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Comment by Aurornis | Hacker News Reader

Flying a drone within 1/2 mile of ICE vehicles, which may be unmarked, is illegal? You can be flying a drone and if an unmarked ICE vehicle drives close enough, without warning, you have now broken serious FAA laws? This isn’t the kind of restriction that gets passed when the people making the rules care about being fair or consistent. It’s a power grab.

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This is par for the course for rules regarding law enforcement. A group of armed men bust down your door in the middle of the night without identifying themselves. They're aiming guns at you and your family. Are you allowed to fire on them with your legally owned firearm? The law says yes, but also that police are allowed to be those people knocking down the door and shoot you if you aim a gun at them. So if that happens, who is in the wrong? Courts have been dodging the question, but in practice the answer is that you're going to be killed and the police won't be liable. You can do everything right and law enforcement is allowed to arrest you, steal your shit, destroy your property, or kill you, and officially you're the criminal for perfectly normal and normally legal behavior.

>Courts have been dodging the question

It's not hard to find contradictions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_Ridge_standoff#Trials_of_...

If by "courts" you mean appellate (precedent setting) courts, cases like these usually never get to that stage because cases like these are straightforward enough that juries can rule on them without lawyers getting into esoteric arguments.

It isnt about the flying. This is about ICE now being able to take down any drone footage and arrest those who post it. They can also obtain extensive search warrants for uploaders, giving them an investigative path into the lives of ICE protest groups.

I expect a court would rule against the government if they tried to enforce this against somebody unknowingly flying within a 1/2 mile of an unmarked ICE vehicle. I'd feel sorry for the poor soul that would have to fight it though.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mens_rea#Levels_of_mens_rea_wi... is relevant here. There are exceptions - I don't know the specifics especially in relation to US law - but the starting point is that unknowingly causing the situation to exist doesn't make you guilty automatically. You have to intend it.

The NOTAM reads:

"ALL UNMANNED ACFT ARE PROHIBITED FROM FLYING WITHIN A STAND-OFF DISTANCE OF 3000FT LATERALLY AND 1000FT ABOVE."

That is somewhat narrowly defined. I'm sure you can still effectively film them from 1100ft.

further:

"FACILITIES AND MOBILE ASSETS, INCLUDING VESSELS AND GROUND VEHICLE CONVOYS AND THEIR ASSOCIATED ESCORTS"

I think you'd easily beat this language in court. "Please show us where 'mobile asset' is legally and narrowly defined."

You cannot fly drones over 400ft above the ground (with some very narrow exceptions).

So this isn't narrow, it's extremely broad. You can't read such rules in a vacuum without knowing their context.

Ummmm… I fly drones at 8,000ft for arial mountain shots… drones are surprisingly capable given good wind conditions.

That would be against the law in the US. https://www.faa.gov/uas/recreational_flyers

Not if you stay within 400 feet AGL of the mountain terrain. You can be over 400 feet MSL (mean-sea-level) but still be within 400 feet above-ground-level from where the drone's sitting in the sky.

If I'm still following the plot, this means protesters just need to get their mountains to follow ICE activity (but remain 3000 feet away, laterally) for lawful recording.

Only if you’re caught. It’s perfectly fine to put your body and life on the line and go paragliding at those altitudes but the moment you strap a headset on for FPV, it’s “illegal”.

Drone altitude restrictions are AGL, not ASL.

I go out on top of the highest local mountain and send a drone up to 12,300' and the FAA won't care. I do the same thing over my house, they would very rightly be quite upset. (But I think it's BLM would care about the drone over the mountain--it's wilderness terrain, no powered vehicles of any type except for emergency use.)

> I'm sure you can still effectively film them from 1100ft.

But also having to be 3000ft laterally which gives you a distance of about 3160ft which is probably beyond the useful camera range of most consumer drones?

Pfffff the rules for flying drones as set by the FAA are already draconian as is and that’s before you begin to run afoul of city/state rules. They’re usually banned in residential areas to begin with (without permits) so you’re screwed even before this rule. Hope you kept VLOS the whole time too or none of the other rules matter.

I hate ICE like the next guy but if the drone followed the wrong car, shouldn't that be illegal?

If a car follows your car, is that illegal?

If a drone follows your car, is that illegal?

If someone systematically follows your car (drone or not), don't you think that should be illegal?

Heard of ALPR networks?

It's seemingly creepy, yes.

It might warrant a restraining order, sure.

Outside of judge's opinion that it constitutes stalking or threatening behavior, what exactly is the crime here?

Perhaps it's a neighbour who keeps the same hours and works in the same city block, etc.

Perhaps it's a PI hired to follow you because <whatever> .. is that a crime?

The 1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, and 11th Circuit Courts of Appeals have recognized the First Amendment right to record law enforcement in public.

The inclusion of drones and vehicles doesn't really change that.

Yes, but what if the drone followed a car they __believe__ is law enforcement (where in reality it is not)?

There’s no expectation of privacy in a public place which includes public roads.

The US doesn't have any general restrictions against filming in public.

Court rulings citing the amendments above were made to affirm that law enforcement are not an exception to the general rule that filming is allowed.

US doesn't have an expectation of privacy in public spaces. This allows for filming of anyone/anything in a public space. Following a specific individual or vehicle in public doesn't make a difference.

Simply filming in public is not a nuisance and should not be illegal.

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