The Miami-Dade Police Department is poised to become the first large metro force using drones in its aerial missions. The department finalized a deal to buy a drone called T-Hawk from defense firm Honeywell and officially applied for permission from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) last month to begin flying it around the county.
What’s not clear is how cops will sort out the raft of thorny privacy questions hovering around plans for using this powerful, new eye in the sky.
“At this point, it doesn’t really matter if you’re against this technology, because it’s coming,” says P. W. Singer, author of Wired for War and an expert on drones. “The precedent that is set in Miami could be huge.”
Miami New Times – 12/9/2010: http://www.miaminewtimes.com/2010-12-09/news/miami-dade-police-buy-drones/
Rest assured that citizens of Miami have nothing to fear though (so long as they don’t do anything out of the ordinary)