DJI might get banned next in the US

[mrandish]

This proposed action just sounds like more election year grandstanding that will reduce American consumer's freedom to choose while having little practical effect on actually improving any national security that matters or can't otherwise be worked around. If it becomes law, the most likely outcome is that DJI becomes a US-based and owned company to whatever extent the law requires. The enterprise itself is too valuable to just shut down, so it's basically a government forced transfer of an asset. Being a forced sale, DJI's valuation will be substantially depressed. This will harm the Chinese entrepreneurs who started DJI as well as their investors but only indirectly cause relatively inconsequential damage to the overall Chinese stock market. To whatever extent Chinese intelligence is harvesting DJI drone data, there are other ways they can get that data ranging from LEO satellites to hiding imaging/sensor packages on any of the thousands of China-based passenger, cargo and private jets that overfly the U.S. weekly. Thus, any actual net improvement in national security posture is relatively minor at best.

It's frustrating because even if we grant there's significant national security harm happening from DJI drone data, there are far more direct and effective ways to mitigate any such harm. For example, mandate that consumer drone data acquired in the U.S. cannot be stored in or transit China without a license. At the same time reverse the new FAA requirement for drone manufacturers to install software remote kill switches on consumer drones. While the idea may have sounded vaguely appealing in concept, in practice it's been a huge hassle for American consumers while being ineffective as a security measure because it's so easy for bad actors to work around. Thus, the only remaining effect is the unintended consequence that it forces U.S. consumers by law to accept the anti-feature of drone makers being able to kill American's drones at will - including foreign owned companies.

[rokkitmensch]

And yet people tell me to "reform the system" instead of advocating to alternatives to the pathologically centralizing and ever daily more despotic USG.

[mullingitover]

I shudder to think of what's going to happen to my 401k when this turns into a tit for tat game and China bans Apple products.

[MaxHoppersGhost]

Thinking of our 401ks only is what got us into this mess with China in the first place.

[sircastor]

Both China and the US are walking on a Cliff's edge here. Apple being locked out of China would be very damaging to the company sure, but Apple (and other major Electronics OEMs) are already moving rapidly to exit China as a manufacturer. China can only pull a few threads at a time, or it risks its economy collapsing - and just as its middle class is starting to settle in.

[aardvarkr]

And put 5 million jobs at risk? Banning Apple products would have wide repercussions to the Chinese economy and would directly strengthen its rivals like India.

[Marsymars]

Because your Apple is over-represented in your 401k or because of the knock-off effects on the world economy?

The first is fairly easy to fix, the latter is really a bigger problem than your 401k anyway.

[GeoAtreides]

[deleted]

[konschubert]

I’m less worried about DJIs ability to spread propaganda than TikTok’s.

[ceejayoz]

I'd imagine the concern about DJI is more in the realm of distributed sensors all over the world.

[qwertox]

With the snap of a finger DJI can dedicate 100% of its production capability towards building weapons in such a scale that nothing can match it. The have the entire stack, from IP to hardware design, hardware production, software design, and they create the best drone hardware of its kind, and apparently also top-notch software. I wonder why that is not addressed, but rather the capability to spy around, specially after seeing how they can be used in the front lines by dropping or placing bombs below trucks.

[falcolas]

Spreading propaganda is a protected first amendment right. Just wanted to point that out.

[sithadmin]

How exactly is a DJI device going to spread propaganda? Fly around with a banner?

[sorenjan]

What other options are there on the drone market? It's my impression that DJI are the biggest because they are the best.

[jandrewrogers]

The US has a mature and highly diversified drone industry with excellent tech. It just isn't targeted at consumers, which is the market segment where DJI plays.

[beeboobaa3]

There already are no options if you don't want to beg china for permission any time you want to use your property.

[antonkochubey]

not much for consumers (Autel Robotics is also Chinese IIRC), plenty of options for industrial/military

[numpad0]

Isn't it partly an artificial problem created by export regulations? US had soft-restricted civilian ownership of missile-related technologies by controlling exports and inflating prices. But none of it applies to DJI drones somehow, so it wins.

[johnea]

I'm sure my comment will be at the bottom and no one will ever see it, but:

This law, `Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act of 2019':

https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/4998

Should certainly apply to android, iOS, windows, and most modern american made automobiles, televisions, refrigerators?, and almost all consumer electronics that are net connected.

The collection and efiltration of personal data from the entire population is a national security risk.

[throwaway4good]

What is the US alternative? Who is lobbying for this?

[sorenjan]

I think Skydio was the main US alternative until they stopped making consumer drones. They can probably start making them again fairly soon if they're incentivized.

I guess they're still an alternative to DJI's commercial segment, but I don't know of any competitors to DJI for most of their consumer drones.

[segasaturn]

Ironically, modified DJI drones have been invaluable in the defense of Ukraine, especially in the early days.

[coldtea]

If you can't compete, ban them!

[cwyers]

You're right, it would be better if there was fair competition and we could let the market decide things. But that's not the status quo. The status quo is one party (China) has extremely protectionist policies and encourages IP theft from other countries. Because of this, companies in other countries are at a disadvantage competing in the Chinese market and against Chinese companies. So then you have to decide: is letting Chinese companies win the competition via unfair practices better or worse than engaging in tit-for-tat and levelling the playing field a bit?

[hedora]

DJI, in particular has a bunch of phone-home kill switch stuff built in. The FAA mandated a lot of it, and now I think they realize that, in practice, that means they're mandating that the Chinese military has indirect control over drones operated by Americans on US soil.

I think it'd be better to ban remote kill switches and instead mandate GIS databases that warn you if you're violating airspace restrictions (for drones over a certain size, where this isn't adding a bunch of complexity).

Shielding domestic drone manufacturers from international competition essentially guarantees that we'll fall behind China. That will cause a national security issue worse than the current situation.

Sometimes I wonder if the regulators are intentionally screwing the US over, or if it's just that the federal government has become unable to coordinate the actions of its own agencies.

edit: The sibling comments are great examples of why we need strong privacy laws. If it was illegal for DJI to exfiltrate the data the drones gather back to their manufacturers, then those classes of national security issues would take care of themselves, and the rules would solve the problem for all industries, not just this one company.

[sithadmin]

That's not really a fair assessment of the situation. The real (and valid) concern is that DJI's commercial products dominate the market for land/resource development, agriculture, infrastructure, chemical refining and pipelines, and other segments, and the software platform is capable of exfiltrating data (flight telemetry, imaging, etc.) back to a firm with strong ties to Chinese government and state enterprises.

[kevin42]

My concern isn't about competition but that since the drones dial home and get over the air updates, there's little that would prevent China from using it to gather images and location data that that we wouldn't want them to (private/commercial/military).

[johnea]

This applies even more to teh chinese EV import bans.

It seems if the USactually wanted people to drive EVs and put photovoltaic on their houses that they would embrace Chinese government subsidized products. Why wouldn't we want the Chinese subsidy to advance the US's electrification?

WRT the the security vulnerabiliters, this is just another case of protecting US surveilance companies.

A law to ban all user data collection and exfiltration would be the most benificial to the population, but I think goggle would have a few complaints.

[hanniabu]

More like if you can't control them. Drones put a lot of power back into citizens and that's not great for those in charge.

[odiroot]

Ironically this actually helped Honda in the end, when it was Harley Davidson lobbying US gov for help.

[talldayo]

[deleted]

[SeanAnderson]

Note that DJI was added to the US' "Entity List" in 2020 which limited the ability for US companies to export products to DJI, https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/12/22/2020-28...

Interesting to see the US taking things a step further.

[sircastor]

This makes me worry that BambuLab might be up on the list too. Any Chinese-owned company becomes a risk. Not necessarily from an actual surveillance/security/propaganda point of view, but it's hard to not view the TikTok ban as a little xenophobic.

It's weird to me that so many congress-people are convinced this is a existential threat, but nobody shares any meaningful evidence. It feels like the kind of situation where "We can't tell them to move the nukes out of ____ because then they'll know our capabilities to detect their nukes."

[sithadmin]

The difference between DJI and Bambu is that Bambu products aren't being used in contexts that convey potentially sensitive information about infrastructure, heavy industry, agriculture, or land development. Bambu has a place in the low end of the market, but anybody doing serious prototyping work in spaces that cross into 'national security' territory is relying on far more specialized and US/Euro-centric vendor ecosystems for additive manufacturing.

[kube-system]

Well, there's this:

https://www.npr.org/2024/03/21/1239691465/tiktok-ban-bill-se...

[oautholaf]

Have to say, I bought a DJI drone that I enjoyed, but then the app stopped working after my Android phone upgraded to a new OS version. Even months later, it appeared that DJI had made no effort to fix this issue (which clearly did not affect only me). There are open source apps, but the existing open source apps at the time did not control a specific unique and important feature on the drone I bought.

Never buying DJI again.

[uxp100]

Elise Stefanik seems to be making a name for herself, but I’m skeptical this will go anywhere.

is the article simplifying something? The law mentions networks, but would a better word be bands or something? I’m not familiar with drones but I would think most of them do not use what you’d call a network.

[smashah]

Instead of actually producing/making anything in the last 20 years, America has focussed on worldwide destabilization and funding high-tech projects like uber, theranos, hyperloop, a tunnel in las vegas, the holocaust of Gaza, Elon Musk's ego and 10 thousand delivery apps. Mainly because contrarian VCs were busy trying to get some Saudi chumps to hold the bag pre-IPO and because the leadership is just a foreign sleeper cell - activated not on behalf of the working people, but on behalf of rent-seekers, financializers, and a certain foreign government.

Instead of competing, US thinks it can ban it's way to success.

[nickburns]

what's the purported privacy risk/s to American citizens specifically with DJI's drones? or is this purely a matter of geopolitics? (TFA links to a paywalled NYT article on what seems to be this point.)

[shanewilhelm]

Geopolitics. A congressperson is quoted as saying they pose a national security risk.

[Takennickname]

Good. So more people can stop pretending America is about freedom. Tired of this bullshit rhetoric. Military industrial complex gets richer by robbing other countries, and politicians get richer by robbing Americans.

[jijijijij]

> In communist China.

Oh boy, the American red scare talk.

It's 2024 guys. Capitalism won. You can stop salivating when you hear the word 'communism'.

Traitor Trump said this, sleepy Joe looked there, bad communist China will take freedom guns away... in 10 years American English will be fully memefied dum-dum talk.

[deputy]

[deleted]

[blackeyeblitzar]

This makes sense to me. Although DJI is not a propaganda tool like TikTok, it is still a national security threat. Who knows what they could be doing - like capturing surveillance footage and biometrics (facial recognition) or high resolution maps from across the country and handing it to the CCP. There is no need for the US to trade at all with China given they are an authoritarian government undermining US interests. We should be seeking a fast path to divestment and disrupt their foreign policy goals in places like Africa.