Posts tagged drones

Visualizing Drone Strikes in Pakistan Out of Site, Out of Mind visualizes every known drone strike in Pakistan since 2004. To date, there have been 3,105 casualties. Of those casualties, 175 were children, 535 civilian, 2,348 “other” (status unknown) and 47 high profile.  The visualization is interactive and lets you mouse over for additional details about each strike. Lower on the page and not shown here is the latest news from establishment and alternative media about drones, policy and their effects. Image: Out of Site, Out of Mind by Pitch Interactive.

Visualizing Drone Strikes in Pakistan

Out of Site, Out of Mind visualizes every known drone strike in Pakistan since 2004. To date, there have been 3,105 casualties.

Of those casualties, 175 were children, 535 civilian, 2,348 “other” (status unknown) and 47 high profile. 

The visualization is interactive and lets you mouse over for additional details about each strike. Lower on the page and not shown here is the latest news from establishment and alternative media about drones, policy and their effects.

Image: Out of Site, Out of Mind by Pitch Interactive.

President Barack Obama, who vastly expanded U.S. drone strikes against terrorism suspects overseas under the cloak of secrecy, is now openly seeking to influence global guidelines for their use as China and other countries pursue their own drone programs

Via Reuters:

“People say what’s going to happen when the Chinese and the Russians get this technology? The president is well aware of those concerns and wants to set the standard for the international community on these tools,” said Tommy Vietor, until earlier this month a White House spokesman.

FJP: Standards.

The Future’s Getting Freaky Via The BBC: It’s been 30 years since the first message was sent over initial nodes of the Arpanet, the Pentagon-sponsored precursor to the internet. But this month, researchers announced something that could be equally historic: the passing of messages between two rat brains, the first step toward what they call the “brain net”. Connecting the brains of two rats through implanted electrodes, scientists at Duke University demonstrated that in response to a visual cue, the trained response of one rat, called an encoder, could be mimicked without a visual cue in a second rat, called the decoder. In other words, the brain of one rat had communicated to the other. “These experiments demonstrated the ability to establish a sophisticated, direct communication linkage between rat brains, and that the decoder brain is working as a pattern-recognition device,” said Miguel Nicolelis, a professor at Duke University School of Medicine. “So basically, we are creating an organic computer that solves a puzzle.” Whether or not the Duke University experiments turn out to be historic (some skepticism has already been raised), the work reflects a growing Pentagon interest in neuroscience for applications that range from such far-off ideas as teleoperation of military devices (think mind-controlled drones), to more near-term and less controversial technology, like prosthetics controlled by the human brain. In fact, like the Arpanet, the experiment on the rat “brain net” was sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa). BBC, Ten extraordinary Pentagon mind experiments. For the rats, see, One rat brain ‘talks’ to another using electronic link. Image: Turning insects into drones with implanted systems, by Darpa, via The BBC.

The Future’s Getting Freaky

Via The BBC:

It’s been 30 years since the first message was sent over initial nodes of the Arpanet, the Pentagon-sponsored precursor to the internet. But this month, researchers announced something that could be equally historic: the passing of messages between two rat brains, the first step toward what they call the “brain net”.

Connecting the brains of two rats through implanted electrodes, scientists at Duke University demonstrated that in response to a visual cue, the trained response of one rat, called an encoder, could be mimicked without a visual cue in a second rat, called the decoder. In other words, the brain of one rat had communicated to the other.

“These experiments demonstrated the ability to establish a sophisticated, direct communication linkage between rat brains, and that the decoder brain is working as a pattern-recognition device,” said Miguel Nicolelis, a professor at Duke University School of Medicine. “So basically, we are creating an organic computer that solves a puzzle.”

Whether or not the Duke University experiments turn out to be historic (some skepticism has already been raised), the work reflects a growing Pentagon interest in neuroscience for applications that range from such far-off ideas as teleoperation of military devices (think mind-controlled drones), to more near-term and less controversial technology, like prosthetics controlled by the human brain. In fact, like the Arpanet, the experiment on the rat “brain net” was sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa).

BBC, Ten extraordinary Pentagon mind experiments.

For the rats, see, One rat brain ‘talks’ to another using electronic link.

Image: Turning insects into drones with implanted systems, by Darpa, via The BBC.

The Mini Drone Via Wired: British troops in Afghanistan are flying a drone that’s shrunk down to its essentials: a micro-machine that spies, built for a solitary user. This is the Black Hornet. Its Norwegian manufacturer, Prox Dynamics, bills it as the world’s smallest military-grade spy drone, with a weight of 16 grams and a length of 4 inches. Propelled by two helicopter blades, the Black Hornet carries little more than a steerable camera that records still and video imagery. (That is: It’s unarmed.) Now British soldiers have brought it to Afghanistan, as it fits in the palms of their hands. It’s supposed to be a drone for an Army of One. “We use it to look for insurgent firing points and check out exposed areas of the ground before crossing, which is a real asset,” Sgt. Christopher Petherbridge of the Brigade Reconnaissance Force told the British Ministry of Defence for a Monday announcement. Image: British Army Sgt. Scott Weaver launches a Black Hornet drone from a compound in Afghanistan. Photo: UK Ministry of Defence, via Wired.

The Mini Drone

Via Wired:

British troops in Afghanistan are flying a drone that’s shrunk down to its essentials: a micro-machine that spies, built for a solitary user.

This is the Black Hornet. Its Norwegian manufacturer, Prox Dynamics, bills it as the world’s smallest military-grade spy drone, with a weight of 16 grams and a length of 4 inches. Propelled by two helicopter blades, the Black Hornet carries little more than a steerable camera that records still and video imagery. (That is: It’s unarmed.) Now British soldiers have brought it to Afghanistan, as it fits in the palms of their hands. It’s supposed to be a drone for an Army of One.

“We use it to look for insurgent firing points and check out exposed areas of the ground before crossing, which is a real asset,” Sgt. Christopher Petherbridge of the Brigade Reconnaissance Force told the British Ministry of Defence for a Monday announcement.

Image: British Army Sgt. Scott Weaver launches a Black Hornet drone from a compound in Afghanistan. Photo: UK Ministry of Defence, via Wired.

Wait, Tolerate or Terminate? The Atlantic with an important explainer to kick off the new year: Over the past two years, the Obama administration has begun to formalize a so-called “disposition matrix” for suspected terrorists abroad: a continuously evolving database that spells out the intelligence on targets and various strategies, including contingencies, for handling them. Although the government has not spelled out the steps involved in deciding how to treat various terrorists, a look at U.S. actions in the past makes evident a rough decision tree. Understanding these procedures is particularly important for one of the most vexing, and potentially most dangerous, categories of terrorists: U.S. citizens. Over the years, U.S. authorities have responded with astonishing variety to American nationals suspected of terrorism, from ignoring their activities to conducting lethal drone strikes. All U.S. terrorists are not created equal. And the U.S. response depends heavily on the role of allies, the degree of threat the suspect poses, and the imminence of that threat — along with other factors. What follows is a flow chart… that takes us through the criteria and decision points that can lead to a suspect terrorist’s being ignored as a minor nuisance, being prosecuted in federal court, being held in a Pakistani prison, or being met with the business end of a Hellfire missile. Image: Screenshot, How Obama Decides Your Fate If He Thinks You’re a Terrorist via The Atlantic. Select to embiggen… But visit to explore.

Wait, Tolerate or Terminate?

The Atlantic with an important explainer to kick off the new year:

Over the past two years, the Obama administration has begun to formalize a so-called “disposition matrix” for suspected terrorists abroad: a continuously evolving database that spells out the intelligence on targets and various strategies, including contingencies, for handling them. Although the government has not spelled out the steps involved in deciding how to treat various terrorists, a look at U.S. actions in the past makes evident a rough decision tree.

Understanding these procedures is particularly important for one of the most vexing, and potentially most dangerous, categories of terrorists: U.S. citizens. Over the years, U.S. authorities have responded with astonishing variety to American nationals suspected of terrorism, from ignoring their activities to conducting lethal drone strikes. All U.S. terrorists are not created equal. And the U.S. response depends heavily on the role of allies, the degree of threat the suspect poses, and the imminence of that threat — along with other factors.

What follows is a flow chart… that takes us through the criteria and decision points that can lead to a suspect terrorist’s being ignored as a minor nuisance, being prosecuted in federal court, being held in a Pakistani prison, or being met with the business end of a Hellfire missile.

Image: Screenshot, How Obama Decides Your Fate If He Thinks You’re a Terrorist via The Atlantic. Select to embiggen… But visit to explore.

TMZ is NOT getting in the DRONE business … we don’t have a drone … we don’t want a drone … we never applied for a drone … despite a bogus report to the contrary.

TMZ is not getting a drone, the gossip site says (the all cap ellipses fetish is theirs).

The news: Last week in an article about the politics of domestic drones, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that TMZ had a applied for a drone permit. TMZ says, not true. 

But, as Slate points out, it’s not farfetched either:

[T]he idea of a news website (gossip-related or otherwise) launching a drone likely won’t sound so crazy. KBIA, an NPR affiliate in Missouri, is currently using a $25,000 grant to lay the groundwork for its own news-gathering drone program, and researchers at the University of Nebraska have likewise been given a $50,000 grant to set up a Drone Journalism Lab, according to the Associated Press. Some people won’t like it, but it’s hard to believe that drones won’t find a role in the journalism of tomorrow.

Interested in ideas behind drone journalism? Ideas from U Nebraska’s Drone Journalism Lab can be found on Tumblr.

Bonus: here’s how a drone is used by a Polish activist to monitor activity between police and protestors in Warsaw.

Dronestagram: The Drone’s Eye View At the FJP, we’re always fascinated by projects that colonize the new booming platforms and go totally native; adapting the story to survive in a new environment.  Dronestagram posts a satellite view to Instagram showing the location of drone strikes before the attack. By focusing on getting the drone story working well on Instagram, the story automatically gets to mobiles, Facebook, twitter and tumblr easily and elegantly. The inventor and publisher, James Bridle, writes he’s “making these locations just a little bit more visible, a little closer. A little more real.” James Bridle’s CV extends way beyond journalism; as well as his column for the UK-based Observer newspaper, he’s presented at TED and SXSW, and his Iraq War Historiography, a twelve volume encyclopedia of changes to politically contentious wikipedia pages about the second gulf war, has been exhibited in galleries in the US, Europe and Asia. The Bureau of Investigative Journalism provides Bridle with details of the strikes across Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia. He then researches across “original media reports, wikipedia, local government and media sites” to get the best location and satellite view. This isn’t the first time creative technologists have tried to tell the drone story in creative ways on digital platforms; back in August we posted about Apple rejecting an iPhone application that showed an alert each time a drone strike was reported. But this one has actually reached the public, and is already growing its audience. There’s more on the project The Verge, and you can follow Dronestagram on twitter, tumblr or Instagram, of course.

Dronestagram: The Drone’s Eye View

At the FJP, we’re always fascinated by projects that colonize the new booming platforms and go totally native; adapting the story to survive in a new environment. 

Dronestagram posts a satellite view to Instagram showing the location of drone strikes before the attack. By focusing on getting the drone story working well on Instagram, the story automatically gets to mobiles, Facebook, twitter and tumblr easily and elegantly.

The inventor and publisher, James Bridle, writes he’s “making these locations just a little bit more visible, a little closer. A little more real.”

James Bridle’s CV extends way beyond journalism; as well as his column for the UK-based Observer newspaper, he’s presented at TED and SXSW, and his Iraq War Historiography, a twelve volume encyclopedia of changes to politically contentious wikipedia pages about the second gulf war, has been exhibited in galleries in the US, Europe and Asia.

The Bureau of Investigative Journalism provides Bridle with details of the strikes across Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia. He then researches across “original media reports, wikipedia, local government and media sites” to get the best location and satellite view.

This isn’t the first time creative technologists have tried to tell the drone story in creative ways on digital platforms; back in August we posted about Apple rejecting an iPhone application that showed an alert each time a drone strike was reported. But this one has actually reached the public, and is already growing its audience.

There’s more on the project The Verge, and you can follow Dronestagram on twitter, tumblr or Instagram, of course.

Apple Rejects App That Tracks U.S. Drone Strikes

It seemed like a simple enough idea for an iPhone app: Send users a pop-up notice whenever a flying robots kills someone in one of America’s many undeclared wars. But Apple keeps blocking the Drones+ program from its App Store — and therefore, from iPhones everywhere. The Cupertino company says the content is “objectionable and crude,” according to Apple’s latest rejection letter.

It’s the third time in a month that Apple has turned Drones+ away, says Josh Begley, the program’s New York-based developer. The company’s reasons for keeping the program out of the App Store keep shifting. First, Apple called the bare-bones application that aggregates news of U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia “not useful.” Then there was an issue with hiding a corporate logo. And now, there’s this crude content problem.

Begley is confused. Drones+ doesn’t present grisly images of corpses left in the aftermath of the strikes. It just tells users when a strike has occurred, going off a publicly available database of strikes compiled by the U.K.’s Bureau of Investigative Journalism, which compiles media accounts of the strikes.

FJP: A short demonstration of how the app works (both text alerts and a map-based visualization) can be seen on Vimeo.

In a recent article at the Columbia Journalism Review, Dan Gillmor reminds us how news organizations’ reliance on technology companies is increasingly problematic. For example, and sticking with Apple:

Governments and businesses are creating choke points inside that emerging ecosystem—points of control where interests unfriendly to journalism can create not just speed bumps on the fabled information highway, but outright barricades…

…Consider Apple. The news industry’s longstanding love affair with what has become the most valuable company on Earth expanded with the death of Steve Jobs. But Apple has a long history of controlling behavior. If you create a journalism app to be sold in the iPhone or iPad marketplace, you explicitly give Apple the right to decide whether your journalism content is acceptable under the company’s vague guidelines. Apple has used this to block material it considers improper, including (until the company came under fire for this) refusing for a time to allow Mark Fiore, who has won a Pulitzer Prize for his cartoons, to sell his own app. Given the dominance Apple now enjoys in the tablet market, journalists should have a Plan B. Apple’s paranoia (not too strong a word) and secretive ways have led it to attack journalism itself. In 2004 the company tried to force several websites to disclose their sources in their Apple coverage; the case was a direct challenge to fundamental business-journalism practices. (Note: I played a small role in that case, filing declarations on behalf of the websites that they were engaged in protected journalism.)

Read through to Gillmor’s article for more about how telecommunications providers, government, and entertainment and technology companies threaten journalism and innovation.

Do Not Kill Registry Gallows humor: In response to the establishment of a national ‘kill list’ and the expansion of the United States’ predator drone program, the National Agency for Ethical Drone-Human Interactions has launched the Do Not Kill Registry. Adding your name to the registry will assist us in avoiding accidental casualties in our mission to make the world a safe place for Democracy and Free Enterprise.  That said, don’t forget the disclaimer:  Adding your name to the ‘Do Not Kill’ Registry does not guarantee that you will not be the target of a drone strike but only that an additional review process will be undertaken before you are labeled an enemy militant and added to the national kill list. 

Do Not Kill Registry

Gallows humor:

In response to the establishment of a national ‘kill list’ and the expansion of the United States’ predator drone program, the National Agency for Ethical Drone-Human Interactions has launched the Do Not Kill Registry. Adding your name to the registry will assist us in avoiding accidental casualties in our mission to make the world a safe place for Democracy and Free Enterprise. 

That said, don’t forget the disclaimer: 

Adding your name to the ‘Do Not Kill’ Registry does not guarantee that you will not be the target of a drone strike but only that an additional review process will be undertaken before you are labeled an enemy militant and added to the national kill list. 

Leaking to the press?! This can’t be tolerated!! Via Cartoon Politics.

Leaking to the press?! This can’t be tolerated!!

Via Cartoon Politics.

Nine Groups File Amicus Briefs to Support ACLU FOIA Request on US Drone Program

The CIA recently rejected an ACLU Freedom of Information Act request for documents that disclose the US government’s guidelines for targeting US citizens and foreign nationals with drone attacks.

In its response to the ACLU request, the CIA wrote that “it can neither confirm nor deny the existence or nonexistence of records responsive to this request without compromising national security concerns.”

Take it away, Glenn Greenwald:

Numerous Obama officials — including the President himself and the CIA Director — have repeatedly boasted in public about this very program. Obama recently hailed the CIA drone program by claiming that “we are very careful in terms of how it’s been applied,” and added that it is “a targeted, focused effort at people who are on a list of active terrorists, who are trying to go in and harm Americans, hit American facilities, American bases and so on.” Obama has told playful jokes about the same drone program. Former CIA Director and current Defense Secretary Leon Panetta also likes to tell cute little jokes about CIA Predator drones, and then proclaimed in December that the drone program has “been very effective at undermining al Qaeda and their ability to plan those kinds of attacks.” Just two weeks ago, Attorney General Eric Holder gave a speech purporting to legally justify these same drone attacks…

… Everyone in the world knows the CIA has a drone program. It is openly discussed everywhere, certainly including the multiple Muslim countries where the drones routinely create piles of corpses, and by top U.S. Government officials themselves.

But then when it comes time to test the accuracy of their public claims by requesting the most basic information about what is done and how execution targets are selected, and when it comes time to ask courts to adjudicate its legality, then suddenly National Security imperatives prevent the government even from confirming or denying the existence of the program: the very same program they’ve been publicly boasting and joking about. As the ACLU’s Jameel Jaffer put it after Obama publicly defended the program: “At this point, the only consequence of pretending that it’s a secret program is that the courts don’t play a role in overseeing it” – that, and ensuring that any facts that contradict these public claims remain concealed.

Nine organization have now filed an Amicus — or friends of the court — brief to support an ACLU appeal against the CIA’s refusal to disclose documents that explain “when, where and against whom drone strikes can be authorized, and how the United States ensures compliance with international laws relating to extrajudicial killing.”

The organizations signing the brief are:

The brief was written by the National Security Clinic at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law.

Hello, Drone Journalism In late November I posted about a Polish activist who built a drone, jerry-rigged it with cameras and filmed police actions against protestors in Warsaw. The hypothetical was how new, and seemingly far-flung technologies might change the face of journalism and citizen reporting. We’re now used to a thousand photos and videos from the street. A bird’s eye view, not so much. But the hypothetical is becoming less so. Over at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s College of Journalism and Mass Communications they’ve launched a lab to study the possibilities and ramifications of “Drone Journalism”. Via the Drone Journalism Lab (they’re posting updates on Tumblr.) In the lab, students and faculty will build drone platforms, use them in the field and research the ethical, legal and regulatory issues involved in using pilotless aircraft to do journalism. Journalists are increasingly faced with two problems: a growing appetite for unique online video in an environment of decreased budgets; and restricted or obstructed access to stories ranging from disaster coverage to Occupy Wall Street protests. The technology behind autonomous and remotely piloted vehicles is rapidly moving from military applications to the point where private citizens can own and operate their own drone. At the same time, high definition and 3D video cameras are getting smaller, cheaper and lighter. Paired with global position devices, they make ideal additions to an airborne platform. In short, drones are an ideal platform for journalism. Interested in more? NPR’s On the Media interviewed Matt Waite, the Lab’s founder, late last week. Image: Test flying ArduCopter Hexa with GoPro camera via DIY Drones.

Hello, Drone Journalism

In late November I posted about a Polish activist who built a drone, jerry-rigged it with cameras and filmed police actions against protestors in Warsaw.

The hypothetical was how new, and seemingly far-flung technologies might change the face of journalism and citizen reporting. We’re now used to a thousand photos and videos from the street. A bird’s eye view, not so much.

But the hypothetical is becoming less so. Over at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s College of Journalism and Mass Communications they’ve launched a lab to study the possibilities and ramifications of “Drone Journalism”.

Via the Drone Journalism Lab (they’re posting updates on Tumblr.)

In the lab, students and faculty will build drone platforms, use them in the field and research the ethical, legal and regulatory issues involved in using pilotless aircraft to do journalism.

Journalists are increasingly faced with two problems: a growing appetite for unique online video in an environment of decreased budgets; and restricted or obstructed access to stories ranging from disaster coverage to Occupy Wall Street protests. The technology behind autonomous and remotely piloted vehicles is rapidly moving from military applications to the point where private citizens can own and operate their own drone. At the same time, high definition and 3D video cameras are getting smaller, cheaper and lighter. Paired with global position devices, they make ideal additions to an airborne platform.

In short, drones are an ideal platform for journalism.

Interested in more? NPR’s On the Media interviewed Matt Waite, the Lab’s founder, late last week.

Image: Test flying ArduCopter Hexa with GoPro camera via DIY Drones.

Who’s Watching Who, Aerial Drone Edition

Via Wired:

In the video above, protesters in Warsaw got a drone’s eye view of a phalanx of police in riot gear during a heated Saturday demonstration. The drone — spotted by Wired editor-in-chief and drone-builder Chris Anderson — was a tiny Polish RoboKopter equipped with a videocamera.

As Chris observes, no more do citizens need to wait for news choppers to get aerial footage of a major event. With drones, they can shoot their own overhead video. But the implications run deeper than that.

The Occupy events around the country gained initial notoriety by filming and uploading incidents of apparent police brutality. Anyone with a cellphone camera and a YouTube account could become a videographer, focusing attention on behavior that cops or banks might not want broadcasted or that the media might not transmit. When the New York Police Department cleared out Zuccotti Park on Tuesday, out came the cellphones to document it.

Getting an aerial view is the next step in compelling DIY citizen video.

On Secrecy, War, Teenagers and Headlines

00 — Last Friday a US drone strike killed US-born Abdulrahman al-Awlaki in Yemen. If the name sounds familiar, it’s because two weeks before a drone strike killed his US-born father. At the time, the US government said that the son was a twenty-something Al Qaeda fighter. A recently released birth certificate shows he was 16. What follows is a back and forth across two articles that focus on the issue, followed by a third, New York Times article that appeared today and calls this relatively new form of warfare a success.

01 — Glenn Greenwald: Two weeks after the U.S. killed American citizen Anwar Awlaki with a drone strike in Yemen — far from any battlefield and with no due process — it did the same to his 16-year-old son, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, ending the teenager’s life on Friday along with his 17-year-old cousin and seven other people.

02 — Amy Davidson: Maybe he was just in the wrong place, like the Yemeni seventeen-year-old who reportedly died, too. Abdulrahman’s family said that he had been at a barbecue, and told the Post that they were speaking to the paper to answer reports said that Abdulrahman was a fighter in his twenties. Looking at his birth certificate, one wonders what those assertions say either about the the quality of the government’s evidence—or the honesty of its claims—and about our own capacity for self-deception. Where does the Obama Administration see the limits of its right to kill an American citizen without a trial?

03 — Glenn Greenwald: It is unknown whether the U.S. targeted the teenager or whether he was merely “collateral damage.” The reason that’s unknown is because the Obama administration refuses to tell us. Said the Post: “The officials would not discuss the attack in any detail, including who the target was.” So here we have yet again one of the most consequential acts a government can take — killing one of its own citizens, in this case a teenage boy — and the government refuses even to talk about what it did, why it did it, what its justification is, what evidence it possesses, or what principles it has embraced in general for such actions. Indeed, it refuses even to admit it did this, since it refuses even to admit that it has a drone program at all and that it is engaged in military action in Yemen. It’s just all shrouded in total secrecy.

04 — The New York Times: Another Victory for a New Approach to War

The death of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi is the latest victory for a new American approach to war: few if any troops on the ground, the heavy use of air power, including drones and, at least in the case of Libya, a reliance on allies…

…[T]he last six months have brought a string of successes. In May, American commandos killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. In August, Tripoli fell, and Colonel Qaddafi fled. In September, an American drone strike killed Anwar al-Awlaki, a top Qaeda operative and propagandist, in Yemen.