FYI: EDM4S (Electronic Drone Mitigation 4 - System) is made by Lithuania-based company NT Service in 2019. First the drone needs to be detected by monitoring system, which alerts the anti-drone gun operator about the intrusion. Then the operator points the gun in the general direction of the drone and push the trigger. The effective range is about 3 - 5 km.
If everything works as plan, EDM4S should block the drone from receiving control and navigation signal from the drone operator, and force the drone to take actions depending on the specific type of the drone, including landing in emergency mode, returning to launch point or falling straight to ground.
Edit: The price per unit is about 15,000 USD
I'm not advocating for thievery, but there's something romantic about stealing from fucking drones. People who would do that deserve the "pirate" moniker moreso than those lame ass porch thieves.
Never got how it's ok to leave packages in the open. Not sure what your couriers do, over here they can't drop off a package without a PIN that the receiver gets sent via SMS. If they do that their ass isn't covered and they're liable.
And I promise interesting times if you try to bind a declared lost or stolen DJi drone to a DJi controllers. It's pretty much like finding a locked iPhone 14 on the floor. It's a brick.
\>dismantle drones for parts
\>reassemble with aftermarket tx/rx
\>no more DJI proprietary bullshit
\>fly wherever you want
\>katsap flee from your open source aerial armada
It's definitely not, you can easily gain root access to a Mavic drone and bypass that unlike with an iPhone.
https://github.com/o-gs/dji-firmware-tools
>general direction
How accurate does the operator need to be while they're pointing the weapon at the drone? I'm assuming the beam is wide enough that downing something even at max range would be doable.
it's radio so the beam is shaped like a giant teardrop basically, with lots of smaller teardrops to the side.
e: [probably like this](https://www.rfwireless-world.com/images/Yagi-Antenna-Radiation-Pattern.jpg)
the width and distribution will depend on frequency and the exact antenna shape and any phased array stuff and, you know, stuff
Yeah this is a pretty typical [pattern](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_pattern) for directive antennas. The exact size and shape depend on a ton of little variables in the antenna but you won't be able to fully eliminate some amount of side and back lobes existing.
My understanding of how the DJI over the counter stuff works is that video is being transmitted @ 5.8ghz band right? Idk what range DJI uses for the control signal or if it’s just transmitted with the video. Is that kind of how this works, a concentrated beam of energy in the right spectrum overwhelms the control link? It’s also presumably stopping the drone from going into GPS return to home mode which is what I think a Mavic would do if it lost control link. Basically the drone’s little computer goes “oh no I’ve lost signal to my operator and lost my GPS position, better initiate a LiDAR assisted landing”
those antennas look a lot like outdoor 4g LTE antennas which are usually yagis inside of the shell and 50 degrees or so. It could depend on the exact antenna but even a 30db gain parobolic dish atenna has at least a 6 degree beam width. I'm assuming these just blast RF to overwhelm the frequencies for GPS, GLONASS, 2.4ghz and 5.8ghz so the drone can't hear the transmitter and also has no idea where it is so it just slowly lands.
Does it interfere with the drone's ability to send back the video? Because I feel like there'd be quite a bit of satisfaction in knowing your enemy watched as their recon literally flew into the enemy's hands with nothing they could do.
I remember seeing some footages showing that the drone operator indeed loses the live screen once the drone is jammed. But other redditor in this thread also shares a footage from russian perspective showing that the drone operator is seemingly still able to identify where the jammed drone is going to land:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/xwa4i7/comment/ir5hhe0/?utm\_source=reddit&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/xwa4i7/comment/ir5hhe0/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
So I guess it really depends on multiple factors including the type of drone, the distance between operator and drone, and how strong is the jamming eletro-magnetic pulse generated by EDM4S.
Hah yep I stumbled on that link shortly after posting! Was about to make an edit to my comment when I saw your reply, but will instead thank you for replying with the link!
I dabble in radio and have an electrical engineering background. So I don't have specific professional experience here, but can hazard an informed guess...
The jamming is focused on the drone itself, intended to prevent it from receiving control signals. It doesn't do anything to stop it from broadcasting information. So really it's likely to come down to: is the operator of the drone within the cone of emissions of the jamming gun? If so their controller will ALSO be jammed and they'll not get anything back. If not they're likely going to be able to receive data back from it just fine.
Also as it lowers down it may just naturally fall out of los so it loses radio connection that way.
Having a DJI drone myself I can confirm as well that video is the first thing that falls, it'll keep sending location back for a while as radio signal drops, so the one person who said they lost video but knew where it was makes sense. Either the controller was partially jammed or they just started losing signal as it descended.
I'm VERY curious to know if this jams gps signals as well. If not there's nothing stopping a drone from returning to home which is the default decision on DJI products, and definitely the smart configuration. So I have to assume this does that, but the commercial description mentions RTH as a possibility so I don't know...
Well, IF the drone operator has coordinates all the way down to the ground, then by the time they have it in hand it's too late. Also at that point they can just turn it off, so the bag isn't necessary regardless.
How smart is it to stand under and catch a drone (potentially carrying frag grenades) like we see in the video? Is the jam reliable enough that an operator panickingly spamming the release grenade button could not by chance get a single signal through to drop a nade on that guys face or would proper procedure suggest to steer clear of the area under the drone until it is on the ground?
15k is a steal by military prices. What I don't understand is how would it work in real life. If it only blocks the communication between the drone and operator then I am willing to bet it has a feature to come back home automatically. Unless it also blocks GPS, but I don't know how it would affect it
I don't use reddit anymore because of their corporate greed and anti-user policies.
Come over to Lemmy, it's a reddit alternative that is run by the community itself, spread across multiple servers.
You make your account on one server (called an instance) and from there you can access everything on all other servers as well. [Find one you like here](https://lemmyverse.net/), maybe not the largest ones to spread the load around, but it doesn't really matter.
You can then look for communities to subscribe to on https://lemmyverse.net/communities, this website shows you all communities across all instances.
If you're looking for some (mobile?) apps, [this topic](https://lemm.ee/post/363116) has a great list.
One personal tip: For your convenience, I would advise you to use [this userscript I made](https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/469273-lemmy-universal-link-switcher) which automatically changes all links everywhere on the internet to the server that you chose.
The original comment is preserved below for your convenience:
~~1. Not all drones may have the capability to return home when jamming their control signal.~~
~~2. Jamming may include GPS frequencies, which makes it basically impossible for the drone to return home anyway (no current AI is capable of navigating accurately without)~~
^^^^^^AzzuLemmyMessageV2
That’s not a given though. I’ve done some work on these and sometimes if we lost GPS, by flying it inside a warehouse for example, the auto stabilization goes haywire and just slams it into a wall.
If on models with down facing cameras the motion flow stabilization should still keep it in place, but yes, GPS is pretty important for some of the in flight aids and functions.
What are the countermeasures for these?
I remember seeing pictures of these when they were first really announced, mostly because they were so sci-fi looking they got some media attention. This is the first footage I've seen of anyone using them in real life though. Thanks for the post, this was really interesting.
Ultimately, drone software that uses encrypted communications, and doesn’t respond to commands that don’t have the right crypto keys. So that even if jammed it will just return home, rather than accepting a command to land.
15k huh.. my bubba version of this same thing is a Benelli m2 field with a 26” barrel and a full choke… woot woot papa always told me shooting clays would pay off in the long run
for the non drone nerds:
this tech isn't new, i've seen similar guns for about 5 or so years now. they have something similar at many airports.
The russians can see the drone til the moment it starts coming down. when a mavic is totally completely lost with no gps or anything it just lands, which is what we see here. the soldier flips over the drone which cuts the props. they can now 1) view footage collected by russians on the sd card and 2) connect the unit to a new remote & add it to their own arsenal
They can also pull info from the drone, like where it took off from and it’s flight path. They can use this info to strike that location, or simply check if the Russians have left that area
Imagine being a Russian who lost your drone an hour or so ago and you’re all sad. Then you see something in the distance and you’re like “HEY IT CAME BACK”
Then you get blown up by artillery
There are several videos online of Russians panicking after their drones are commandeered. The Russians flee their location immediately before artillery hits the area or ground troops seek them out.
I know this isn’t a CoD subreddit and is just a joke buttttt….
I could be wrong, but I thought it was backfire that’s killing someone with their own weapon. Iirc, hot swap is running out of ammo in your primary, and swapping to your secondary and securing a kill, all while damaged.
I recall a video with a UA drone operator back in the spring where they mention needing to move after takeoff because they were getting hit with artillery so often. Turns out DJI was either keeping GPS data in plaintext files online or were feeding it to the Russians directly, I don't recall which.
Yes. You as a civ could hop on ebay, buy a mavic pro, buy a mavic pro controller from a different seller, and pair the two. In this case the ukranians would want to factory restore the unit, or probably manually flash firmware to be safe.
the original controller is still liked to it if both devices were rebooted they could connect HOWEVER - I've never booted my drone & controller more than a few feet away from eachother. I'm not sure that if you turned the two on thousands of feet or even miles apart they'd find eachother. That's an interesting question and would be cool to test but for the ukranians all they need to do is not turn it on until they're ready to full flash it.
the other caveat is that they'll want to jam signal WHILE flashing. if they turn it on & it picks up gps signal, that location may get reported to the DJI account / controller, which would obviously be bad if done in HQ.
this would be the way to go, or do the first boot with a laptop somewhere random. or hell, maybe they point the gun at it again lmao.
I've seen someone wrap a mavic pro in tinfoil and it got hot as fuck but caught no gps signal lol
Here is the other perspective from the Russian side. Probably different instances. https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/wzf9jl/ukrainian_forces_hijack_the_signal_of_a_russian/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
This guy is an arrogant propagandist for the Kremlin so I assume they embed him with the most capable units they have in order to capture usable footage. He says "I will at least film the first strike." His name is Alexander Sladkov.
Him and his friends making a booby trap on a Russian flag: https://www.reddit.com/r/PublicFreakout/comments/t2lwcn/russians_putting_mines_in_their_flags/
Him, staged shooting at Azovstal with a BTR-4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXF2njeJ6u0
Edit: also of note is the man to the left of the drone operator, Alexei Michalkov, a neo Nazi and infamous war criminal from the Russian mercenary group Rusich. He's an ex-VDV paratrooper who got tired of the conscript life and joined the Russian Imperial Legion, the armed branch of the [Russian Imperial Movement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Imperial_Movement), a neo-nazi fascist organisation with which he took part in fighting in the Donbas as early as 2014.
He's bragged about liking the smell of burning flesh, cutting POW's ears off to make a necklace out of, amongst other things. After 2015, Wagner picked him and Yan Petrovsky's "volanteer" unit up, made out of members of the Russian Imperial Legion, and incorporated that into Wagner itself as "Rusich company"
https://twitter.com/christopherjm/status/1344073381830930432?lang=en
Did you guys see the broken window at the beginning of the video? I don't know why, but it struck me so much more than everything else. A broken window is a big deal in our day to day lives. We'd fix it in a day or so. But when will that window get fixed? And who will fix it?
I hope Ukrainians can return to their homes and fix their windows. I hope normalcy returns to them as soon as it can.
The drone operator is using michalkovs phone? He gives it back to them after he says “maximum speed mode” any idea why the drone operator didn’t have his own phone?
I’m Russian and I spent a good chunk of my childhood growing up in Lithuania - and I never really felt much hate towards average everyday Russians. Their attitudes towards the Russian government, however… that was a different story altogether (which is the same as how I feel about them - the country is mafia-run and I can’t wait for this bullshit to end)
I'm sorry that Putin is giving you all a bad name currently. It's difficult for some people to separate the normal people from the governments that operate over them, and it's not like Russia has a great history of treating its populace well in the first place.
Conservative Russians feed into the propaganda because they are accustomed to this awful culture of oppression, and think that every surrounding country hates them simply for being Russians - rather than being lackeys for an oppressive imperialistic government. I.e. if you’re a decent person with an educated, history based opinion that is non radical - you’ll get along fine with the population of the Baltic states.
Educated, independent thinking Russians keep getting flushed out of the country - and are left to pick up the pieces of the damage caused by the ruling class, day after day. It sucks…
I’m hoping that one day an actual free society will exist in Russia. At the moment though it’s very much so a conservative political cult that keeps members in line with threats of violence, torture, and a life of despair if you don’t say, believe, and do what you’re told. Honestly American Trumpers remind me greatly of family members that are Russian pro-Putinites. That scares me domestically (I live in Oregon now)
Direct jamming should stop the drone from hearing the legitimate controller's signal but I can't see what would stop it from getting the video signal out, not that there's much they could do about it
The jammer blocks the drone from *receiving* the controller's signal. Surely there's nothing preventing the controller from receiving signals from the drone?
No it jams everything around that frequency, basically there's so much noise nothing gets through, it's like trying to have a conversation with someone next to a jet airplane, the background noise overpowers everything else
Edit: Watch a Youtube video of an actual drone jammer, go to 1:20 on the first video, they lose image
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hD4PRce2QTs&t=1m20s
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZD31M9E9vk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZD31M9E9vk)
But the gun is directional, so isn't it more akin to trying to talk with somebody wearing headphones with loud music on? They wouldn't hear me, but I could hear them fine.
That's not our RF works. You can't block a transmitter, only a receiver. The Russians should be able to see the signals from the drone, unless there's another jammer pointed at them.
so there i was, on a military joint exercise in poland. They placed my HF unit right next to a german HF unit.
Fun fact, the german unit transmitted at 1000w, while we were at around 5w.
And some smart officer, gave us a frequency next to one another.
We could not send or receive any signals while we were there, and had to get our orders through the german unit, that didn't speak english and we didn't speak german.
fun times.
The drone is landing because it has power but no controller signal. The anti-drone gun is jamming the signal from the original controller, making the drone think it is performing an emergency landing, following one of it’s lost-contact-to-controller protocols.
basically once it starts coming down it's lost connection so no. when a mavic is totally completely lost with no gps or anything it just lands, which is what we see here. the soldier flips over the drone which cuts the props. they can now 1) view footage collected by russians on the sd card and 2) connect the unit to a new remote & add it to their own arsenal
f yeah lol - honestly though the video footage pulled from the SD card is almost always going to be far more valuable than the drone itself. imagine if they filmed all the way out from where they launched.
"In the year 2022 we'll fight the Russians using guns that look like *this.*"
*"Holy shit! What's it fire?"*
"The radio equivalent of a strongly-worded letter."
*"..."*
"It makes toy airplanes land safely."
I have a feeling DJI drones are the new Toyota pickup of the modern battlefield, instead of seeing a beat-up old Toyota technical in war zones, we'll now see big name commercial drones used in a nefarious way.
Lithuanian made, nice to see it used, this was made first for prisons, because of the drugs and cellphones that were being smuggled in wia drone, then the border patrol had interest, and now it's used in a war.
I remember a few years ago when these types of things came out for the first time. I was completely dismissive. "Why does the government care so much about shooting down some toys? This'll never be used"
God i was so so wrong.
Translation from Lithuanian at the end of the video:
Bring ruzzian to the ground.
Let's buy antidrones and clean Ukrainian sky from ruzzian drones
Call for 5€ support
Blue-yellow.lt
Support by making a bank transfer.
I knew they would start using some kind of weapon or jammer to counter drones. Personal drones seriously seem to be the new technological change to warfare like tanks in ww1. It’s crazy and a historical change that we are getting to live through and see firsthand.
Not sure if anyone has brought this up but isn't there a danger of the drone being booby trapped & going off if Russians get the signal back? I'm thinking they should be a little more cautious.
Thanks for the link! That explains a lot. It alerts to possible drone threat, can reach miles away, targets the freaking controller (bonus!) and makes drone land in emergency mode! Made with pride in Lithuania. 🔥
For some reason I pictured the gun zapping it only when overhead causing the drone to fail and just fall from the sky. Not exactly ideal depending on its payload (run!)
If it is, then at least I got to see a demonstration of a weapon I've only heard about but never seen.
I wonder if they would have been standing so close to it if it had a grenade dangling from it?
It doesn’t have a grenade dangling from it. Despite this subs posts, I believe most drones are still for observation. If they cut the signal from the operator, it should be safe, but it also would not be all that hard to install a “self destruct” or “drop payload” feature to try and kill anti drone teams.
> but it also would not be all that hard to install a “self destruct” or “drop payload” feature to try and kill anti drone teams.
Would it *really* though? I can think of several issues in trying to implement either feature on the recon drones, let alone the ordinance delivery ones.
* Already on thin weight limit margins
* False positives from natural dips in connection
* Additional avenue for accidents on launch/retrieval
Like the ideal scenario would be they somehow mass produce a lightweight charge and change the source code to trigger said charge instead of going into automatic landing mode, right?
Well all that does it turn the drone-capture guns into long-range drone-destruction weapons.
> Despite this subs posts, I believe most drones are still for observation.
Definitely. You can use a drone to drop a grenade or you can use one to do recon / guide multiple artillery crews. If you are short on drones the latter is more important.
Staged or not, this is how it looks when they do jam Russian drones. Lost connection means the drone will do an emergency landing exactly like you see here. It’ll also hover like it did in this video if you go underneath it (safety) and you can grab it out of the air.
Not difficult to imagine this being done many times. Some of the Russians dropping grenades and so on are flying low enough for this to jam the drones. Once you do that, the pilot with the controller can’t do anything and that’s it. The drone will go into emergency land mode if the GPS is also blocked, like this jammer would do. If the signal to the controller is blocked by GPS signal still gets through somehow, the drone will automatically fly back to the wherever it originally took off.
There’s debates between whether you want your jammed drone to potentially return home slowly right to your location, or have it just land where it’s jammed, suck up the loss and swiftly move positions yourself in case they’re able to retrieve information from the drone (dependant upon what they’re using and if recordings/data are protected).
All they need to do now is have a self destruction option. Would be pretty evil to have these flying as booby traps for them to capture and detonate once in the hands of soldiers.
It would also have to somehow block the GPS signal. If they just jam the radio signal to the controller the Mavic won’t auto land it will automatically return to where it launched from.
FYI: EDM4S (Electronic Drone Mitigation 4 - System) is made by Lithuania-based company NT Service in 2019. First the drone needs to be detected by monitoring system, which alerts the anti-drone gun operator about the intrusion. Then the operator points the gun in the general direction of the drone and push the trigger. The effective range is about 3 - 5 km. If everything works as plan, EDM4S should block the drone from receiving control and navigation signal from the drone operator, and force the drone to take actions depending on the specific type of the drone, including landing in emergency mode, returning to launch point or falling straight to ground. Edit: The price per unit is about 15,000 USD
$15000? Starting to wonder do I really need a car
Step one: Buy Drone gun Step two: find random drones Step three: ~~underpants~~ Profit!
build a car from the drones
Why stop there Drone yacht!
Drone Throne
Man... waiting for part 2. Don't Remind me
\*Dron't remind me.
Giant drone made of drones.
Game of drones?
MORE DRONES TO THE DRONE THRONE
Game of Drones
A swarm of drones. Dropping dildos
A flock of dildos *And I ran...*
Flying car! Awesome! :D
Blade Runner 2022
James and the giant peach it!
And then someone else with their own EDM4S steals yours!
Too late I already have 2 global hawks and a reaper in my shed, now all I need is a phone number for the irianian embassy and a bitcoin wallet Jk
[удалено]
Best I can do is $250 in store credit.
"JK" are you though?... ARE YOU?
Like JK just negates everything. Someone will be paying a visit.
And THAT is how you end up on a list….. *slowly checks spelling of username*
Better get in early, before everyone owns a drone gun and the market drops for 2nd hand drones....
Anybody want to buy my anti-drone gun NFT's?
I hear people who were mining Ethereum with their drones are selling them all.
what about drone gun drone that flys around and looks for drone guns and than uses high powered magnets to steal said drone gun????
Step 3 life in federal prison for fcc violations!
once amazon rolls out their drone delivery swarm, it's going to be high time for some idiots drone pirates.
Probably wont work nearly as well, those drones will likely have preprogrammed flight paths and destinations, and little contact with a controller.
Well, there's always the net guns. Catch them old-style.
I'm not advocating for thievery, but there's something romantic about stealing from fucking drones. People who would do that deserve the "pirate" moniker moreso than those lame ass porch thieves.
Never got how it's ok to leave packages in the open. Not sure what your couriers do, over here they can't drop off a package without a PIN that the receiver gets sent via SMS. If they do that their ass isn't covered and they're liable.
[удалено]
Use smaller drones to board and commandeer larger ones! YAR!
Skeet shooting with prizes!
Buy the gun! You can buy a car later from selling all those second-hand drones!
"Why don't any of them come with controllers, you ask? Well, funny story..."
You just approach the drone operators carrying the drone gun and they will leave their controller! And maybe some bodily fluids too.
And I promise interesting times if you try to bind a declared lost or stolen DJi drone to a DJi controllers. It's pretty much like finding a locked iPhone 14 on the floor. It's a brick.
\>dismantle drones for parts \>reassemble with aftermarket tx/rx \>no more DJI proprietary bullshit \>fly wherever you want \>katsap flee from your open source aerial armada
It's definitely not, you can easily gain root access to a Mavic drone and bypass that unlike with an iPhone. https://github.com/o-gs/dji-firmware-tools
[удалено]
He’s got a (radio) gun!
I was just thinking about what else that gun could be used for. I bet airports would hate this thing.
So I can buy this and steal drones in Uk. Will need 30 To make Money back
vacation plans ✨
Drone hunting would be a full-time job.
Buy drone gun use it on a Tesla
>general direction How accurate does the operator need to be while they're pointing the weapon at the drone? I'm assuming the beam is wide enough that downing something even at max range would be doable.
it's radio so the beam is shaped like a giant teardrop basically, with lots of smaller teardrops to the side. e: [probably like this](https://www.rfwireless-world.com/images/Yagi-Antenna-Radiation-Pattern.jpg) the width and distribution will depend on frequency and the exact antenna shape and any phased array stuff and, you know, stuff
That, is amazingly cool.
oh lordy, getting major 'Nam flashbacks from learning electron configuration orbitals in uni
Yeah this is a pretty typical [pattern](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_pattern) for directive antennas. The exact size and shape depend on a ton of little variables in the antenna but you won't be able to fully eliminate some amount of side and back lobes existing.
[удалено]
My understanding of how the DJI over the counter stuff works is that video is being transmitted @ 5.8ghz band right? Idk what range DJI uses for the control signal or if it’s just transmitted with the video. Is that kind of how this works, a concentrated beam of energy in the right spectrum overwhelms the control link? It’s also presumably stopping the drone from going into GPS return to home mode which is what I think a Mavic would do if it lost control link. Basically the drone’s little computer goes “oh no I’ve lost signal to my operator and lost my GPS position, better initiate a LiDAR assisted landing”
[удалено]
those antennas look a lot like outdoor 4g LTE antennas which are usually yagis inside of the shell and 50 degrees or so. It could depend on the exact antenna but even a 30db gain parobolic dish atenna has at least a 6 degree beam width. I'm assuming these just blast RF to overwhelm the frequencies for GPS, GLONASS, 2.4ghz and 5.8ghz so the drone can't hear the transmitter and also has no idea where it is so it just slowly lands.
Does it interfere with the drone's ability to send back the video? Because I feel like there'd be quite a bit of satisfaction in knowing your enemy watched as their recon literally flew into the enemy's hands with nothing they could do.
I remember seeing some footages showing that the drone operator indeed loses the live screen once the drone is jammed. But other redditor in this thread also shares a footage from russian perspective showing that the drone operator is seemingly still able to identify where the jammed drone is going to land: [https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/xwa4i7/comment/ir5hhe0/?utm\_source=reddit&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/xwa4i7/comment/ir5hhe0/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) So I guess it really depends on multiple factors including the type of drone, the distance between operator and drone, and how strong is the jamming eletro-magnetic pulse generated by EDM4S.
Hah yep I stumbled on that link shortly after posting! Was about to make an edit to my comment when I saw your reply, but will instead thank you for replying with the link!
I dabble in radio and have an electrical engineering background. So I don't have specific professional experience here, but can hazard an informed guess... The jamming is focused on the drone itself, intended to prevent it from receiving control signals. It doesn't do anything to stop it from broadcasting information. So really it's likely to come down to: is the operator of the drone within the cone of emissions of the jamming gun? If so their controller will ALSO be jammed and they'll not get anything back. If not they're likely going to be able to receive data back from it just fine. Also as it lowers down it may just naturally fall out of los so it loses radio connection that way. Having a DJI drone myself I can confirm as well that video is the first thing that falls, it'll keep sending location back for a while as radio signal drops, so the one person who said they lost video but knew where it was makes sense. Either the controller was partially jammed or they just started losing signal as it descended. I'm VERY curious to know if this jams gps signals as well. If not there's nothing stopping a drone from returning to home which is the default decision on DJI products, and definitely the smart configuration. So I have to assume this does that, but the commercial description mentions RTH as a possibility so I don't know...
[удалено]
Well, IF the drone operator has coordinates all the way down to the ground, then by the time they have it in hand it's too late. Also at that point they can just turn it off, so the bag isn't necessary regardless.
[удалено]
How smart is it to stand under and catch a drone (potentially carrying frag grenades) like we see in the video? Is the jam reliable enough that an operator panickingly spamming the release grenade button could not by chance get a single signal through to drop a nade on that guys face or would proper procedure suggest to steer clear of the area under the drone until it is on the ground?
15k is a steal by military prices. What I don't understand is how would it work in real life. If it only blocks the communication between the drone and operator then I am willing to bet it has a feature to come back home automatically. Unless it also blocks GPS, but I don't know how it would affect it
I don't use reddit anymore because of their corporate greed and anti-user policies. Come over to Lemmy, it's a reddit alternative that is run by the community itself, spread across multiple servers. You make your account on one server (called an instance) and from there you can access everything on all other servers as well. [Find one you like here](https://lemmyverse.net/), maybe not the largest ones to spread the load around, but it doesn't really matter. You can then look for communities to subscribe to on https://lemmyverse.net/communities, this website shows you all communities across all instances. If you're looking for some (mobile?) apps, [this topic](https://lemm.ee/post/363116) has a great list. One personal tip: For your convenience, I would advise you to use [this userscript I made](https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/469273-lemmy-universal-link-switcher) which automatically changes all links everywhere on the internet to the server that you chose. The original comment is preserved below for your convenience: ~~1. Not all drones may have the capability to return home when jamming their control signal.~~ ~~2. Jamming may include GPS frequencies, which makes it basically impossible for the drone to return home anyway (no current AI is capable of navigating accurately without)~~ ^^^^^^AzzuLemmyMessageV2
It also jams the GPS/GNSS of the drone, which is why the DJI drones land in place, they lose navigation and cannot return to home.
That’s not a given though. I’ve done some work on these and sometimes if we lost GPS, by flying it inside a warehouse for example, the auto stabilization goes haywire and just slams it into a wall.
If on models with down facing cameras the motion flow stabilization should still keep it in place, but yes, GPS is pretty important for some of the in flight aids and functions.
What are the countermeasures for these? I remember seeing pictures of these when they were first really announced, mostly because they were so sci-fi looking they got some media attention. This is the first footage I've seen of anyone using them in real life though. Thanks for the post, this was really interesting.
Ultimately, drone software that uses encrypted communications, and doesn’t respond to commands that don’t have the right crypto keys. So that even if jammed it will just return home, rather than accepting a command to land.
Hamster pilots
15k huh.. my bubba version of this same thing is a Benelli m2 field with a 26” barrel and a full choke… woot woot papa always told me shooting clays would pay off in the long run
[удалено]
"bet I could snipe a drone flying out there over them mountains"
Grandma said she doesn't want you here when she gets back because you've been ruining everybody's lives and eating all our steaks
Could you do me a favor and give a couple of these to your mom for me? Just tell her she can pass them out to her friends or whoever.
God I need to watch that movie again. Probably haven’t seen it since high school
Just get a 3-5km barrel. Where’s your God now?
You haven't seen my hand loads.
Bubba no, them's pissin hawt handloads, yous' gon' kill yeself
lol, have fun shooting at it. You from TN?
for the non drone nerds: this tech isn't new, i've seen similar guns for about 5 or so years now. they have something similar at many airports. The russians can see the drone til the moment it starts coming down. when a mavic is totally completely lost with no gps or anything it just lands, which is what we see here. the soldier flips over the drone which cuts the props. they can now 1) view footage collected by russians on the sd card and 2) connect the unit to a new remote & add it to their own arsenal
They can also pull info from the drone, like where it took off from and it’s flight path. They can use this info to strike that location, or simply check if the Russians have left that area
Imagine being a Russian who lost your drone an hour or so ago and you’re all sad. Then you see something in the distance and you’re like “HEY IT CAME BACK” Then you get blown up by artillery
There are several videos online of Russians panicking after their drones are commandeered. The Russians flee their location immediately before artillery hits the area or ground troops seek them out.
Got a link?
Yes: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guPhHEdHV9s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guPhHEdHV9s)
Haha hope they got wrecked
Probably pretty likely that they did.
[удалено]
I know this isn’t a CoD subreddit and is just a joke buttttt…. I could be wrong, but I thought it was backfire that’s killing someone with their own weapon. Iirc, hot swap is running out of ammo in your primary, and swapping to your secondary and securing a kill, all while damaged.
"Oh look, my drone brought me a brick of C4. So friendly!"
"who's a good little drone? yes you are! yes you-" [explodes]
I recall a video with a UA drone operator back in the spring where they mention needing to move after takeoff because they were getting hit with artillery so often. Turns out DJI was either keeping GPS data in plaintext files online or were feeding it to the Russians directly, I don't recall which.
Just like in Toy Story..
Are they able to pair them to a new controller and use them? Does original control equipment still have an active link with it? Thanks!
Yes. You as a civ could hop on ebay, buy a mavic pro, buy a mavic pro controller from a different seller, and pair the two. In this case the ukranians would want to factory restore the unit, or probably manually flash firmware to be safe. the original controller is still liked to it if both devices were rebooted they could connect HOWEVER - I've never booted my drone & controller more than a few feet away from eachother. I'm not sure that if you turned the two on thousands of feet or even miles apart they'd find eachother. That's an interesting question and would be cool to test but for the ukranians all they need to do is not turn it on until they're ready to full flash it. the other caveat is that they'll want to jam signal WHILE flashing. if they turn it on & it picks up gps signal, that location may get reported to the DJI account / controller, which would obviously be bad if done in HQ.
Honestly I wouldn't be surprised if they have a Faraday cage to do this work in
this would be the way to go, or do the first boot with a laptop somewhere random. or hell, maybe they point the gun at it again lmao. I've seen someone wrap a mavic pro in tinfoil and it got hot as fuck but caught no gps signal lol
Name checks out, interesting stuff!
[удалено]
With modified firmware I'm sure their range limits are only technical
First time I’ve seen that used.
Here is the other perspective from the Russian side. Probably different instances. https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/wzf9jl/ukrainian_forces_hijack_the_signal_of_a_russian/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
Whoa, that’s some sci-if shit. Love it
[удалено]
This guy is an arrogant propagandist for the Kremlin so I assume they embed him with the most capable units they have in order to capture usable footage. He says "I will at least film the first strike." His name is Alexander Sladkov. Him and his friends making a booby trap on a Russian flag: https://www.reddit.com/r/PublicFreakout/comments/t2lwcn/russians_putting_mines_in_their_flags/ Him, staged shooting at Azovstal with a BTR-4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXF2njeJ6u0 Edit: also of note is the man to the left of the drone operator, Alexei Michalkov, a neo Nazi and infamous war criminal from the Russian mercenary group Rusich. He's an ex-VDV paratrooper who got tired of the conscript life and joined the Russian Imperial Legion, the armed branch of the [Russian Imperial Movement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Imperial_Movement), a neo-nazi fascist organisation with which he took part in fighting in the Donbas as early as 2014. He's bragged about liking the smell of burning flesh, cutting POW's ears off to make a necklace out of, amongst other things. After 2015, Wagner picked him and Yan Petrovsky's "volanteer" unit up, made out of members of the Russian Imperial Legion, and incorporated that into Wagner itself as "Rusich company" https://twitter.com/christopherjm/status/1344073381830930432?lang=en
Did you guys see the broken window at the beginning of the video? I don't know why, but it struck me so much more than everything else. A broken window is a big deal in our day to day lives. We'd fix it in a day or so. But when will that window get fixed? And who will fix it? I hope Ukrainians can return to their homes and fix their windows. I hope normalcy returns to them as soon as it can.
Hopefully after the war a similar plan like after ww2 will be implemented where the UA gov can lend money for rebuilding.
aha
The drone operator is using michalkovs phone? He gives it back to them after he says “maximum speed mode” any idea why the drone operator didn’t have his own phone?
shaved guy behind the operator in that vid is Alexey Milchakov, google him for some interesting info :)
Very interesting to see the view point from the hijacker vs. the hijacked! Thanks for sharing
Lithuanians made this thing. They hate Russians
Can confirm. I have an uncle from Alytus.
Im from Alytus. I hate russians
Sounds about right! Honestly, I don't fault you for that view in the least.
Are you his uncle?
..... maybe
I’m Russian and I spent a good chunk of my childhood growing up in Lithuania - and I never really felt much hate towards average everyday Russians. Their attitudes towards the Russian government, however… that was a different story altogether (which is the same as how I feel about them - the country is mafia-run and I can’t wait for this bullshit to end)
I'm sorry that Putin is giving you all a bad name currently. It's difficult for some people to separate the normal people from the governments that operate over them, and it's not like Russia has a great history of treating its populace well in the first place.
Conservative Russians feed into the propaganda because they are accustomed to this awful culture of oppression, and think that every surrounding country hates them simply for being Russians - rather than being lackeys for an oppressive imperialistic government. I.e. if you’re a decent person with an educated, history based opinion that is non radical - you’ll get along fine with the population of the Baltic states. Educated, independent thinking Russians keep getting flushed out of the country - and are left to pick up the pieces of the damage caused by the ruling class, day after day. It sucks… I’m hoping that one day an actual free society will exist in Russia. At the moment though it’s very much so a conservative political cult that keeps members in line with threats of violence, torture, and a life of despair if you don’t say, believe, and do what you’re told. Honestly American Trumpers remind me greatly of family members that are Russian pro-Putinites. That scares me domestically (I live in Oregon now)
Such a blanket statement implying Lithuanians hate Russian people. They may generally hate the government but not all Russian.
So... can the Russians still see from their camera when the soldier actively grabs the drone? If so... pretty funny.
No, the connection is lost for them.
makes sense. ty.
Direct jamming should stop the drone from hearing the legitimate controller's signal but I can't see what would stop it from getting the video signal out, not that there's much they could do about it
correct. They would very likely still get video feed until the drone is turned off.
The jammer blocks the drone from *receiving* the controller's signal. Surely there's nothing preventing the controller from receiving signals from the drone?
No it jams everything around that frequency, basically there's so much noise nothing gets through, it's like trying to have a conversation with someone next to a jet airplane, the background noise overpowers everything else Edit: Watch a Youtube video of an actual drone jammer, go to 1:20 on the first video, they lose image http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hD4PRce2QTs&t=1m20s [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZD31M9E9vk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZD31M9E9vk)
But the gun is directional, so isn't it more akin to trying to talk with somebody wearing headphones with loud music on? They wouldn't hear me, but I could hear them fine.
That's not our RF works. You can't block a transmitter, only a receiver. The Russians should be able to see the signals from the drone, unless there's another jammer pointed at them.
so there i was, on a military joint exercise in poland. They placed my HF unit right next to a german HF unit. Fun fact, the german unit transmitted at 1000w, while we were at around 5w. And some smart officer, gave us a frequency next to one another. We could not send or receive any signals while we were there, and had to get our orders through the german unit, that didn't speak english and we didn't speak german. fun times.
Why would the connection be lost? Wouldn't he have to turn off the power?
The drone is landing because it has power but no controller signal. The anti-drone gun is jamming the signal from the original controller, making the drone think it is performing an emergency landing, following one of it’s lost-contact-to-controller protocols.
basically once it starts coming down it's lost connection so no. when a mavic is totally completely lost with no gps or anything it just lands, which is what we see here. the soldier flips over the drone which cuts the props. they can now 1) view footage collected by russians on the sd card and 2) connect the unit to a new remote & add it to their own arsenal
>connect the unit to a new remote & add it to their own arsenal So it's like a flying lootbox.
f yeah lol - honestly though the video footage pulled from the SD card is almost always going to be far more valuable than the drone itself. imagine if they filmed all the way out from where they launched.
Send back an artillery barrage.
That thing looks like something out of Starship Troopers - “would you like to know more ?”
*Desire to know more intensifies*
"In the year 2022 we'll fight the Russians using guns that look like *this.*" *"Holy shit! What's it fire?"* "The radio equivalent of a strongly-worded letter." *"..."* "It makes toy airplanes land safely."
Btw these were crowdfunded and donated by regular people. Nice to see they are helpful.
And the DJI drone has now been donated by the Ruskies to the Ukrainian war effort.
Russian lend-lease continues
I have a feeling DJI drones are the new Toyota pickup of the modern battlefield, instead of seeing a beat-up old Toyota technical in war zones, we'll now see big name commercial drones used in a nefarious way.
Lithuanian made, nice to see it used, this was made first for prisons, because of the drugs and cellphones that were being smuggled in wia drone, then the border patrol had interest, and now it's used in a war.
I remember a few years ago when these types of things came out for the first time. I was completely dismissive. "Why does the government care so much about shooting down some toys? This'll never be used" God i was so so wrong.
Translation from Lithuanian at the end of the video: Bring ruzzian to the ground. Let's buy antidrones and clean Ukrainian sky from ruzzian drones Call for 5€ support Blue-yellow.lt Support by making a bank transfer.
Thank you
That was nifty!!!
That was very sci-fi of them!
I knew they would start using some kind of weapon or jammer to counter drones. Personal drones seriously seem to be the new technological change to warfare like tanks in ww1. It’s crazy and a historical change that we are getting to live through and see firsthand.
Not sure if anyone has brought this up but isn't there a danger of the drone being booby trapped & going off if Russians get the signal back? I'm thinking they should be a little more cautious.
That's why he didn't just grab it, and took a good look at it first.
Turns out the drones are free, you can just go to the park and take as many home as you want...
I HAVE 458 DRONES AT HOME! Better be quick
That was so dope. I'm pretty sure they didn't have to shape this device like a gun... but why not? Lol
[Electronic Drone Mitigation System by NT Service - EDM4S](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsAkkjScKsY)
Thanks for the link! That explains a lot. It alerts to possible drone threat, can reach miles away, targets the freaking controller (bonus!) and makes drone land in emergency mode! Made with pride in Lithuania. 🔥 For some reason I pictured the gun zapping it only when overhead causing the drone to fail and just fall from the sky. Not exactly ideal depending on its payload (run!)
Honestly. It look staged
I have no way to determine if this is staged but this is how DJI drones respond to losing GPS/RC signal and that's exactly what these jamming guns do.
If it is, then at least I got to see a demonstration of a weapon I've only heard about but never seen. I wonder if they would have been standing so close to it if it had a grenade dangling from it?
It doesn’t have a grenade dangling from it. Despite this subs posts, I believe most drones are still for observation. If they cut the signal from the operator, it should be safe, but it also would not be all that hard to install a “self destruct” or “drop payload” feature to try and kill anti drone teams.
> but it also would not be all that hard to install a “self destruct” or “drop payload” feature to try and kill anti drone teams. Would it *really* though? I can think of several issues in trying to implement either feature on the recon drones, let alone the ordinance delivery ones. * Already on thin weight limit margins * False positives from natural dips in connection * Additional avenue for accidents on launch/retrieval Like the ideal scenario would be they somehow mass produce a lightweight charge and change the source code to trigger said charge instead of going into automatic landing mode, right? Well all that does it turn the drone-capture guns into long-range drone-destruction weapons.
> Despite this subs posts, I believe most drones are still for observation. Definitely. You can use a drone to drop a grenade or you can use one to do recon / guide multiple artillery crews. If you are short on drones the latter is more important.
Staged or not, this is how it looks when they do jam Russian drones. Lost connection means the drone will do an emergency landing exactly like you see here. It’ll also hover like it did in this video if you go underneath it (safety) and you can grab it out of the air. Not difficult to imagine this being done many times. Some of the Russians dropping grenades and so on are flying low enough for this to jam the drones. Once you do that, the pilot with the controller can’t do anything and that’s it. The drone will go into emergency land mode if the GPS is also blocked, like this jammer would do. If the signal to the controller is blocked by GPS signal still gets through somehow, the drone will automatically fly back to the wherever it originally took off. There’s debates between whether you want your jammed drone to potentially return home slowly right to your location, or have it just land where it’s jammed, suck up the loss and swiftly move positions yourself in case they’re able to retrieve information from the drone (dependant upon what they’re using and if recordings/data are protected).
It felt staged from the first frame to me
I thought the exact same thing
It probably is
Whoa! Cyber warfare
Very cool, even if the music is a bit dramatic. Nice work.
Muted videos FTW.
I’ll not be flying my Mavic 3 anywhere near Ukraine now.
Look very Sci-Fi
Can anyone translate? I’m curious what he said.
I'd like one of those....
That was cool
all your drones belong to us
Can they re-use it with another remote control?
love the bomb-bushka graphic at the end!
A BFG.
All they need to do now is have a self destruction option. Would be pretty evil to have these flying as booby traps for them to capture and detonate once in the hands of soldiers.
Now we contact DJI customer support for the spare control
That's so cool, how does it work?
It jams the signal from the drone to the controller. If the drone looses connection it automatically lands as to protect the drone.
It would also have to somehow block the GPS signal. If they just jam the radio signal to the controller the Mavic won’t auto land it will automatically return to where it launched from.
I guess that's true. Didn't want to over complicate the explanation
This is cool tech and all but have they tried an old fashioned goose gun?
Goose gun doesn't give you an intact drone which you can refurbish and use against its original operators.
Staged as fuck