Secret Service: Drones Being Tested Near White House to Develop a Defense Against Them

The U.S. Secret Service, the agency in charge of protecting the president and other high-ranking dignitaries, is set to fly drones near the White House during the next several days to develop a defense against them, the Associated Press reported.

The unmanned aircraft will take to the Washington skies between 1 a.m. and 4 a.m. in airspace that is normally off limits as a no-fly zone, an unnamed U.S. official briefed on the plans told the news service. The Federal Aviation Administration has confirmed that it granted the Secret Service a special waiver to fly drones over the nation's capital.

The Secret Service will conduct tests to both learn how to employ drones for its own use and how to defend against potentially hostile units, the official added. The agency declined to say how many unmanned aircraft will be involved and when, where and for how long they will fly; it did, however, acknowledge that the tests would take place so as to avoid public concerns over nighttime drone sightings.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has already developed methods to combat drones at remote sites, the AP noted. But the real-world environment around the White House will help the Secret Service understand how the radio waves used to control the aircraft are affected by objects such as buildings, monuments and vegetation.

Jeremy Gillula, a staff technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said that there are essentially three ways to stop a drone: physically disabling it; blocking the radio signal between the aircraft and its pilot on the ground; and hacking the drone's control signals to trick it into believing it is somewhere else.

Physically knocking a drone out of the air with a projectile or using a net to catch it may be the most effective method to bring down a hostile aircraft, Gillula explained.

"If it were me, that would actually be the first thing I would think about doing," he said. "You would have to basically encase the White House in this net. It sure wouldn't look pretty, but in some ways it would be the most effective way."