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Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

theregister.com

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Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#51

Post by evv »

zaroth wrote: post #27

I have a DJI Mavic Mini and I was very impressed with the hardware and software overall. My kids and I have had a lot of fun flying this little drone! It does log every flight to the cloud, showing the telemetry logs of exactly where the drone flew and what it sent and received along the way (not full video, just telemetry). I find the logs extremely cool to look over after the fact when analyzing a flight. Their ins…

> I wouldn't want them to have copies of the video or pictures, and as I understand it those never leave the SD card.

I'm sure you know this, but in addition to the imagery being saved on the SD card, it is also streamed to your smartphone, which runs proprietary software and is connected to the internet.

Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#52

Post by mleonhard »

awinter-py wrote: post #12

woo! dept of interior insisted on this, got a forked DJI OS, and did an expensive consulting round to verify that it didn't phone home looks like all it takes to negotiate privacy w/ a big tech company is a million+ procurement process and a trade war

Can you share a link with more information on this forked DJI OS?

Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#53

Post by zaroth »

evv wrote: post #51
zaroth wrote: post #27

I have a DJI Mavic Mini and I was very impressed with the hardware and software overall. My kids and I have had a lot of fun flying this little drone! It does log every flight to the cloud, showing the telemetry logs of exactly where the drone flew and what it sent and received along the way (not full video, just telemetry). I find the logs extremely cool to look over after the fact when analyzing a flight. Their ins…

> I wouldn't want them to have copies of the video or pictures, and as I understand it those never leave the SD card. I'm sure you know this, but in addition to the imagery being saved on the SD card, it is also streamed to your smartphone, which runs proprietary software and is connected to the internet.

This is a very good point. There is absolutely the potential for the video feed or screenshots of the video feed to get onto their servers.

Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#54

Post by somehnguy »

zaroth wrote: post #48
davinic wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Drones are a serious responsibility, and can be misused to cause a lot of damage >I flew the drone over to a friend's back yard, and had misconfigured the "return-to-home" altitude too low You claim to understand the need for responsible drone ownership, yet in the same comment mention how you crashed your drone (luckily only into a tree) while violating clearly-stated FAA line-of-sight guidelines (and also not hav…

I think it’s possible to both understand that something is a serious responsibility as well as still crash a drone as an inexperienced operator. There was never danger to people or property (besides the drone itself). I just misjudged the one tall tree in the field between our houses which managed to exceed 30 meters, and somehow was unlucky enough for the drone to decide to fly exactly straight into the very top of…

>Worth noting that the range of the remote is significantly less than claimed in the marketing materials, which is not really surprising because they claim 4km (!) and it dropped out on me at ~200 meters.

This isn't really true. While radio links can of course perform poorly or unexpectedly at times, DJI's actually does deliver on their promises. It's quite incredible what they're doing with range of the control & video systems on 2.4 & 5.8Ghz actually. Not sure which model you have but the 2.4Ghz one will perform far better, though 5.8 is plenty fine in decent operating conditions. As you saw though, just because it can go 4km in normal conditions doesn't mean it won't ever hiccup for a variety of reasons (noise floor, obstructions, orientation, etc).

Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#55

Post by coronadisaster »

sneak wrote: post #49

Even DJI stuff that poses no risk whatsoever to health or safety, like their Osmo Pocket 4k gimbal camera, or their Osmo Action gopro-clone, require that you “activate” them, iPhone style, which logs at the very least your OS + IP (and thus rough location) + serial number to DJI. It’s bullshit. These are not internet-attached devices, they shouldn’t be spying on us. I’d love to see similar approaches to even domestic…

> These are not internet-attached devices, they shouldn’t be spying on us.

Should all internet-connected devices spy on us?

Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#56

Post by Aperocky »

libertine wrote: post #6
philips wrote: post #4

My take: DJI, Apple, Huawei, Google etc are all in a similar boat where the governments they operate under have publicly and privately pressured them to use their profitable platforms for spying or gathering evidence. This reduces their profitablity as consumers have less confidence the product isn't working against them. But in the case of DJI and Huawei and TikTok the US is more concerned about how those chinese co…

While I agree with you, I think there's something that should be pointed out: China stance on foreign companies doing business in China. Currently China wants all the perks of the open global market, while closing it's own. I don't understand how this is allowed.

Closing it's own as in? With the exception of internet giants, everything else seemed to be well represented in China.

name a western brand of physical good that's not available in China. Granted that our lives are more software oriented in this forum, majority of the trade in this planet is decidedly not.

Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#57

Post by fuzzylearner2 »

This new change is actually good for consumers though. One of the things that US government previously wanted was internet being necessary whenever you fly a drone.

This data was also supposed to be sent to a third party picked by the government and they would hold this data for months. I think it was on the lines of remote id or something.

Unrelated, but recently I finished an app for making recreational drone flying easy. Check it out https://dronetrails.app or download the test flight app at https://testflight.apple.com/join/id9NkioE

Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#58

Post by dicomdan »

Aperocky wrote: post #56
libertine wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree with you, I think there's something that should be pointed out: China stance on foreign companies doing business in China. Currently China wants all the perks of the open global market, while closing it's own. I don't understand how this is allowed.

Closing it's own as in? With the exception of internet giants, everything else seemed to be well represented in China. name a western brand of physical good that's not available in China. Granted that our lives are more software oriented in this forum, majority of the trade in this planet is decidedly not.

If you are an average Chinese citizen you cannot access most of the internet due to the Firewall. It's a modern day protectionism at an extreme level given that increasingly large parts of the economy are digital services nowadays.

Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#59

Post by Barrin92 »

libertine wrote: post #6
philips wrote: post #4

My take: DJI, Apple, Huawei, Google etc are all in a similar boat where the governments they operate under have publicly and privately pressured them to use their profitable platforms for spying or gathering evidence. This reduces their profitablity as consumers have less confidence the product isn't working against them. But in the case of DJI and Huawei and TikTok the US is more concerned about how those chinese co…

While I agree with you, I think there's something that should be pointed out: China stance on foreign companies doing business in China. Currently China wants all the perks of the open global market, while closing it's own. I don't understand how this is allowed.

>Currently China wants all the perks of the open global market, while closing it's own. I don't understand how this is allowed.

Because that's the equilibrium between the countries. Each side tries to negotiate whatever is most to their advantage and that's that. China wants more control over companies, the US wants access to what is going to be the world's largest market and source of qualified labour.

Each side can say no and walk away. For many US companies however that'd represent a significant loss, so they accept the conditions. Same reason people give Apple a 30% cut on their store.

Re: Drone firm DJI promises 'local data mode' to fend off US government's mooted ban

#60

Post by nfc_ »

libertine wrote: post #6
philips wrote: post #4

My take: DJI, Apple, Huawei, Google etc are all in a similar boat where the governments they operate under have publicly and privately pressured them to use their profitable platforms for spying or gathering evidence. This reduces their profitablity as consumers have less confidence the product isn't working against them. But in the case of DJI and Huawei and TikTok the US is more concerned about how those chinese co…

While I agree with you, I think there's something that should be pointed out: China stance on foreign companies doing business in China. Currently China wants all the perks of the open global market, while closing it's own. I don't understand how this is allowed.

China not being open to multinationals is a common narrative on HN and not supported by the data.

In fact in consumer goods, foreign companies have more market share in China (40%) than the US (26%).

https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/mckinsey/featured%20insight...

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