Mic Drop: Predator mode

Summary

Podcast Summary: Click Here – "Mic Drop: Predator Mode"

Episode Information:

• Title: Mic Drop: Predator Mode
• Host: Dina Temple-Weston, Recorded Future News
• Release Date: June 27, 2025

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1. Introduction

In the episode titled "Mic Drop: Predator Mode," Dina Temple-Weston delves into the expanding role of drones in the United States, exploring the implications of their increasing presence in civilian spaces. The discussion centers around the deployment of military-grade Predator drones during protests and the broader consequences for surveillance and civil liberties.

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2. Predator Drones Over Protests

The episode opens with a vivid description of Predator drones circling above Los Angeles during protests against President Trump's deportation policies. These drones, specifically the MQ-9 Reaper models, are portrayed not as typical consumer drones but as formidable military machines previously used in conflict zones like Iraq and Afghanistan.

Dina Temple-Weston [00:51]: "It's a Predator, a military grade MQ9 Reaper, the kind that's been used in Iraq and Afghanistan for surveillance and for strikes."

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3. Fane Greenwood's Background

Fane Greenwood, a drone researcher, shares her journey from a curious observer at Stanford University to an active member of the Stanford Drone Club. Her early experiences with hobbyist drones ignited her passion for understanding drone technology and its applications.

Fane Greenwood [03:47]: "I remember vividly I saw one flying over the Stanford campus one day and I was like, what the heck is that curious?"

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4. The Shift from Positive to Negative Uses

Initially, drones like the Predator were employed for beneficial purposes such as environmental monitoring and disaster response. However, Greenwood highlights a significant shift towards militarization and surveillance, particularly in domestic settings.

Fane Greenwood [04:26]: "Using Predator drones for stuff like environmental monitoring of fires. So I think the first Predator drones were deployed domestically for response to things like California wildfires."

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5. Surveillance and Intimidation

The summer of 2020 marked a turning point when Predator drones began surveilling George Floyd protests. The presence of these drones was not merely observational but served as a tool for intimidation and information gathering, raising alarms about the erosion of First Amendment rights.

Fane Greenwood [05:17]: "This is a really disturbing escalation of using military grade technology against protesters exercising their First Amendment rights."

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6. Small Drones: The Real Threat

While Predator drones garner significant attention, Greenwood emphasizes that smaller, more ubiquitous drones pose a greater and more insidious threat. These drones are being widely adopted by police departments across the country, leading to pervasive surveillance in everyday settings.

Fane Greenwood [08:14]: "This Predator drone deployment was limited and disturbing, but what we're seeing all over the country in way greater quantities is these small drones."

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7. Data Collection and Privacy Concerns

The deployment of drones, especially in residential and private areas, leads to extensive data collection. Greenwood points out the lack of transparency regarding data usage, storage, and access, highlighting risks of persistent surveillance and potential misuse of information.

Fane Greenwood [11:03]: "According to the ACLU, the drones have been deployed more than 700 times and have captured at least 5,600 images."

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8. Comparisons to Authoritarian Regimes

Greenwood draws parallels between the use of drones in the U.S. and their deployment in authoritarian countries like Iran and China. She argues that the objectives—surveillance and intimidation—are strikingly similar, questioning the U.S.'s stance on civil liberties.

Fane Greenwood [12:24]: "I think the way that the US police have been using drones is not meaningfully different from the way police are using drones in other countries and other authoritarian countries."

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9. Call for Regulations and Oversight

Addressing the growing concerns, Greenwood advocates for strict regulations on drone usage. She calls for limitations on deploying drones over protests, clear rules on data management, public transparency, and robust local oversight to prevent abuse and protect citizen privacy.

Fane Greenwood [12:56]: "I would certainly like to see a very, very hard rules against not using drones over protests unless there are very, very specific exceptions."

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10. Conclusion and Final Thoughts

As the episode concludes, Greenwood emphasizes the critical juncture at which society stands regarding drone surveillance. She urges the public to remain vigilant and proactive in advocating for regulations to prevent the misuse of drone technology, ensuring that advancements do not come at the expense of fundamental freedoms.

Fane Greenwood [14:05]: "I think we're absolutely at a crisis point in terms of both drones becoming pervasive... it's a really important time. People again, stand up and fight back."

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Notable Quotes:

• Dina Temple-Weston [00:51]: "It's a Predator, a military grade MQ9 Reaper, the kind that's been used in Iraq and Afghanistan for surveillance and for strikes."

• Fane Greenwood [05:17]: "This is a really disturbing escalation of using military grade technology against protesters exercising their First Amendment rights."

• Fane Greenwood [12:24]: "I think the way that the US police have been using drones is not meaningfully different from the way police are using drones in other countries and other authoritarian countries."

• Fane Greenwood [14:05]: "I think we're absolutely at a crisis point in terms of both drones becoming pervasive... it's a really important time. People again, stand up and fight back."

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Final Remarks

"Mic Drop: Predator Mode" offers a compelling examination of the dual-edged nature of drone technology. While acknowledging the potential benefits, the episode underscores the urgent need for comprehensive oversight to safeguard civil liberties against the encroaching tide of surveillance.

Transcript

[Dina Temple-Weston]

From Recorded Future News and prx, this is Click Here. We'd like to think we'd notice when something changes, like when the sky starts watching us back, or when tools of war show up in our neighborhoods. But sometimes change isn't announced in a way that gets our attention. Sometimes it arrives as a low hum just above your head. That's the sound of air traffic controllers chattering over a live frequency, tracking something unusual over Los Angeles.

[Fane Greenwood]

Zero miles opposite direction, another Troy Q9.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

The Troy Q9 was circling above LA protests raging against President Trump's deportation policy. And the Q9 is not a plane, not a helicopter. It's a drone, but not the kind you find in a mall kiosk. This one's a Predator, a military grade MQ9 Reaper, the kind that's been used in Iraq and Afghanistan for surveillance and for strikes. And when you think of a drone, you might picture something just a few feet wide with some propellers. But that's not the kind of drone flying over la.

[Fane Greenwood]

Predator drones are enormous, about the size of a banned aircraft. These are tools designed for warfare, and seeing these over civilian protests is deeply disturbing.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

From Recorded Future News and prx, this is Click Here's Mic Drop. A longer listen to one of our favorite interviews of the week. I'm Dina Templewaston. On Tuesday, we did a deep dive on how the use of surveillance tech on immigrants has been weaponized by the Trump administration. And today we look at the expanding role of drones in America and what it says about how much surveillance has crept into our lives. And drone researcher Fane Greenwood says this is just the beginning.

[Fane Greenwood]

This is a really disturbing escalation of using military grade technology against protesters exercising their First Amendment rights. You're threatening people with these military technologies just for protesting. I just wish people could see it for what it is. We're already kind of going sliding down a hill and people need to realize that.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

Stay with us. Click Here is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit progressive.com to see if you could save. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company has affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations. I'm Dina Templewoster and this is Click Here's Mic Drop. Fane Greenwood started getting up close and personal with drones in 2013. She was at Stanford studying journalism when something buzzed over her head.

[Fane Greenwood]

I remember vividly I saw one flying over the Stanford campus one day and I was like, what the heck Is that curious?

[Dina Temple-Weston]

She walked over to the operators. Not military, just students who had ducks, taped drones together and were teaching each other how to fly.

[Fane Greenwood]

They taught me how to build one and how to fly one. And I was like, this is way less complicated than I assumed it was going to be.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

Before long, she had joined the Stanford Drone Club.

[Fane Greenwood]

But also, this is really cool.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

This is why I've become a researcher and a big believer in what drones could do outside of war.

[Fane Greenwood]

I do want to emphasize that, that drones have a lot of good things they can do for people.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

And at first they did, they were.

[Fane Greenwood]

Using Predator drones for stuff like environmental monitoring of fires. So I think the first Predator drones were deployed domestically for response to things like California wildfires.

[Unknown Interviewer]

And when did you first sort of see it not necessarily having a positive use here in the United States?

[Fane Greenwood]

Back in the late 2000s, I believe there were some police agencies were already kind of looking into drones And I believe CPB, Border Patrol. I think like 2005 is when they first started using the Predator. So that's been going on for a long time. And I was always pretty cognizant of that as well. I think even in 2013, there was a lot of controversy around drones, a lot of fear and uncertainty. Good, Floyd. Good, Floyd.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

So when drones started circling protests, Fain wasn't surprised. She was alarmed.

[Fane Greenwood]

I can't breathe. I can't breathe.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

It began in the summer of 2020 during the George Floyd protests. A Predator drone was watching one of those massive military grade drones that was.

[Fane Greenwood]

The first side they used for a protest setting, which was, of course, a really disturbing escalation.

[Unknown Interviewer]

And did we know how they used that information?

[Fane Greenwood]

There was some kind of contradictory information from the authorities about what that information was actually being used for or why, but I don't think we have a clear sense.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

And then the Trump administration called them back during the recent protests in la.

[Fane Greenwood]

And it's really unfortunate and scary that we're seeing a return to those tactics in 2025. It's indicating that this is something that unfortunately the current regime is not going to shy away from. And yeah, I think it's a really disturbing indicator of the attitudes that this administration has towards protesters and, you know, First Amendment rights.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

Customs and Border Patrol has said the Predator drones were unarmed, that they were protecting police, not targeting protesters. But even UNAR presence carries weight.

[Unknown Interviewer]

And part of the issue is intimidation. Part of the issue is identifying people. Is that the idea?

[Fane Greenwood]

Yeah, it's identifying people. It's intimidation. It's collecting information that could be fed into other data sources, which, I mean, they're pretty explicit about. I think there's the goal to can we combine this drone information with other sources of data? There was an incident in the LA protest where someone flying a manned helicopter was on a loudspeaker down to the people below was saying something to the effect of, I can identify you, I can come to your house.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

It may have been a bluff, but the impact was clear.

[Fane Greenwood]

That's obviously going to have a real chilling effect on protesters. If you're thinking if I go to this protest, the government may be able to find me, they may be able to punish me, that's extremely disturbing.

[Unknown Interviewer]

Do we know if the Trump administration or the police are using facial recognition from the footage that they're getting from the drones?

[Fane Greenwood]

Well, facial recognition from drones is still really crappy. There's a lot of issues with the fact the drone is moving. It's up really high. Facial recognition from stationary sensors that are really close to someone's face. The accuracy rate's still not that great even now. And there's a lot of false positives. A lot of people have written about the issues and ethical problems that creates. And the problem becomes exponentially harder when you're dealing with the drones way up in the sky. It's moving around with people who are moving around. But of course, the problem with this is that AI or facial recognition technology is just as dangerous when it doesn't actually work as when it does because it provides justification, even if it's fingering the wrong person. So it doesn't really matter as much if it's accurate or not. So, yeah, that's a really disturbing possibility.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

When we come back. Predator drones are massive military grade machines. But as far as Fang Greenwood is concerned, small drones are a much bigger deal.

[Fane Greenwood]

This Predator drone deployment was limited and disturbing, but what we're seeing all over the country in way greater quantities is these small drones. So police departments around the country are using these small drones way, way more often than using predators.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

We'll be right back.

[Unknown Host]

It's hard to remember now, but the Internet used to be fun.

[Fane Greenwood]

I can't believe how easy it is to surf the net.

[Unknown Host]

Surf's up on long shadow breaking the Internet. We'll trace how a tool that once fueled democracy, opposition activists organized the march on Facebook became a weapon aimed at the very heart of it. You're watching the unraveling of our democracy right now from longlead and prx. This is Longshadow breaking the Internet. Subscribe now wherever you get your podcasts.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

Predator drones get the headlines. But Fane Greenwood says the real threat is smaller, quieter, and a lot more familiar. She's seen the upside of small drones firsthand, how they can help people survey hurricane damage or scout fire lines or even locate missing persons. But she's also seen how quickly that same technology can turn into something darker. In Ukraine, consumer drones have been strapped with explosives. In Iran and China, they hover above city squares, recording dissent. And here in the US they're showing up more and more at protests, at 911 calls without any warning. There's an actual program called Drone as First Responder.

[Fane Greenwood]

So the idea is that the drone is going to both provide a way to get someone out there before the cops can arrive, so the drone will go there in advance and figure out, you know, scope out the situation or can be used to even defuse certain hostilities or because you have an eye in the sky in advance. But I'm not seeing particularly compelling data indicating this is really a benefit. I think there is no need to deploy a drone. Every single first. First response call, I think that's completely over the top. And I think they are opening the door to pervasive surveillance in ways that are really just upsetting.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

Do they have to tell anybody?

[Fane Greenwood]

I don't believe so, no. I think the drone shows up, and of course, it's also transiting other people's properties. Right. So on its way to wherever it's going, it's got sensors going. It's going to be going over other people's property or nothing to do with this.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

Fane looked closely at Sonoma County, California, where small drones were added to the Sheriff's department in 2019. And what she found was revealing.

[Fane Greenwood]

According to the ACLU, the drones have been deployed more than 700 times and have captured at least 5,600 images. And they're usually in residential areas and private properties. So that's really pervasive use of drones that's creating persistent surveillance, even if that's not what they're saying out loud. It's really a shame because, again, I do a lot of work in disaster response with drones, and they're amazing for that. But it's like, yeah, it would be fine if you were straight to say, okay, there's a fire. Let's go look at that. That's fine. But Cindy went out for every single. Every single nine zero one call. That's. That's massive scope creep.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

Scope creep. The idea that a tool designed for one thing slowly and quietly becomes something else. Something broader, something more dangerous now layer in protest surveillance where the potential downsides and dangers are crystal clear.

[Fane Greenwood]

I mean, this was a big problem in 2020. Police were using drones to surveil protesters. I think police in Phoenix actually did use drones to make arrests of protesters. They're using that drone imagery to actually make arrests.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

And it all adds up to a lot of heavy handed Big Brother ness, something the US has long accused other countries of doing.

[Unknown Interviewer]

Do you see parallels between the way drones are being used in regimes like Iran or China versus the way the US is using them?

[Fane Greenwood]

I do think the way that the US police have been using drones is not meaningfully different from the the way police are using drones in other countries and other authoritarian countries. I think it's a generally geared towards the same goals, which is surveillance, intimidating people, trying to make people think that they can be identified if they act up. And this is not to say that I think the US is just as bad as China or Iran and human rights. But I think in the case of drones, I don't think we're meaningfully better. No.

[Unknown Interviewer]

And what would you like to see in terms of rules or regulations? What would allay your concerns?

[Fane Greenwood]

I would certainly. So, for example, I would certainly like to see a very, very hard rules against not using drones over protests unless there are very, very specific exceptions. And even then I'm not totally sold. I don't think that drones really bring anything to the table that are not provided already by people on the ground and perhaps by limited use of manned aircraft. We also need rules around data management. So again, we need a lot more certainty over who's storing the data for how long, or the rules about data storage, who can access it. We need a lot more public information. So public should be able to access information about what the drones are being used for, why we should be subject to FOIA request. I'm a big believer in data minimization. Collect only the data you need. And using drones this pervasively is not contributing to that. It's creating a lot more problems. And I think we do need a lot more local control and oversight. A lot of municipalities are pushing back on this, but it requires a lot of constant effort and really staying on top of it because you have to really, really push back against these persistent narratives. And us right now are saying that police need access to more and more militarized technology.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

As Fain sees it, the fight's not over yet, but it is at a critical juncture.

[Fane Greenwood]

I think we're absolutely at a crisis point in terms of both drones becoming pervasive. And of course, if you combine the new use of drones by authorities with the fact the Trump administration is much more authoritarian, I think it could lead us to really dark places. So I think this is a really important time. People again, stand up and fight back, but I don't think it's hopeless at all. I think we do have levers and abilities to push back on this. The federal level may be difficult for the next four years, but on a local level you can, I think perhaps will have an impact. There's never a good time to give up.

[Dina Temple-Weston]

From Recorded Future News this has been Click Here's Mic Drop. It was written and produced by Zach Hirsch, Megan Dietrich, Sean Powers, Erica Gaeda, Lucas Riley and Megan Me, Dina Temple Reston. It was edited by Karen Duffin. We'll be back on Tuesday with an all new episode of Click Here. Thanks for listening and have a great weekend.

[Unknown Announcer]

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