{"id":16222,"date":"2013-01-16T07:38:56","date_gmt":"2013-01-16T12:38:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theredphoenixapl.org\/?p=16222"},"modified":"2013-01-16T07:38:56","modified_gmt":"2013-01-16T12:38:56","slug":"laws-urged-to-curb-snooping-by-drones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/2013\/01\/laws-urged-to-curb-snooping-by-drones\/","title":{"rendered":"Laws urged to curb snooping by drones"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"border-patrol-drones\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Privacy safeguards not keeping up with eye-in-sky technology, critics say<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Big Brother and Big Business may soon be able to easily spy on American citizens using surveillance drones, security and civil liberties specialists warned Tuesday.<\/span><\/p>\n

As technology inches closer to that of science fiction, U.S. law has failed to keep up with those advances, they said, claiming that Fourth Amendment and other personal privacy protections are no longer enough to shield citizens from the unseen eye of drones, which will become commonplace sooner than most Americans realize.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe current state of the law is inadequate to address the threat \u2026 as drone technology becomes cheaper, the threat to privacy will become more substantial,\u201d said\u00a0Amie Stepanovich<\/span><\/a><\/span>, a lawyer with the\u00a0Electronic Privacy Information Center<\/span><\/a><\/span>, which Tuesday held a\u00a0National Press Club<\/span><\/a><\/span>\u00a0forum to discuss drones and their present and future effects on privacy and civil liberties.<\/span><\/p>\n

Also called unmanned aerial vehicles, drones currently are used only by the military and law enforcement agencies. They are set to become available for personal and commercial use as early as September 2015, raising new questions and concerns.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cDrones operated by private entities open new doors to spying, harassment and stalking,\u201d\u00a0Ms. Stepanovich<\/span><\/a><\/span>\u00a0said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Congress\u00a0continues to work on legislation to govern the use of drones both by police and other public agencies and eventually by the general public. Such laws, constitutional specialists argue, must be implemented soon to address looming problems before they occur.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a natural space for\u00a0Congress\u00a0to step in and say that we have a new technology, and we\u2019re worried about its privacy implications. Ultimately, we don\u2019t have to accept new technologies and let them go and see how they work. We can try and regulate the privacy implications at the outset,\u201d said\u00a0Orin Kerr<\/span><\/a><\/span>, a professor of law at George Washington\u00a0University Law School<\/span><\/a><\/span>, at Tuesday\u2019s event.<\/span><\/p>\n

Several members of\u00a0Congress\u00a0continue to try to tackle the daunting issue. Thus far, however, no sweeping drone laws have been passed, with the exception of last year\u2019s Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization act.<\/span><\/p>\n

That measure dealt only with the safety aspects of drone integration into U.S. airspace and set a detailed schedule for that to take place. It did not address privacy concerns, though the FAA has committed to addressing those concerns before moving ahead with its drone integration timetable.<\/span><\/p>\n

Meantime, lawmakers could clear up any confusion and set clear parameters for what drones can and cannot do, though it remains to be seen whether that will happen.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s my opinion that\u00a0Congress\u00a0should take the lead on this issue, rather than wait for [violation of privacy] cases to occur and those cases end up in different courts throughout the country,\u201d said Rep. Ted Poe, Texas Republican, who is leading the fight to enact strict privacy guidelines for drones.<\/span><\/p>\n

For its part, the unmanned vehicle industry also has said that privacy protections are necessary. Last year, the sector\u2019s leading trade group, the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI), passed a \u201ccode of conduct\u201d detailing what drone operators should and should not do when it comes to taking photos, video or otherwise collecting data and tracking citizens.<\/span><\/p>\n

The group also points to the technological advances and economic benefits associated with drones.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe technology has already demonstrated its value,\u201d said Gretchen West, AUVSI\u2019s executive vice president, at Tuesday\u2019s forum. \u201cExpansion of this technology will help drive economic growth across the country.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Source<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Privacy safeguards not keeping up with eye-in-sky technology, critics say Big Brother and Big Business may soon be able to easily spy on American citizens..<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":38202,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[166,97],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","category-us-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/redphoenix.news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/border-patrol-drones.jpg?fit=514%2C366&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}