Unmanned Aircrafts Are Being Developed to Monitor Civilians

British police is developing the "invisible surveillance" program and in the coming year cities will be monitored by the use of unmanned aerial vehicles. They will patrol over the city in 6 km altitude and will record violations of law.
The company "BAE Systems", by the orders of police, is developing such aircrafts; they are already called as a "revolutionary" crime preventing technique. (Source newspaper "The Guardian")

Unlike in Afghanistan and other countries, the use of military unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs, Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) is for purposes like destruction of intelligence and target acquisition, the UAVs for police will be purely for civilian uses.

These aircrafts, which are invisible from land, will be able to simultaneously carry many different purposes and surveillance tasks like: monitor serious traffic offenses, control the activities of protesters and monitor anti-social behavior of urban streets, "catch" agricultural technology thieves, vandalism, etc.

The first UAV prototype, filled with high-definition video cameras and other monitoring equipment kits, will rise up the air this year.

It is reported that BAE Systems' machines will be able to rise and descend themselves, patrol in the air up to 15 hours. These UAVs will be programmed to perform specific police operations for example: automatically withdraw from the patrol route, if it detects suspicious activity on earth, or, at the same time, meet the different intelligence tasks. High-definition video cameras, radar and infrared sensors will be used in such aircrafts.

These UAVs will also monitor the shipping of the country's coasts and the Channel, trying to detect the illegal immigrants entering France. It is reported that the aircrafts will be used for automatic search and rescue operations. British police expect that a national monitoring program by UAVs will be fully launched in 2012 during the London Olympic Games.

One could argue that such type of military-style spy drones will be violating the privacy rights of civilian people. Such type of invisible surveillance brings us one step closer to fully automated law enforcement which can be achieved in the near future.

Here is the video showing one of the possible prototypes of UAV.

Source:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/jan/23/cctv-sky-police-plan-drones?CMP=AFCYAH