drones

Minnesota lawmakers are mulling whether to legislate drones, including restricting the use of drones by law enforcement, the Associated Press' Kyle Potter reports: "Jay Stanley of the American Civil Liberties Union ... and several lawmakers suggested a handful of protections like requiring a search warrant before any drone flight, imposing limits for how long agencies can keep images and requiring law enforcement to get local government approval before buying a drone."

Law firm Pinsent Masons, writing on its Out-Law blog, reports that the Court of Justice of the EU has ruled that a Czech journalist's use of a CCTV system at his home violated EU's data protection law. The court ruled that "'video surveillance' by individuals that is carried out 'even partially' in a public space is subject to the EU's Data Protection Directive, even if the camera capturing images of people is 'directed outwards from the private setting of the person processing the data.'" UK information commissioner David Smith told the blog that the CJEU's judgment applies to private people using drones with cameras: "The judgment means civilian operators of drones in public places will have to adhere to 'fair processing' requirements if capturing images that can identify individuals and may, in many cases, require them to obtain individuals' consent to the capturing of such footage, among other data protection rules that apply." The result is that the media's use of drones will require getting consent of the people being photographed and videorecorded.

The Federal Aviation Administration doesn't expect to finalize rules for the commercial use of drones under 55 pounds until 2017 or 2018, the Washington Post's Craig Whitlock reports. Members of a House Transportation Committee panel had a hearing yesterday during which lawmakers questioned if the FAA is keeping aviation standards in pace with consumer drone sales. Rules were supposed to be released by September 2015. 

The FAA also announced it gave permission to four companies to use drones on a limited basis for aerial surveying and inspections.

The House Transportation is going to be holding a hearing Wednesday about the status of the Federal Aviation Administration's regulations for commercial drones, The Hill's Tim Devaney and Lydia Wheeler report: "Pressure is mounting from the GOP and the business community for the FAA to approve the use of commercial drones, though, Republicans acknowledge the need to address certain safety and privacy issues."

In a separate development, Amazon has told the FAA  that it may move testing of the use of drones in package delivery outside the United States if regulators don't approve domestic testing, Bloomberg's Spencer Soper and Alan Levin report.

U.S. Senator Diane Feinstein, D-California, plans on introducing legislation to strengthen drone safety laws, Lawfare's Cody Poplin writes. The legislation would expand the moratorium on private drone use unless the FAA authorizes it, while imposing felony penalties. The bill would require a "safety certification for expansions of private drone use," Feinstein wrote to the head of the FAA.

The Federal Aviation Administration has said no to a petition from the Electronic Privacy Information Center to conduct rulemaking about the privacy and civil liberties concerns raised by drones, Gizmodo's Adam Clark Estes writes. The FAA, which has to prioritize making rules when immediate safety or security concerns are at stake, said privacy is not an immediate safety concern, but "conveniently, the agency didn't comment on whether drones and privacy present a security concern," Estes says. While it's understandable that the FAA didn't trckle drones and privacy, Este concludes "it makes the issue even more frustrating, because if the agency in charge of regulating drones is not going to protect privacy in its drone rulemaking, who will?"

FAA Administrator Michael Huerta said today on CNN that his agency is planning the integration of drones into American airspace in stages, "starting with lower-risk uses and then moving on to other applications," Politico's Jennifer Shutt reports.

The Wall Street Journal's Jack Nicas and Andy Pasztor report that the Federal Aviation Administration is contemplating regulations for commercial drones that industry folks say will "essentially prohibit" industrial applications in pipeline inspections and crop monitoring. While the FAA has not released the proposed federal rules for integrating drones into American airspace, WSJ reports the rules "are expected to require operators to have a license and limit flights to daylight hours, below 400 feet and within sight of the person at the controls, according to people familiar with the rule-making process." Requiring pilot training for drone operators will curb commercial drone usage because it'll be harder to get legal status to use them, including for media usages like filmmaking, WSJ also reports.

Even though the National Transportation Safety Board ruled that the FAA can fine drone operators for commercial use of their aircraft, including toy models, Popular Mechanics reports that the ruling was narrowly focused on "'whether unmanned aircraft systems are subject to an aviation safety regulation concerning reckless operation.'" A rule to integrate drones into American airspace will take up to a year before it goes into effect, Popular Mechanics further reports.

Entrepreneur Jay Bregman wants to add regulatory engineers at a new startup to help companies use drones without running afoul of products liability and privacy law, C|NET's Steve Shankland reports: "His as-yet-unnamed startup plans to bake those rules into drone control software so drone makers and operators can fly the robotic devices without fear." Bregman said that the Federal Aviation Administration just doesn't have the bandwidth to regulate thousands and thousands of drones, so technology could enforce regulations via software code.