Police report rapid rise in drone crime

8th August 2016

Joe Bush

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It seems that for every ‘good news story’ on the use of UAVs, or drones, there is another involving more sinister uses for their capabilities. Only last week Electronic Specifier reported that Amazon had begun trialling its delivery drone service where customers could potentially make an order and have it delivered to their door, by drone, within 30 minutes.

However, in other news, the Independent has today published the results of an investigation into the huge rise in drone crime. Police forces are reporting a four-fold increase in the number of reports involving commercially available drones over the past year. A total of 94 UAV incidents were reported to the police in 2014. This increased to over 400 in 2015 with more reports predicted this year.

The crimes involve burglars spying on potential target properties, smuggling contraband into prisons, voyeurism and even paedophiles using drones to fly over children’s playgrounds. In one incident a man in Northern Ireland was arrested last year after he was found to be using a drone to film a cashpoint where members of the public were inputting their PIN numbers.

Some commercially available drones are capable of transferring images to a smartphone or tablet, and others include night vision functions. Therefore the rise in unscrupulous drone usage has led to a greater awareness of privacy concerns and suspicion of the machines, and as such the police have also reported a number of instances where drone usage has resulted in confrontations and fights between members of the public.

According to police figures, safety is by far the most pressing concern when the public have reported drone use, while other reports cited anti-social behaviour, drugs, burglary, protests, sexual offences and the involvement of minors.

With fairly lacklustre safeguards around UAV use, and with the current lack of accountability or deterrence, experts have called for an increase in regulation and even a Drone Bill to increase education around drone usage.

The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has drawn up specific rules that drone pilots must follow. These include:

The drone should be visible at all times and be flown no further than 500m away from the pilot.
The drone should not be flown higher than 400ft (122m) – some drones are capable at flying at 10,000ft which make them a threat to aircraft flying in and out of airports.
The drone should never fly within 50m of people, vehicles and buildings.
The drone is forbidden to fly within 150m of gatherings larger than 1,000 people.
Using drones for professional purposes requires CAA permission and a licence granted after completing a training programme.