brings the effective 'si
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There are more than DJI drones involved if ADS-B is required,
The models of drones that are being discussed here ALL fly at much lower altitudes than the flight levels, and at the altitudes they DO fly at, jets are limited to 200 knots.
and there's little to prevent a UAV operator from sending the UAV as high as it can go, possibly placing it in general airspace.
You mean nothing but the 400 foot limit, which I believe DJI, for one, tries to enforce.
Even at 200 knots with a reduced-power ADS-B drone transmitter
Who says it will be "reduced power"? It's well within technical capability to meet the 7 watt minimum.
There is also signal blockage from ground clutter
Not if you are up high enough that the 200 knot speed limit no longer applies.
Ummm, what? What difference does it make to the antenna if the 7 watt ADSB signal comes from a UAV or a manned aircraft?
That statement is in relation to a low-powered ADS-B transmitter for small UAVs unable to reasonably accommodate a standard ADS-B-out package.
A 7 watt package is easily accommodated.
The engineering has already been done, and the only rule-making the FAA needs to do is to mandate it for UAV above a certain minimum weight.
I'm sorry, but as someone with decades of experience in the avionics field, I don't believe that is true.
Decades of avionics experie
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That's the point...there are more drones involved than what are being discussed here that would be affected by such a blanket requirement.
Again, there are more than DJI drones involved here, including home-builts without any restrictions whatsoever except the builder's ability & budget.
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That's the point...there are more drones involved than what are being discussed here that would be affected by such a blanket requirement.
There are, but they aren't the topic of this discussion. And those "other drones" are very much larger, and capable of much larger payloads. They are not going to have an issue with a few ounces for an ADS-B OUT transmitter or the power drain from it.
Again, there are more than DJI drones involved here, including home-builts without any restrictions whatsoever except the builder's ability & budget.
I'm sorry, but there is still the 400 foot flight limit imposed by class of UAS and operator privileges. You claim no restrictions, which is patently absurd.
That 7 watts is transmitter output power, not consumed power. Even with a very efficient final power amplifier, it's going to need at least 10-11 watts or more, and that's for *just* the final transmitter output stage, not including signal generation and driver stages for the final amplifier stage. That's a serious amount of power drain for a small drone and will seriously reduce flight endurance and performance.
I guess you are ignoring all of the electrical budget discussion already posted. In my budget, I assumed
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The battery in my DJI is 4.5AH and lasts about 20 minutes in f
Good! (Score:2)
Needless to say I'm going to draw all sorts of fire from entitled drone owners who think they can do whatever the hel