[mrspandex]

I understand that drones make aerial surveillance much cheaper and easier, but why specify drone surveillance and not aerial surveillance in general?

It bothers me that there is such a fear around drones. Please remember that many people would like to use them for far less nefarious purposes - real estate photography, farming, etc.

[mtgx]

They could just pass a bill saying the Government is not allowed to use drone surveillance, and they can't get private companies to do it for them either.

Otherwise companies (and people?) are allowed to use drones.

[planetguy]

The difference is that manned aerial surveillance (i.e. police helicopters and the occasional plane) is sufficiently expensive that they only do it occasionally. If there's a police helicopter in the air it's probably doing some specific task.

The fear is that drone surveillance could become sufficiently cheap that the police could have a constant fleet of drones circling over the city and capable of looking at anything at a moment's notice.

[nirvana]

I don't know the status of the legislation but I heard that a bill was introduced (and possibly passed) that criminalized use of drones by private entities, allowing only government to use them.

So, the political position seems to be that its ok for spying, but not ok for mapping farmland or photography.