Drones & Satellite issues (with a bit of Big Data mixed in)

Posted by Christian

Talking points and links from today’s seminar, in chronological order:

Amazon delivery drones are coming  http://wordpress.khm.de/sag/?p=1628

 

Ostfriesen testen Bierdrohne https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2oVw39rk1U

 

Matrix Sentinel  https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=matrix%20sentinel&tbs=imgo:1

 

autonome Kampfroboter: “Das Gesicht unserer Gegner von morgen”  http://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/debatten/krieg-mit-drohnen-das-gesicht-unserer-gegner-von-morgen-11897252.html?printPagedArticle=true#pageIndex_2

 

a science fiction novel in our Semesterapparat:  Daniel Suarez, Kill Decision  New York, NY: Penguin , 2013 . – 495 S

http://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/debatten/digitales-denken/daniel-suarez-im-gespraech-schwaerme-von-toetungsmaschinen-11897282.html?printPagedArticle=true#pageIndex_2

Rezension von Dietmar Dath dazuin der FAZ vom 21.7.2012:   http://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/buecher/thriller-kill-decision-von-daniel-suarez-wie-technik-die-welt-zum-schlechteren-wendet-11826693.html?printPagedArticle=true#pageIndex_2

 

Surveillance in Science Fiction. About how most things that were once science fiction are now here and in use. Plus a list of actual surveillance measures deployed right now.

http://rhizome.org/editorial/2012/jun/6/natural-history-surveillance/ linking to:

http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Science_List_Detail.asp?BT=Surveillance

 

Martha Rosler quoting from Philip K. Dick: Vulcan’s Hammer  http://www.martharosler.net/projects/drone2.html

 

Anti-drone self-defense

Animals and drones – chimpanzee   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPidiiaovL4

 

Animals attacking drones

“Thank you, animals, for being able to express how we all feel.”

+ another comment below:

“drones shouldnt be considered property, if i destroy them, it is self defense in 100% of cases, as a person with programming knowledge, I know you can program to do literally anything you desire for them to do, and since, by sight i cannot know what they are programmed to do, and yet at sight they may be able to harm me, i have the right to disable them, they are hazardous anima they cannot be of traditional perception of “property” .. when i can see them, they infringe upon me explicitly.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9F8sPBsR9Lo

 

 

These Shotgun Shells Are Made for Shooting Down Drones http://makezine.com/2015/08/19/these-shotgun-shells-are-made-for-shooting-down-drones/

 

Long-Distance Jammer Is Taking Down Drones  http://makezine.com/2015/10/16/research-company-takes-aim-uavs-portable-anti-drone-rifle/

 

 

new problems!  but what about robot rights?  https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/08/shooting_down_d.html

 

Drones that shoot back  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqHrTtvFFIs

 

Prototype Quadrotor with Machine Gun!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNPJMk2fgJU

 

 

Basically these things exist in reality and have been used in war for quite some time now.
The Intercept – Drone Papers  https://theintercept.com/drone-papers

 

Al-Quaida anti drone instructions:  http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/_international/_pdfs/al-qaida-papers-drones.pdf

 

 

 

Eben Moglen: Time To Apply Asimov’s First Law Of Robotics “A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.”  http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2012/06/26/eben-moglen-time-to-apply-the-first-law-of-robotics-to-our-smartphones/

 

 

typical news photo 2015 – it’s now OK to photograph someone from above and use that in newspapers

https://www.google.com/search?sa=G&hl=de&tbm=isch&tbs=simg:CAQSjgEaiwELEKjU2AQaBAgACAMMCxCwjKcIGmIKYAgDEijEGfkO4hvHGeQO5Q76DskZ-A7GGdAs2i2pOtEs7zqtOt0tyy2GJLMzGjA2T-Vc6YLYXtS4M9QtFwGYbczcCNja0f6NMP8hdR7NR4y24DtdX-1sJRRB94AA4IEgAgwLEI6u_1ggaCgoICAESBM1cybYM&ved=0CBsQ2A4oAWoVChMImfL9hJr1yAIVwjcUCh3ecwT_&biw=1389&bih=776

 

 

Big Data using Satellite view: skybox startup

“Inside a Startup’s Plan to Turn a Swarm of DIY Satellites Into an All-Seeing Eye”  http://www.wired.com/2013/06/startup-skybox/

http://www.skyboximaging.com/

“Skybox Imaging empowers global businesses to make better decisions with timely, high fidelity imagery and infinite analytics.”  http://www.skyboximaging.com/products/analytics

Introducing SkyNode  – yes let’s try and order this for seminar use: http://www.skyboximaging.com/products#access
In the end, the aim is to have a live street-view. Example full-HD videos:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsW6IGc4tt0&index=1&list=PLIIuwfzJSzET1C0KDpA5FZrHLlDGfcHr3

conflict in Tripoli  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWXN3CXsxTg

 

 

The discussion strayed into Big Data territory (even though we try to concentrate on aerial issues), so let’s have this excellent essay as a last point:

James Bridle, booktwo.org: Big Data, No Thanks  http://booktwo.org/notebook/big-data-no-thanks/

 

Guest speaker on Nov 11 : Tobias Flessenkemper

Posted by Christian

Wednesday, 11 November 2015, 10h30-12h00

“The European border regime in South Eastern Europe – between collapse and resurrection”

Tobias Flessenkemper, Senior Associate Researcher
Centre international de formation européenne (CIFE) – European Institute, Nice/Berlin/Istanbul

Tobias Flessenkemper is working on the issue of external and internal security policies of the European Union with a focus on South Eastern Europe and the European neighbourhood. He holds a M.A. of the University of Cologne in Political Science and a European Master in International Humanitarian Assistance of the Ruhr-University Bochum. Since 1996 he worked for international organisations in Brussels and South Eastern Europe and currently manages elbarlament.org an independent organisation working in the field of democratic governance.

www.cife.eu

Raben und Krähen. Das waren Frauen und Kinder.

Posted by Christian

Aus der Befragung des ex-Drohnenpiloten Brandon Bryant im NSA-Untersuchungsausschuss des deutschen Bundestages, 15. Oktober 2015

Flisek: Gab es in Ihrer Praxis Fälle, wo es zu Kollateralschäden gekommen ist, wo Menschen im Umfeld des Ziels zu Schaden gekommen sind?

Bryant: Ja.

Flisek: Einzelfälle? Worüber unterhalten wir uns, war das Regelfall?

Bryant: Ziemlich. Drei Kennzeichen: Männer in milit. Alter. Dann Raben und Krähen. Das waren Frauen und Kinder. Sonst Männer in milit. Alter, d.h. über 12 Jahre. Das waren legitime Ziele. Würde sagen, das sind Kollateralschäden, weil nicht entsprechend UN-Terminologie.

Flisek: Per se Männer mit Aussehen über 12 Jahre als milit. Ziele eingestuft – zum Abschuss freigegeben?

Bryant: Ja.

Flisek: Woran hat man das Alter festgemacht?

Bryant: Wussten wir nicht. Man hat gutes Bild von Körper über Infrarot bekommen. Konnte gut sehen: Jugendlicher, Kind, Frau, Mann.

SAG shared calendar with all seminar events, constantly updated.

Posted by Christian

We  have a shared calendar with all seminar dates. Maintained by Christian and Julia in a collaborative effort, this calendar will always hold the latest info about seminar events, and some more stuff we think is relevant to the group.

You can see the calendar in a web page here.

Another way to access it is to subscribe to it with your favorite calendaring application.

To do that, select and copy this address:
https://kalender.khm.de/public.php/sag/SAG-Public-Events/
Then go to e.g. Calendar.app and choose Calendar -> Subscribe (-> Abonnieren on German systems). Paste the entire address including the https://.
Accept and trust the security certificate, and confirm with your computer password.

Make sure to switch ‘Auto-Update’ on (set it to an hour or so).

The procedure is similar on smart phones and with other calendaring apps. Happy to help if you need setting it up!

Why they spy

Posted by Christian

Let me use this as a notebook to make sure I have this article handy whenever I need reminding what’s going on.

Technology should be used to create social mobility – not to spy on citizens
NSA and GCHQ mass surveillance is more about disrupting political opposition than catching terrorists
Cory Doctorow
Tuesday 10 March 2015

Why spy? That’s the several-million pound question, in the wake of the Snowden revelations. Why would the US continue to wiretap its entire population, given that the only “terrorism” they caught with it was a single attempt to send a small amount of money to Al Shabab?
One obvious answer is: because they can. Spying is cheap, and cheaper every day. Many people have compared NSA/GCHQ mass spying to the surveillance programme of East Germany’s notorious Stasi, but the differences between the NSA and the Stasi are more interesting than the similarities.
The most important difference is size. The Stasi employed one snitch for every 50 or 60 people it watched. We can’t be sure of the size of the entire Five Eyes global surveillance workforce, but there are only about 1.4 million Americans with Top Secret clearance, and many of them don’t work at or for the NSA, which means that the number is smaller than that (the other Five Eyes states have much smaller workforces than the US). This million-ish person workforce keeps six or seven billion people under surveillance – a ratio approaching 1:10,000. What’s more, the US has only (“only”!) quadrupled its surveillance budget since the end of the Cold War: tooling up to give the spies their toys wasn’t all that expensive, compared to the number of lives that gear lets them pry into. (…)

"Bycatch", a card game about drone strikes

Posted by Christian

Leading up to this Winter term’s “Up in the Air”, here’s a different way to talk about flying killer robots. “Bycatch” is a card game for 3 to 5 participants, played with paper cards and your own mobile phones. You get a lot of points for successfully killing a “terrorist” and only a few minus points for offing the wrong people. So the incentive is to just go for it. That sounds terrifyingly realistic. You can use your phone to photograph your opponent’s cards and use this surveillance to judge whether to strike or not – you get one blurry snapshot and that’s all. Yes, it’s cynical and not too subtle, but it also sounds promising – just ordered a copy for our upcoming seminar.
https://bycat.ch/
https://www.wired.de/collection/latest/bycatch-macht-den-drohnenkrieg-zum-kartenspiel/
https://boingboing.net/2015/08/20/bycatch-card-game.html

I’m curious as to what the effect of playing really is – does it work? Is this a viable way to “get” the mechanics of contemporary warfare, as exercised by the West?

What I know is that humor is often the only way to confront a terrible reality. It distances you from it, and from that perspective allows you to see it for what it is. How fitting for a game about drones.

Bycatch game