The Federal
Aviation Administration (FAA) recently announced that Unmanned
Aircraft Systems (UAS) Identification and Tracking Aviation Rulemaking
Committee (ARC) chartered by the FAA has submitted its report and
recommendations to the agency on technologies available to identify
and track drones in flight and other associated issues. The FAA charged the UAS-ID ARC with the
following three objectives:
1.
Identify, categorize and recommend available and emerging technology for the
remote identification and tracking of UAS.
2.
Identify the requirements for meeting the security and public safety needs of
the law enforcement, homeland defense, and national security communities for
the remote identification and tracking of UAS. The ARC should consider and
evaluate the need to provide information that could assist in threat
discrimination and determination of hostile intent.
3.
Evaluate the feasibility and affordability of available technical solutions,
and determine how well those technologies address the needs of the law
enforcement and air traffic control communities.
The FAA stated in its announcement
that the ARC’s recommendations and
suggestions, which are fully detailed in the report, cover issues related to
existing and emerging technologies, law enforcement and security, and
implementation of remote identification and tracking. Although some
recommendations were not unanimous, the group reached general agreement on
most. Highlights of the recommendations include:
- The FAA should consider two methods for remote ID and tracking of drones: direct broadcast (transmitting data in one direction only with no specific destination or recipient) and (2) network publishing (transmitting data to an internet service or group of services). Both methods would send the data to an FAA-approved internet-based database.
- The data collected must include a unique identifier for unmanned aircraft, tracking information, and drone owner and remote pilot identification.
- The FAA should promote fast-tracked development of industry standards while a final remote ID and tracking rule is developed, potentially offering incentives for early adoption and relying on educational initiatives to pave the way to the implementation of the rule.
- The FAA should implement a rule in three stages, with an ultimate goal that all drones manufactured or sold within the United States that comply with the rule must be so labeled. The agency should allow a reasonable grace period to retrofit drones manufactured or sold before the final rule is effective.
- The FAA should coordinate any ID and tracking system with the existing air traffic control system and ensure it does not substantially increase workloads.
- The FAA should exempt drones operating under air traffic control or those operating under the agency’s discretion (public aircraft operations, security or defense operations, or with a waiver).
- The FAA must review privacy considerations, in consultation with privacy experts and other Federal agencies, including developing a secure system that allows for segmented access to the ID and tracking information. Within the system, only persons authorized by the FAA (e.g., law enforcement officials, airspace management officials, etc.) would be able to access personally identifiable information.
The FAA pointed out that, while the
ARC reached consensus on most issues, there were dissenting opinions, primarily
over to which drones the ID and tracking requirements should apply. Many of
these dissenting opinions expressed concerns that exempting model aircraft
operating under Section 336 of the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012
would undermine the value of an ID and tracking requirement. Other dissenting
opinions touched upon issues such as privacy and a lack of detail or
consideration for ATC involvement.
The FAA indicated that will use the
data and recommendations in the ARC report in crafting a proposed rule for
public comment. There was no indication
when that proposed rulemaking would be issued.
The 50-page report with four appendices
totaling 158 pages will be discussed in further detail in the next post.
Copyright Robert E Kelly, Esq.2016-2018
Copyright Robert E Kelly, Esq.2016-2018