In a new partnership between AT&T and Dedrone, a collaboration that will mainly be focused on developing IoT sensors for unauthorized drone flights is outlined – mainly to be put to practice in military bases, venues, enterprises, cities, correctional facilities and more.
AT&T has joined forces with the San Francisco-based drone detection technology startup, teaming up on the new drone detection solution that will help protect many military bases, venues, cities as well as businesses – from malicious drones.
In an era when drones are becoming more and more important, the misuse of this emerging technology should be properly addressed – which is what AT&T will focus on with this new partnership. According to some data by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), more than 1 million drones have been registered in the US, which is certainly a new path and threat vector for the community.
Meanwhile, Dedrone is a startup that is actively detecting drones of all kinds, such as commercial, consumer as well as military-grade drones, aside from autonomous drones. It has been active since 2014, working with correctional facilities, public utilities as well as other organizations in order to protect their lower airspace from drone incursions. The airspace platform currently uses the Internet of Things (IoT) sensors and LTE connectivity in order to detect, classify, mitigate as well as localize the threats coming from drones.
The Vice President and General Manager of Smart Cities at AT&T was confident about the new partnership. He stated:
“Physical security and cybersecurity are equally important when safeguarding an entire ecosystem. Malicious drones pose an aerial threat for the community, for businesses and for the people that live and work there. With Dedrone, we’re helping to protect customers and citizens from this type of risk.”
The platform will also identify the approaching drones by means of radio frequency, as well as visual, radar and other sensor data. As it analyzes this data, it will reliably classify the approaching drones and find their location – triggering the alarms to alert the security staff.
That way, public safety agencies can react more quickly and more efficiently – but also integrate the platform’s capabilities with other countermeasures to help protect the public, such as building management and alarm systems.
In the wake of the new project and platform build-up, the CEO and co-founder of Dedrone, Joerg Lamprecht, stated:
“AT&T provides a reliable platform for Dedrone customers to connect our technology to their security ecosystem, and use Dedrone analytics to understand their lower airspace activity.Working with AT&T helps ensure that Dedrone technology is integrated into smart cities to prevent drone intrusions.”
This is not the first time AT&T is looking into drones. The company has been using drone technology for tower inspections, live LTE communications for its customers and connectivity at scale. Aside from that, it has been investigating the purposes of this technology for a few years.