Drones & UAVs – Page 3 – Public Intelligence Blog

UN Experts Meeting on Humanitarian UAVs

The Humanitarian UAV Network (UAViators) and the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) are co-organizing the first ever “Experts Meeting on Humanitarian UAVs” next month at UN Headquarters in New York. This full-day strategy meeting, which is co-sponsored by the ICT for Peace Foundation (ICT4Peace) and QCRI, will bring together leading UAV experts (including several members of the UAV Network’s Advisory Board, such as DJI) with seasoned humanitarian professionals from OCHA, WFP, UNICEF, UNHCR, UNDAC, IOM, American Red Cross, European Commission and several other groups that are also starting to use civilian UAVs or have a strong interest in leveraging this technology.

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2014/07/182014/07/15

Patrick Meier: Crowdsourced Crisis Map of UAV/Aerial Videos for Disaster Response

Crowd-Sourcing, Drones & UAVs, Geospatial

Crowdsourced Crisis Map of UAV/Aerial Videos for Disaster Response

The first version of the Humanitarian UAV Network's Crisis Map of UAV/aerial videos is now live on the Network's website. The crowdsourced map features dozens of aerial videos of recent disasters. Like social media, this new medium—user-generated (aerial) content—can be used by humanitarian organizations to complement their damage assessments and thus improve situational awareness.

The purpose of this Humanitarian UAV Network (UAViators) map is not only to provide humanitarian organizations and disaster-affected communities with an online repository of aerial information on disaster damage to augment their situational awareness; this crisis map also serves to raise awareness on how to safely & responsibly use small UAVs for rapid damage assessments. This explains why users who upload new content to the map must confirm that they have read the UAViator‘s Code of Conduct. They also have to confirm that the videos conform to the Network's mission and that they do not violate privacy or copyrights. In sum, the map seeks to crowdsource both aerial footage and critical thinking for the responsible use of UAVs in humanitarian settings.

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2014/07/102014/07/09

Patrick Meier: Using UAVs for Community Mapping & Disaster Risk Reduction — The Haiti Example

Crowd-Sourcing, Culture, Drones & UAVs, Geospatial, Governance

Using UAVs for Community Mapping and Disaster Risk Reduction in Haiti

“What if, to solve our problems, we simply need to rise above them?” CartONG and France’s OpenStreetMap (OSM) community recently teamed up to support OSM Haiti’s disaster risk reduction efforts by deploying a small UAV, “which proved very useful for participatory mapping.” The video documentary below provides an excellent summary of this humanitarian UAV mission which took place just a few weeks ago.

As I noted in this earlier blog post on grassroots UAVs, the use of UAVs at the community level can be viewed as an extension of community and participatory mapping, which is why community engagement is pivotal for humanitarian UAV deployments. In many ways, a micro-UAV can actually bring a community together; can catalyze conversations & participation, which should be taken as more than simply a positive externality. Public Participatory GIS Projects (PPGIS) have long been used as a means to catalyze community conversations and even conflict resolution and mediation. So one should not overlook the positive uses of UAVs as a way to convene a community. Indeed, as CartONG and partners rightly note in the above video documentary, “The UAV is the uniting tool that brings the community together.”

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2014/06/292014/06/29

Berto Jongman: Drone Report — No Thinking, Too Much Secrecy, War Without End …

Drones & UAVs

Use of Drones for Killings Risks a War Without End, Panel Concludes in Report

Mark Mazzetti

New York Times, 26 June 2014

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration’s embrace of targeted killings using armed drones risks putting the United States on a “slippery slope” into perpetual war and sets a dangerous precedent for lethal operations that other countries might adopt in the future, according to a report by a bipartisan panel that includes several former senior intelligence and military officials.

The group found that more than a decade into the era of armed drones, the American government has yet to carry out a thorough analysis of whether the costs of routine secret killing operations outweigh the benefits. The report urges the administration to conduct such an analysis and to give a public accounting of both militants and civilians killed in drone strikes.

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2014/06/252014/06/25

Patrick Meier: Comprehensive List of UAVs for Humanitarian Response

Drones & UAVs

Comprehensive List of UAVs for Humanitarian Response

Posted on June 24, 2014 | Leave a comment

The Humanitarian UAV Network (UAViators) is carrying out a comprehensive evaluation of UAVs and related technologies for use in humanitarian settings. We’ve developed an evaluation framework for this assessment and have now drafted this list of UAV models to determine which are worth evaluating. As you’ll note, the link also points to three other related lists: cameras, sensors and software for image processing and analysis. We’ll be evaluating these as well to identify which are the best fit for use by humanitarians in the field.

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2014/06/112014/06/10

Owl: Micro Drones for Assassination – A New Equalizer Between 1% and 99%?

Drones & UAVs

The New Equalizer – A Genuine Game Changer: Kamikaze Assassination Micro Drones

The revolver was the great equalizer of the 19th and 20th centuries between individuals unequal in power or size, and perhaps, in the light of John Robb's writings, guns of various kinds have been a great equalizer between guerilla fighters and much larger state forces. But what will be the great equalizer between the pubic and increasingly tyrannical states inflicting their police and military forces on the much weaker public? I believe this new analysis gives the answer: Kamikaze assassination micro drones.

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2014/06/052014/06/04

Patrick Meier: Learning from Conservation UAV Campaigns — with Comment on 21st Century Neighborhood Watch, Alternative ISR, Citizen Intelligence

Advanced Cyber/IO, Drones & UAVs

What Humanitarians Can Learn from Conservation UAVs

I recently joined my fellow National Geographic Emergency Explorer colleague Shah Selbe on his first expedition of SoarOcean, which seeks to leverage low-cost UAVs for Ocean protection. Why did I participate in an expedition that seemingly had nothing to do with humanitarian response? Because the conservation space is well ahead of the humanitarian sector when it comes to using UAVs. To this end, we have a lot to learn from colleagues like Shah and others outside our field. The video below explains this further & provides a great overview of SoarOcean.

Video, post, other links.

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