Drone sightings spark concern

NICK EICHER, HOST: It’s Tuesday the 17th of December.

This is WORLD Radio. Thank you for listening! Good morning, I’m Nick Eicher.

REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard.

First up on The World and Everything in It … mystery drones.

AUDIO: That is not a commercial airliner. It’s hovering. It’s sitting right there.

For several weeks now, people in New Jersey have witnessed drones flying over their neighborhoods.

EICHER: The Pentagon says these drones are not operated by foreign adversaries…or by the U.S. military. Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh:

SABRINA SINGH: We’re going to continue to monitor what is happening. But, you know, at no point were our installations threatened when this activity was occurring.

But some members of Congress are demanding more explanation than that … saying that even if the drones don’t pose a threat, it’s important to know who is responsible for them. Here’s New Jersey Congressman Josh Gottheimer.

GOTTHEIMER: What do we know? Where they are? How do we stop them from being in airports and other places?

Joining us now to talk about it is Mark Montgomery. He is an expert on cybersecurity and technology innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

REICHARD: Mark, good morning.

MARK MONTGOMERY: Hey, good morning. Thank you for having me, Mary.

REICHARD: So glad you're here. Well, what do we know so far about these drone sightings over New Jersey and who might be responsible for them?

MONTGOMERY: I think first we need to acknowledge there are drone sightings, right? That maybe some of these are planes, maybe some are other objects. There are drone sightings. I think the other thing we need to acknowledge is there's like 800,000 registered drones with the FAA, and that's just a small percentage of the number of drones operated in America by government, corporate, or personal use.

The vast majority of these are not nefarious. They're, you know, people out with their own systems, with their kids, or on their own, looking at things. You know, it's not a serious issue. But the government doesn't do us any favors when they kind of blanket describe it all as not a problem. There are espionage issues, there are flight safety issues, and there might be legitimate concerns about some of these drones. So the government should do a better job of acknowledging people's concerns, but then trying to focus on the small percentage that are really issue, law enforcement or national security issues.

REICHARD: So you don't seem terribly worried at this point.

MONTGOMERY: So, I don't think that these are being launched from an Iranian ship. I don't think these are coming, you know, they're like the spy balloon, which clearly came from China. These are probably domestic drones. Now, do I think that there are people who work at cross purposes with US national security, who live in the United States and have drones? Yes. Do I think it's likely that on occasion they use those drones to get a determination of what kind of maintenance is going on in a ship in a shipyard or how many planes or ships are at a pier or an airfield? Yes. Do I think that that is a pretty small percentage of what we're seeing up in the air? Absolutely. I think that this is a recognition of a large issue that basically sat in the background for a while. And now it's in the foreground and it looks even bigger than it should.

REICHARD: Well, I've looked around online to see what people are theorizing about it. so even given what you just said, I want to get your thoughts on this. One theory is that the drones are looking for radioactive material, maybe some material used for medical imaging that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission did confirm went missing earlier this month. Do you have any thoughts on that theory?

MONTGOMERY: So of the several thousand drones that have been reported, that could be one. So do I think it's possible there's a drone out there looking, you know, that's equipped for something like that? Yes. Do I think that that is a very, very, very small percentage of what's being reported? Yes.

REICHARD: Let's talk about the interface between government and citizenry. We've got members of Congress asking for more information while defense officials are trying to reassure everybody, hey, there's no threat here. But people are naturally concerned, though. Do you think the government is doing enough to inform us and our representatives of what's going on?

MONTGOMERY: So this is where it's interesting. This is a multi-tiered answer. One, they're not doing enough to, like they should have an honest discussion, like I'm saying to you, like there are real issues, but there are all these extra drones out there. You're thinking about them more because of all these issues where you're seeing them in Ukraine and Israel and, you know, in Netflix series where drones are used to attack people in their home for no apparent reason. You know, I get it.

But here's the other thing I will tell you. Kind of underlying this is the fact that our number one mission, whether you look at the last Trump administration, or the current Biden administration or even the Obama administration, the number one national security issue is to defend the homeland. And I have to be honest with you, we can't defend the homeland. The Chinese spy balloon is a perfect indication. We do not have situational awareness of our airspace, which is to say that we can't defend ourselves against any cruise missiles launched in our country anywhere than at the national capital region, you know, the White House and Pentagon itself. We don't have active air defense systems up and running. We don't have good sensor systems up and running that aren't very much aligned just to detect an intercontinental ballistic missile launch from China, North Korea, Russia, Iran, right? So as a result, all these other things operate below that and we have a very poor picture of it. So if you ask the federal government, tell us what happened over New Jersey over the last seven days. They couldn't paint an air picture for you that showed it because they don't have it.

REICHARD: This is all so informative. Is there some aspect of this story that you think is being overlooked or maybe misunderstood?

MONTGOMERY: Well, look, the violations of the military bases is the most likely one where I said someone with nefarious intent is doing something to get some kind of insight into military bases. So those should be investigated. And secondly, the violation of airspace safety, the airfields and the approaches to airfields in New Jersey, but also I think we saw them in New York and and I'm sure we'll hear reports from other states soon. Those have to stop. And the way it stops is law enforcement focuses and prioritizes those cases, catches the people involved and holds them criminally responsible. So everybody else goes, well, I'm not going to do that. And then the, and then the military and their intelligence can go work and their police forces can go work the base penetrations. And I think if we did that, we would take a lot of the angst off the table.

REICHARD: Mark Montgomery leads the Center on Cybersecurity and Technological Innovation for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Mark, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.

MONTGOMERY: Thank you for having me, Mary.

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