1 The term ‘drone’ is a colloquial expression for an unmanned aircraft that may be variously known as an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) or a remotely piloted aircraft (RPA). The term drone may also be used for the complete ‘system’ that encompasses the flying machine, telemetry links and ground control station, otherwise known as an unmanned aerial system (UAS) or remotely piloted aircraft system (RPAS).
2 These reports may cover any aspect of drone activities, including crashes, close approaches to manned aircraft, operating in airspace where there is no authorisation.
3 In the context of UAVs, ‘small’ is typically taken to mean 25kg or less (US Department of Transportation, 2013).
4 The author owns a JJRC H6C quadcopter which has an all-up weight of 50g, including quadcopter, battery and propeller guards. The H6C is fitted with a 2MP camera that records still photos or video to a micro-SD card. A different model of this quadcopter is fitted with FPV capabilities.
5 The definition of agency in the Privacy Act also includes a number of exceptions, none of which rule out a private individual collecting information about others.
6 Section 11 of the Privacy Act expressly provides that ‘the information privacy principles do not confer on any person any legal right that is enforceable in a court of law’, with the exception to obtain confirmation from a public sector agency of whether information is held, and to have access to that information.
7 The other breaches specified in section 66 of the act are a breach of: (a) a code of practice relating to public registers; (b) an IPP or code of practice related to information sharing agreements; (c) an information sharing agreement; and (d) provisions relating to information matching.
8 Appeals to the High Court are made under section 123 of the Human Rights Act 1993.
9 Section 405 of the Crimes Act 1961 expressly provides that ‘no civil remedy for an act or omission shall be suspended by reason that such act or omission is an offence’.
Acknowledgements
This article is derived from material to form a master’s degree in the School of Economics and Finance, Victoria University of Wellington, supervised by Professor Lewis Evans. I would like to thank Dr James Every-Palmer and an anonymous reviewer for helpful comments and suggestions. All errors are those of the author.
Address for correspondence: [email protected].
You can download the full paper on the Author's page on Social Science Research Network:
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=1318856
28 sUAS Guide / Q3 Update, October 2016