The drone wars intensify as the Secret Service announced its intent to fly the unmanned air vehicles over the White House's previously restricted air space. The news comes after an intelligence officer drunkenly flew a drone over the White House's air space in late January.
In a brief announcement, the Secret Service stated that it intends to begin drone exercises over the White House property. The Secret Service indicated that it will carry out the drone exercises with inter-agency partners "in the coming days and weeks."
"Because these exercises will be conducted within the normally flight restricted areas in the Washington D.C. area, they have been carefully planned and will be tightly controlled," stated the agency. "In preparation for these exercises, the Secret Service has coordinated with all appropriate federal, state and local agencies."
The Federal Aviation Administration is slowly hammering out legislation to regulate all uses of drones -- recreational, commercial and governmental -- but the use of the aircraft has been banned entirely in the District of Columbia. However, drones can be difficult to detect and they don't require licenses or registration.
While drones are often undetectable by aerial scanners, the aircraft have been increasingly prominent on the public's radar. The Secret Service says it has been working with French police after Paris landmarks were buzzed by drones for two consecutive days.
Paris has restricted the use of drones altogether and France requires users hold licenses for the aircraft, but French authorities spotted one or more drones flying over Paris landmarks such as the Montparnasse Tower and Eiffel Tower. Authorities believe there were at least five drones involved in the incidents.
French authorities have arrested and accused three Al Jazeera journalists of flying drones in Paris' restricted air space, but it's still too early to determine if the suspects are the perpetrators who have been guiding unmanned air vehicles over the city's landmarks.
Al Jazeera's PR says the journalists were filming a report on the previous drone violations.
The motives of the mystery drone operators are still unclear, but Christophe Naudin, a criminologist, theorizes that the perpetrators are attempting to point security vulnerabilities.
"The goal here is to scare people and attack the feeling of security of the nation," said Naudin. "Their message is that modern states are incapable of protecting their nation, their territory, their citizens."
