David McManus says concerns are being raised about the flying machines

For people of a certain age, the word drone still conjures up images of dystopian science fiction films like Bladerunner or Terminator where autonomous flying robots hovered over the population keeping a watchful and controlling eye on its activities.

We now find ourselves in a world where drones are a reality. At present, the only fully autonomous models are owned by the military and governments insist they are used only for spying and reconnaissance while their slightly less self aware versions are remotely piloted by army personnel.

While those armed pilotless vehicles bring up a whole range of their own ethical questions, an increasingly concerned alarm is being raised about the cameras in the sky.

Earlier this year, comedian Michael McIntyre was in the news after snaps of him crossing a London street were posted to Twitter. There would be nothing greatly newsworthy in that if the pictures had been taken by passing fans suddenly excited to see a celebrity in their midst, but they were posted by the Metropolitan Police who had spotted the star out for a stroll on their remote spy drones. McIntyre himself was clearly unaware the pictures were being taken.

Somehow it is less the idea that the police have cameras in the sky (just look at the number of CCTV cameras to realise most of us have become blasé about being watched) but that they are now so widely used that someone controlling them thought it was acceptable to turn paparazzi and put the pictures to social media.

If the public should be concerned about the authorities, then the authorities should also be concerned about the public.

Drones of varying levels of sophistication are now available to buy for recreational use. Earlier in the summer, firefighters in California expressed their concern that their attempts to control blazes in the hills over the city were hampered by remote-controlled craft. It led to them coining the term ‘If you fly, we can’t’ after helicopters were grounded due to the sheer number of aerial obstacles.

The range of consumer level drones is enormous, ranging from tiny toy-like models that can be bought for pocket money up to professional level spy-in-the-sky types used by television news channels.

Earlier this year, I decided to try out a new hobby, starting off with the whizzy little drones which are more accurately described as quadcopters. Once the initial challenge of learning to control them is overcome, they turn out to be a lot of fun for £15.

It wasn’t long before I wanted to see what it looked like from up there so I moved up to a model containing a camera which produces poor quality footage, is impossible to control and routinely breaks from the inevitably harsh impact of a landing.

The next type up is the sport GPS ‘fly by view’ cameras so you can actually see what you are filming via a smartphone, but cost as much as a secondhand car.

These are also the models where you need to start considering the safety of where you are flying but the footage they produce is spectacular when it is sweeping countryside rather than comics out for a stroll.