DJI claims its decision to allow drones to fly in dangerous areas is not political

DJI will no longer stop drones from flying over airports, fires and the White House, passing the buck to US law enforcement to prevent some of the worst forms of drone misuse. Some are suggesting the curious timing of the decision is political, coming just days before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, weeks after drone hysteria in New Jersey and days after a plane fighting the LA fires was shot down by a drone. DJI. Some even suggest that this is China getting back at the United States for orchestrating the TikTok ban, which I find difficult.

Either way, DJI is now reacting to the whole atmosphere with an official blog post claiming the timing is coincidental.

“We planned to release this update in the US months ago, but delayed the implementation to make sure the update would work properly,” the company’s unsigned blog post said.

He also claims, in bold, that “Policy does not guide security decisions at DJI.

“To suggest that this update is related to the current political environment in the US is not only false, but also dangerous,” writes DJI’s unnamed author.

While the post contains a number of additional details about what is and isn’t happening with the company’s geofencing system, it doesn’t dispute that DJI has eliminated the feature that prevents the vast majority of US drone pilots, by default, from flying over airports, power plants , active fires, military bases and government buildings like the White House, apparently without exception.

If politics didn’t drive that decision, what did? The blog post says nothing. While promising to provide “the real reasons behind this update,” he goes on to suggest generically that DJI has been in touch with aviation regulators about the “principle of operator responsibility” and, on a smaller note, states that its Areas No Fly created “Missed opportunities, delayed operations or unnecessary waiting time” for pilots.

“This was particularly challenging for commercial operators, drone businesses — and most critically — public safety agencies performing rescue work, where delays are simply unacceptable,” DJI writes.

It is true that DJI’s geofencing system was created voluntarily by DJI and is not mandated by US regulators. “The FAA does not require geofencing from drone manufacturers,” FAA spokesman Ian Gregor said. Threshold.

But does removing hard geofencing make us safer and did it cost DJI something to keep it in place? We asked DJI the following questions:

• If politics did not drive this decision, what did?
• Were US regulators or representatives asking DJI to remove the No Fly Zones?
• Was there a financial benefit to DJI in removing them, or an opportunity cost that DJI would pay by maintaining them?
• Was DJI technologically unable to update its GEO system with official FAA data while maintaining No Fly Zones?
• The blog post suggests that public safety agencies were experiencing unlock delays – are there specific instances where DJI unlock delays resulted in specific impacts to rescue work?
• How does removing No Fly Zones make drones safer?

We’ll let you know how DJI responds.

Even if this decision has nothing to do with China, the company has very strong reasons to be on the radar of US regulators right now – it is currently facing a total ban on imports of its drones and cameras into the United States. until or unless “an appropriate national security agency” publicly declares that its products are not an unacceptable national security risk.

Perhaps this move helps highlight how DJI made its drones voluntary less of a national security risk by keeping them away from important facilities. Perhaps DJI executives believe that the US will only realize this after removing this feature.