Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects' • Hacker News Board

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#21

Post by hugh-avherald » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 2:06 PM UTC

zozbot123 wrote: post #8

ajb257 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whilst a free press is important, I would argue that 'a man and a woman have been held in connection with the Gatwick Airport drone incident' would suffice. Kudos to the BBC for recognising this. It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime. Publishing their names and pictures before _even being charged_ does nothing but open potentially innocent…

> ... It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime. ... On the contrary, the commonly-acknowledged right of habeas corpus essentially requires the government to make the fact that someone is being detained public, at least if the prisoner himself so chooses. Privacy is a red herring here - habeas corpus is about preserving basic freedoms.

It's risible to claim that the press published the names because they were concerned about habeas corpus.

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#22

Post by setquk » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 2:09 PM UTC

qrbLPHiKpiux wrote: post #17

Normal_gaussian wrote: post #2

I'm sure the two of them are enjoying having their faces plastered over the sunday news ( https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs/the_papers ) and sorting through all the lovely messages they've received over the last day or so.

A lot of them death threats, others suggesting life prison and torture. Side note, this shows, in the lowest common denominator, the true nature of people on the internet.

Believe me it’s not just the internet. Those people are just as vocal about it among friends and family.

If you think the average British person is nice, you’ve probably just been lucky so far.

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#23

Post by DanBC » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 2:13 PM UTC

ajb257 wrote: post #5

Normal_gaussian wrote: post #2

I'm sure the two of them are enjoying having their faces plastered over the sunday news ( https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs/the_papers ) and sorting through all the lovely messages they've received over the last day or so.

Whilst a free press is important, I would argue that 'a man and a woman have been held in connection with the Gatwick Airport drone incident' would suffice. Kudos to the BBC for recognising this. It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime. Publishing their names and pictures before _even being charged_ does nothing but open potentially innocent…

> It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime.

The press always say that naming people who've been arrested is an important measure against authoritarian regimes. It allows the public to know whether police powers of arrest are being misused or not.

They appear to have lost this argument, because this is in tension with people's right to privacy and rights to a fair trial by the courts not by the media.

There's some interesting info here about different approaches: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/100634...

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/apr/21/press-intrusio...

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#24

Post by e40 » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 2:24 PM UTC

Normal_gaussian wrote: post #2

I'm sure the two of them are enjoying having their faces plastered over the sunday news ( https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs/the_papers ) and sorting through all the lovely messages they've received over the last day or so.

What happened to the UK law or practice of not naming suspects? That's the way it was a decade ago (or more?), right?

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#25

Post by goodcanadian » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 2:37 PM UTC

jstanley wrote: post #4

There must have been some motive for whoever did this. AFAIK, no environmental or terrorist groups have claimed responsibility. Is it possible that this has been done by someone within the police or intelligence community in order to create a pretext for pushing through drone licensing laws?

I believe it is more likely to be a foreign nation proving a capability. They've just shown that with a team of a dozen people or so and some moderately sophisticated drones, they could shut down every major airport in the country more or less indefinitely.

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#26

Post by knorker » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 2:54 PM UTC

goodcanadian wrote: post #25

jstanley wrote: post #4

There must have been some motive for whoever did this. AFAIK, no environmental or terrorist groups have claimed responsibility. Is it possible that this has been done by someone within the police or intelligence community in order to create a pretext for pushing through drone licensing laws?

I believe it is more likely to be a foreign nation proving a capability. They've just shown that with a team of a dozen people or so and some moderately sophisticated drones, they could shut down every major airport in the country more or less indefinitely.

I doubt it. That would be like burning a zero-day exploit. I think the airports have been absolutely asleep at the wheel because OF COURSE this was a risk. OF COURSE I would have set up TDoA equipment and had a company with anti-drone tech on speed dial (at the very least) if I were responsible for an airport bigger than a hobbyist field.

I bet you could get cover for Gatwick with TDoA equipment for less than $10k easy, say another $10k to have it installed.

Hell, you could probably get some amateur radio people to install it for free, but paying $10k is more CYA.

Anyway, my point is that now they sure as hell will prepare, so next time (well... give it a year for them to get their thumbs out of their asses) it will not work as well.

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#27

Post by danso » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 2:56 PM UTC

ajb257 wrote: post #5

Normal_gaussian wrote: post #2

I'm sure the two of them are enjoying having their faces plastered over the sunday news ( https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs/the_papers ) and sorting through all the lovely messages they've received over the last day or so.

Whilst a free press is important, I would argue that 'a man and a woman have been held in connection with the Gatwick Airport drone incident' would suffice. Kudos to the BBC for recognising this. It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime. Publishing their names and pictures before _even being charged_ does nothing but open potentially innocent…

I think the right to privacy vs. printing public info about the actions of our police is always going to be in tension. Of course, there's no argument that innocent people should have their privacy invaded, but ideally, innocent people shouldn't have been arrested at all. The flip side is when famous/powerful people are arrested but not charged, and the public not being able to know whether they got off because strings were pulled. And there's the overarching problem of people being disappeared with the public/press having no idea whether they were arrested, and for what reason. Which has led to some absurd situations in China recently:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/13/world/asia/china-fan-bing...

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#28

Post by jswizzy » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 2:56 PM UTC

I work with small drones, sUAS, and back in the day some of the guys were too lazy to go to the airfield to fly them and would just go to a beach park instead but it was close to an airforce base and an medium size airport. Anyways they were flying pumas and had the entire police force of the city show up. Luckily the drones they had were fixed wing and designed to just fall out of the sky so they brought them down really quick and got away. I'm sure no one ever figured out who was flying drones in their airspace.

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#29

Post by hopler » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 3:13 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #23

ajb257 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whilst a free press is important, I would argue that 'a man and a woman have been held in connection with the Gatwick Airport drone incident' would suffice. Kudos to the BBC for recognising this. It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime. Publishing their names and pictures before _even being charged_ does nothing but open potentially innocent…

> It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime. The press always say that naming people who've been arrested is an important measure against authoritarian regimes. It allows the public to know whether police powers of arrest are being misused or not. They appear to have lost this argument, because this is in tension with people's right to privacy…

There is an obvious difference between protecting people by tracking their identities in captivity vs harming people by publicly shaming them by immediately parroting the authority'sallegations.

Re: Gatwick drones pair 'no longer suspects'

#30

Post by goodcanadian » Sun, Dec 23, 2018, 3:15 PM UTC

knorker wrote: post #26

goodcanadian wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe it is more likely to be a foreign nation proving a capability. They've just shown that with a team of a dozen people or so and some moderately sophisticated drones, they could shut down every major airport in the country more or less indefinitely.

I doubt it. That would be like burning a zero-day exploit. I think the airports have been absolutely asleep at the wheel because OF COURSE this was a risk. OF COURSE I would have set up TDoA equipment and had a company with anti-drone tech on speed dial (at the very least) if I were responsible for an airport bigger than a hobbyist field. I bet you could get cover for Gatwick with TDoA equipment for less than $10k ea…

I see your point. However, if they were some kind of activists, we would have heard their manifesto by now. If they were simply trouble makers, I would have expected them to get bored (and maybe scared) a lot sooner. The list of reasonable candidates is a bit short. I wouldn't put it past the Russians (for example, I don't mean to point fingers) to cause trouble just for the sake of causing trouble. Also, even if this particular tactic becomes harder in the future, it shows just how pitiful the response has been. Whoever it was tested us, and we failed.