In a time of rising skepticism against tech surveillance, it seems not even the best intentions can spare you from backlash.
That’s a lesson some good samaritans in Los Vegas learned the hard way, after a thermal imaging drone they were using to track a runaway dog was trashed by a group of unidentified vandals.
According to to Las Vegas station FOX5, the volunteer animal rescue group Paws Patrol LV has been scrambling to replace a $7,000 camera drone after it suddenly went offline while tracking an injured dog.
“For the past couple of days, we’ve been searching for a dog we believe was hit by a car,” the group wrote in a post on Facebook. “We searched on foot, but the vegetation was simply too dense to see through with flashlights. So we launched our thermal drone… one of the most valuable rescue tools we’ve ever owned.”
“Less than a minute after it took off,” the post continues, “a group of unhoused individuals knocked it out of the sky, smashed it, and threw it into the water.”
The animal-rescue group wasn’t left empty-handed for long, however, as a business owner from Montana chipped in to donate a brand new thermal imaging drone, per an update on the original post.
While it would be easy to blame a group of unwashed Luddites for the damage, it’s important to keep in mind that the true identity of the vandal or vandals remains unknown. If the vandals really are homeless, as Paws Patrol LV volunteers suggest, then their aversion to strange drones makes sense — elsewhere, surveillance drones have been deployed by police officers to clear homeless camps, while private citizens have used drones to drop dog feces on homeless populations struggling to survive.
And one doesn’t necessarily have to be homeless to have an aversion to the growing number of surveillance drones surfing our skies. In some parts of the US, malicious operators have used drones to harass random suburbanites and poach wildlife, while insurance adjusters are increasingly conducting secretive drone flights to find excuses to penalize homeowners and sometimes even drop customers altogether.
While we hope the dog gets found, the episode underscores a larger point: the skies have become a contested space, with drone operators both benevolent and vindictive jockeying for control — not just of the airspace itself, but over how their drones are perceived.
More on drones: We’re Admittedly Terrified That They’ve Now Invented Invisible Drones