The Republican party-goers in Tampa will be surveilled by drones.
This will mark the first time unmanned aerial vehicles will patrol the skies over a national convention, according to an engineer with a Naples company that builds and will operate the drones.
The vehicle, called an Aether Aero, is an eight-bladed vertical takeoff platform that will provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance to government agencies, according to Curt Winter, an engineer with United Drones.
Presumably they’re being deployed to defend against the “anarchists” the government has already leaked pose a threat to the Convention. Or perhaps they–and United Drones’ unmanned ground vehicles, the Wraiths–will be there just to get delegates all hot and bothered to approve more drone spending.
But the surveillance from the drones will be shared with unnamed government agencies. While that’s probably DHS, the gentlemen delegates publicly soliciting the services of sex workers–or just wandering the streets obviously cheating on their wives–should be warned that the Air Force, at least, permits the “incidental” collection of intelligence on US persons, so long as it isn’t targeted against that US person intentionally. And while they’re not supposed to be able to retrieve that “incidentally” collected intelligence by searching on a US person’s name, that doesn’t mean images “incidentally” collected in Tampa will remain in Tampa.
I’d really hate if any of you war-mongers subsequently had your careers ruined because of out-of-control surveillance capturing you while you’re partying.