The use of technology to mechanize and enhance responsibilities consistently discharged by humans is expected to grow tremendously. Incidentally, experts have created drones that can seamlessly execute the majority of duties that were once discharged manually. Drones were initially designed for military use. However, today, there are individual drones employed for commercial practices (Wall and Monahan 29-254). They aid in recording videos, capturing images of expansive areas that are inaccessible, and monitoring and surveying purposes. The benefits of the use of drones surpass their demerits.
Law enforcement agencies use drones to impose law and order. For instance, in the United States, security personnel use drones to search for lost children. The United States is dotted with forests that are difficult and dangerous to infiltrate. Cases of children and adults disappearing in the forests are common. Conducting a physical search of the lost children may pose a danger to security personnel. Therefore, security officers use drones equipped with thermal imaging gadgets to search for missing persons. The drones not only accelerate the searching exercise but also free some personnel enabling them to execute other duties. Wall and Monahan claim that drones help security officials to track suspects and conduct tactical surveillance (239-254). In the current times, many illegal immigrants attempt to cross the border between the United States and Canada and the use of drones assists in monitoring and tracking them. Moreover, drones have helped to curb cases of criminals smuggling drugs from Mexico into the United States.
Aerial images of farms taken by the use of drones enable farmers to estimate the quantity of herbicides and pesticides to use in a particular piece of land, thus reducing wastage. Apart from regulating resource usage, the use of drones helps farmers to increase their agricultural yields. According to Urbahs and Jonaite, drones help farmers to identify sections of land that require the greatest attention, therefore ensuring that they get maximum produce (170-175). Drones used in farm administration are equipped with crop management systems that enable farmers to assess and react to changes in individual plants. Therefore, farmers can detect disease outbreak and take appropriate measures before plants get overwhelmed. Agribotix has recently come up with a program dubbed “Bring Your Own Drone” that has enabled farmers to share ideas and improve their productivity.
Despite drones helping the state bodies to maintain law and order, critics allege that the bodies need to come up with alternative measures. Individuals opposed to the use of drones claim that they infringe on privacy. Police and other law enforcement agencies use drones to observe secretly activities taking place in public events or a city (Schlag 456-475). The information that the drones collect is not censored. Therefore, they sometime intrude on people’s privacy by gathering sensitive information. Many people view the use of drones in the enforcement of the law as a violation of human rights and infringement on private lives. Some people view drones as Big Brothers on the space that curtail people’s freedom of going on with their daily activities confidentially. Unfortunately, the government cannot enforce the law without monitoring activities of all people as it is hard to identify and isolate criminals.
In conclusion, the use of drones to enforce law and order helps to track and apprehend criminals. The use of drones by farmers also assists in improving the productivity of their farms hence increasing profits. Despite some legal and social challenges associated with the use of drones in terms of infringement on people’s privacy, it is evident that their advantages outshine their disadvantages.
Works Cited
Schlag, Chris. “The New Privacy Battle: How the Expanding Use of Drones Continues to Erode our Concept of Privacy and Privacy Rights.” Journal of Technology & Law Policy, vol. 13, no. 1, 2013, pp. 456-475.
Urbahs, Aleksandrs, and Ieva Jonaite. “Features of the Use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles for Agriculture Applications.” Aviation, vol. 17, no. 4, 2013, pp. 170-175.
Wall, Tyler, and Torin Monahan. “Surveillance and Violence from Afar: The Politics of Drones and Liminal Security-Scapes.” Theoretical Criminology, vol. 15, no. 3, 2011, pp. 239-254.