Drones, Drones, Drones,, Who has the Drones? Options

[ShadowDragon8685]

[Faelan]

I don't think anyone is saying that hardwired commands are the problem, it is the degree of thought that is required for the drone to follow these hardwired commands. For instance visual recognition of its master, knowledge of variations of hand signals, tracking a moving master, tracking targets and firing on those it is indicated to do so by its master. Essentially you are saying the drone can continue to operate as a flexible platform eventhough it is now operating under hardwired commands. In my mind I think it is just a little bit to much to expect. For instance if it receives a command like "attack master" and switches over to its hardwired programming which is essentially fly to the following coordinates, land and shut down that would be well within what myself and I think others would consider feasible. The problem is your drones are continuing to operate at near full capacity, eventhough you have been outperformed by an opposing hacker/rigger. So not only is it no joy, it is no joy and here eat some hot lead for your effort, which smacks of munckinism, and mass twinkery. Hardwired commands are just that very specific commands, not the basis of an impossible to hack interactive platform.

I think that might be where most of us are coming from.

[KarmaInferno]

You should be able to encode basic actions with word substitutions so even if another rigger got control he wouldn't be able to command the drone.

For example, you pre-program a drone to understand that the command "Mack" means "open fire". "Hippo" means "My target". You execute "open fire on my target" by targeting something and issuing the command, "Mack Hippo".

Unlike ciphers and codes, word or phrase substitutions cannot really be cracked with just decryption. You need the codebook to do it, or at the very least listen to the code for a while to match word combinations with actions taken. Something that's very unlikely in the heat of a firefight, especially if the codebook gets randomized every mission, or even better if the system switches to a new codebook every, say, five minutes.

So the enemy rigger manages to get wireless-linked with your drone, and sends the command, "Open fire on my target!". But the drone didn't hear "Mack Hippo", so it does nothing. Unless the hijacking rigger somehow knows the phrase "Mack Hippo", he won't be able to execute the associated command.

This does limit the flexibility of commands, as the drone can only execute pre-coded command sequences. But it does increase security.


-karma

[Konsaki]

Of course if the 'Attack my target' command doesnt work, the hacker will do a browse test to see what commands do work and look at the effects of said commands. Easily bypassed.

[Kesslan]

Personally I'd just limit hard coding to tell the drone to shut off where it is, or in the case of a flyer drone, land and then shut off. And likely activate a tracking beacon or something so you can find it again.

But thats only assuming it's cut off from communication with the rigger via jamming or it some how realizes it's either been hacked (At which point it's probably too late) or is under a hacking attack.

Thats really allways been the threat of using drones. Sure their nifty, and pretty secure overall. But in the end they can be turned against you. Which is why I personaly dont ever send out too many attack capable drones.

The only other failsafe I could see working, is an independant explosive device wired to detonate after receiving a specific encoded burst transmission on a preset frequency (Which has the benifit of making it far less likely that some one will obtain the correct code. Because to get it they'd have to either have gotten to the drone allready, or to your transmitter)

[Lovesmasher]

[Lovesmasher]

[ShadowDragon8685]

I'm not talking about hardwared commands.

The hardware only does 2 things:

1: It shuts off and prevents the reactivation of the drone's radio recievers. At this point, the drone is RF-BLIND, there is no such thing as a remote command to it.
2: It flushes the actual programming in the drone's memory and restores it to your restore settings - much like using a system restore today. In this case, it restores it to "Pokemon Mode".

Sure, all the extra stuff will be needed - for one thing, you're probably going to have to devise and then learn a "Drone Command Sign Language". The drone can't pick up your AR target, so you have to delinate your target to it in the best way you can - pointing and shouting. This is where a high-rating autosoft comes in - but it's an autosoft that could fail - you might recognize that that pile of rocks has a sniper under it, and want your drone to throw an ATGM into the pile. If you had your drone's AR up, you could simply make an AR target there and order the drone to fire an ATGM at the AR target. But the drone isen't recieving AR - it simply knows you're indicating a rough direction you want it to fire in. It scans the area, fails to see any targets, and takes no action. Then the sniper fires again.

It does not operate the drone with anything near 100% efficiency. More like 40%. You have to be out there, risking your very own meatbod where you want the drone to operate - so chances are you're only going to risk your body long enough to issue the "Follow me!" command and leg it for the van.

[Kesslan]

With a system like that I'd probably think its operating at far less than 40 percent efficency, also there's a high probabilty then that it would interpret the target as being something other than intended, like that LS SWAT team that just rounded the corner, or that old lady in a wheelchair trying to flee from the 'terrorists' (Runners)

And if it totally glitched out on the interpretation, assuming it doesnt misidenfity the rigger some how (entirely possible at that point, especialy if some one is playing around with spells &/or disguises) then it may well attack the team, or Ms. Tiddlewinks prize shrubbery.

[ShadowDragon8685]

That's why you get the highest rated autosoft you can, including programming your own if nessessary. ;)

That way, you've got nobody to blame but yourself if your drone glitches and wastes the old lady. Though to be fair, it should recognize the difference between one person headed outbound and unarmed and twenty of them armed and inbound - that's pretty hard to mistake, you'd need a critical glitch to do that one..

[WearzManySkins]

[Rotbart van Dain...]

..and that being the case, you have no issue with a two-way transmission setup that only ever considers one end? I'm impressed.

[WearzManySkins]

[Rotbart van Dain...]

[neko128]

[WeaverMount]

[klinktastic]

If the rigger has an elaborate set up of failsafes in place, just make it a hit or 2 harder to hack. Either that, or you can make it an extended test or something.

[Tarantula]