---
title: "Watch Protestors Kill a Drone Using Hundreds of Laser Pointers"
description: "Chilean protestors banded together to disable a hovering police drone using hundreds of consumer laser pointers in a dazzling concerted effort."
date: "2019-11-14"
modified: "2019-11-14"
authors:
  - name: "Dan Robitzski"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/danrobitzski"
url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/protestors-kill-drone-using-laser-pointers"
categories:
  - "Drones"
  - "Future Society"
  - "Robotics"
  - "Robots and Machines"
tags:
  - "drones"
  - "lasers"
  - "protestors"
  - "surveillance"
  - "the digest"
---

# Watch Protestors Kill a Drone Using Hundreds of Laser Pointers

![Chilean protestors banded together to disable a hovering police drone using hundreds of consumer laser pointers in a dazzling concerted effort.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/protestors-kill-drone-using-laser-pointers.jpg>)
*\<em\>Image: toyspilot/Reddit\</em\>*

## Pull!

In response to rising public transit costs, Chileans have taken to the streets in ongoing protests that have now evolved to encompass broader concerns about inequality — and they're using high-tech tricks to push police back.

Particularly, a police drone was disabled and fell to the ground after hundreds of protestors aimed their laser pointers at it, [according to *NextGov*](<https://www.nextgov.com/emerging-tech/2019/11/how-chilean-protesters-took-down-drone-standard-laser-pointers/161288/>). The impromptu light show, [captured on video](<https://www.reddit.com/r/nextfuckinglevel/comments/dvlvwr/chilean_protesters_take_down_a_police_drone_with/?sort=confidence>), provides a poignant illustration of an on-going, futuristic arms race.

## Blinding

The Chileans aren't the first protestors to disable police tech with lasers: the Hong Kong protests used lasers to [shut down surveillance cameras](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/hong-kong-protesters-lasers-facial-recognition>) equipped with facial recognition tech. Nor are they the first to use lasers to disable drones — it's an increasingly-common [military technique](<https://futurism.com/military-mounting-laser-weapons-tanks>), though those lasers are more powerful.

In this case, the lasers probably didn't burn through the drone as a military laser cannon might. Rather, *NextGov* reports that the lasers likely blinded either a human pilot's camera feed or interfered with the drone's built-in altitude sensors and forced an emergency descent.

## One-Off

Christopher Williams, the CEO of the military tech contractor Citadel Defense Company, pushes back against the idea that laser pointers will become a common anti-surveillance tool.

"There are many other technologies that are less disruptive that provide a superior, more scalable, more reliable and more cost-effective countermeasure," he told *NextGov*.

However, it's not clear which of those technologies could become as ubiquitous for protestors on the street as a consumer laser pointer.

**READ MORE:** [How Chilean Protesters Took Down a Drone With Standard Laser Pointers](<https://www.nextgov.com/emerging-tech/2019/11/how-chilean-protesters-took-down-drone-standard-laser-pointers/161288/>) \[*NextGov*\]

**More on drone lasers:** *[The Military Is Mounting Laser Weapons on Tanks](<https://futurism.com/military-mounting-laser-weapons-tanks>)*

## Author
Dan Robitzki is a senior reporter for Futurism, where he likes to cover AI, tech ethics, and medicine. He spends his extra time fencing and streaming games from Los Angeles, California.

### Author social links  
[Twitter](<https://x.com/danrobitzski>)