TeflonTrout :bc: he/him on Nostr: Hey! You folks wanna know some cool things about aerial surveillance? First: "The ...
Hey! You folks wanna know some cool things about aerial surveillance?
First: "The fuck does Teflon know about this?" LOTS. I spent all 3 of my deployments watching live aerial feeds as part of my duties in an aerial operations center in charge of helicopter teams, reviewing footage and writing reports. Drones, blimps, helos, I've seen thousands of hours of the stuff. I also love drones, and fly one frequently.
Let's talk first about capabilities- what CAN you see from the sky? Well, there's two main camera types, infrared (FLIR) and standard. Their strengths and weaknesses balance each other out nearly perfectly.
Airborne video cameras can be good enough to have a decent chance to identify an individual person without being close enough for that person to hear. The caveat is that lenses this good are too heavy for normal quadcopter type drones- we're talking big boys here, full on aircraft-manned or otherwise.
Birds like this also usually have FLIR, and there's no hiding from that for long without using some specific techniques I'll bring up later. Basic thing to remember is that if you have reason to think you are being watched, checking visually is pointless for these platforms. Even if you confirm that a helicopter circling is 10km or even more away, that doesn't mean they can't see you.
You won't even see a Predator or Shadow.
Good news? Those are Federal level assets, as far as I know- military, CIA, FBI. Us normal folks probably will never warrant that kind of asset. Police helos are another story though. Depending on the size of the agency, they very well could have this kind of capability.
Now, small UAS is another matter entirely. Replace the zoom capability of the big birds with the ability to get close, and you have an asset that works better and costs almost nothing to operate- usually, the officer running the thing is already on duty, and the few thousand bucks is nothing for a police department to invest in the systems. And yes, the lil fellas also have FLIR.
So, how do you tell if you are being watched from the air?
Easy! You don't. You learn about local assets available don't worry, this is easy. The police, despite AC being B, actually operate on the belief that what they are doing is a good thing, they generally love their communities, and want to show that they are operating in good faith. Departments in general like to (IN GENERAL- shitbags doing shitbag things DO exist and DO try to hide) demonstrate openness and not try to hide what they can do from their cities.
NOW: I work with cops frequently. There are absolutely bastards in every group of people. I am NOT trying to say all police are a united force for good, invalidate any criticism, etc, etc. If this makes you think less of me, that is FINE. I'm grateful we still have the ability to talk shit about authority and I'm stoked to see people exercising that right!
Anyway, read the local newspaper. Follow your local police department online. Do ride-alongs! Yes, you can walk in to your local PD, fill out some paperwork, and they will schedule a time to come and ride with a police officer on duty! They will tell you what they can do; you're a citizen and have a right to know. Don't push for specifics, but you can find out what they have and then look up the systems later! None of this stuff is classified.
Hopefully this gets folks a little interested, I'll be making posts on this as I have time today, each one focusing on a specific aspect.
1/n
First: "The fuck does Teflon know about this?" LOTS. I spent all 3 of my deployments watching live aerial feeds as part of my duties in an aerial operations center in charge of helicopter teams, reviewing footage and writing reports. Drones, blimps, helos, I've seen thousands of hours of the stuff. I also love drones, and fly one frequently.
Let's talk first about capabilities- what CAN you see from the sky? Well, there's two main camera types, infrared (FLIR) and standard. Their strengths and weaknesses balance each other out nearly perfectly.
Airborne video cameras can be good enough to have a decent chance to identify an individual person without being close enough for that person to hear. The caveat is that lenses this good are too heavy for normal quadcopter type drones- we're talking big boys here, full on aircraft-manned or otherwise.
Birds like this also usually have FLIR, and there's no hiding from that for long without using some specific techniques I'll bring up later. Basic thing to remember is that if you have reason to think you are being watched, checking visually is pointless for these platforms. Even if you confirm that a helicopter circling is 10km or even more away, that doesn't mean they can't see you.
You won't even see a Predator or Shadow.
Good news? Those are Federal level assets, as far as I know- military, CIA, FBI. Us normal folks probably will never warrant that kind of asset. Police helos are another story though. Depending on the size of the agency, they very well could have this kind of capability.
Now, small UAS is another matter entirely. Replace the zoom capability of the big birds with the ability to get close, and you have an asset that works better and costs almost nothing to operate- usually, the officer running the thing is already on duty, and the few thousand bucks is nothing for a police department to invest in the systems. And yes, the lil fellas also have FLIR.
So, how do you tell if you are being watched from the air?
Easy! You don't. You learn about local assets available don't worry, this is easy. The police, despite AC being B, actually operate on the belief that what they are doing is a good thing, they generally love their communities, and want to show that they are operating in good faith. Departments in general like to (IN GENERAL- shitbags doing shitbag things DO exist and DO try to hide) demonstrate openness and not try to hide what they can do from their cities.
NOW: I work with cops frequently. There are absolutely bastards in every group of people. I am NOT trying to say all police are a united force for good, invalidate any criticism, etc, etc. If this makes you think less of me, that is FINE. I'm grateful we still have the ability to talk shit about authority and I'm stoked to see people exercising that right!
Anyway, read the local newspaper. Follow your local police department online. Do ride-alongs! Yes, you can walk in to your local PD, fill out some paperwork, and they will schedule a time to come and ride with a police officer on duty! They will tell you what they can do; you're a citizen and have a right to know. Don't push for specifics, but you can find out what they have and then look up the systems later! None of this stuff is classified.
Hopefully this gets folks a little interested, I'll be making posts on this as I have time today, each one focusing on a specific aspect.
1/n