I reckon so CalderDrone. Only thing this will achieve is to lessen the areas we can fly in by limiting it to areas with mobile data coverage. Sad that the CAA seem to have chosen to implement RID in this ridiculous fashion. I also worry that they say they “can use” RID historical data. Only reason I can see to use such data, is to implement prosecutions/ fines (scenario, they look at it and see you were flying a mini 4 pro and flew 500m away from where the controller was. Therefore claim you were BVLOS on that flight )
follow the money… revenue generation from registration
do you think all of this is going to be done for free
@aide this is fellow member @Windswept 
Thanks for the plug, aide 
I don’t comment here as often as I should, but I do get email alerts and occasionally pop in to let words fall onto the page 
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It is indeed
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Hi Rob
I thought it might be beneficial for every one to view
Your video
All the bests to you
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The CAA responded to my FOI request:
Your request has been considered in line with the provisions of the Freedom of Information
Act 2000 (FOIA). I can confirm that following a review of held information it has been
reasonably determined that the CAA holds no information within scope of the request.
The CAA was supplied with the grand figure of 18,290, as annotated in the consultation
document (Review of UK Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Regulations), by National
Police Chiefs Council’s Counter Drone team from police forces and other agencies;
therefore a further breakdown of the figure is not held by the CAA.
So it seems that they are basing their policy decisions on completely unverified (and possibly irrelevant) data. By being unable to interrogate their data to determine how many complaints were genuine, and how many were the responsibility of properly registered operators, it seems to me that they can have no idea about whether their proposed solution will resolve the perceived problem.
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Full reply I received
F0006594-reply.pdf (623.0 KB)
As Ben says above, it appears that the CAA are happy to accept unverified data as a basis for their policy decision, which is simply not acceptable !
Same data as I received this afternoon, completely unacceptable…
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218,449 registered Operators. As of 30th June 2023.
This proposed change to legislation has far more reaching consequences than just being another hurdle for recreational, and commercial, drone users to jump over. And I garner no pleasure from saying that no matter what we say or do in opposition to the “proposed changes” we will not effect any changes, as the changes are already in place, they just haven’t “officially” gone live yet.
The powers that be have been working on a project called SAPIENT which is AI driven.One of its capabilities is to determine the threat level a particular action might present. To do this it looks at historical data, acquired from RID, along with a database of potential threats, such as the Drone and model flyer registration database. I believe it has already been trialled using Aeroscope to collect the live data which is correlated against th existing drone registration database, but RID will be used instead of Aeroscope as a way to collect the live data.
I do admit it sounds very Terminator Rise of the Machines, but just this week the Government have announced that they propose to use AI to access and monitor the bank accounts of pensioners and benefit claimants as a way of means testing.
I’m not very good with words so I refer you to a YT podcast of five, or more, grumpy old men for a better source of info. Ian, UAVHIVE, who has been instrumental in disclosing the Gatwick fiasco, has also been instrumental in highlighting the implications of SAPIENT. It is a long video, but unlike some YT’ers whom upload doom and gloom hour long videos for clicks, these guys actually know what they’re talking about.
https://www.youtube.com/live/aKlhee1P398?si=GoVqET_tzDpGwIz0
I
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Thanks for the link - it’s a really interesting discussion. Are any of these guys members of the GADC?
Might it be an idea for us to write to our MPs to raise this issue? I would do it but I would need help in being able to describe to a layman (MP) what is going on, what is proposed and the problems resulting from this? I will certainly go to my MP’s surgery but I am not quite sure exactly what to propose.
It seems a shame for us all to throw our hands in the air saying ‘what can I do?’ It seems there is a chance to do something before it’s too late.
I believe there are some "prominent YT’ers in this forum but for reasons they remaining as lurkers.
Bruce was probably the first person to do a Youtube channel dedicated to RC flying. He was also a presenter on Scrapheap challenge, and produced an intercontinental ballistic missile using off the shelf highstreet components which put him on the radar of many governments.
Patrick Egan, and Gary Mortimer were heavily involved in UAS activities both in the military and as contractors. Ian (UAVHIVE) has been very prolific behind the scenes digging out and publishing the sort of stuff that some have been too afraid to talk about.
I haven’t quite reached 60 yet, but I’ve been involved in remote flight for the best part of thirty years, plus the time I spent as a kid building free flight models. I have not witnessed the kind of crap this hobby is being subjected to in those 30yrs as I have in the last five years. If I was a kid today wanting to get into model-flying I’d be shit out of luck as legally I wouldn’t be allowed to.
As hobbyists we have a very large mountain to climb. In recent years the general public have been told that we’re voyeuristic perverts, and a clear and present danger to general aviation. To legally test hover a sub250gram camera equipped flying machine in my own backyard I have to be registered like some sex offender. If i want to fly FPV in my own garden I need to enlist a competent spotter, and I can’t fly behind a bush as that’s considered BVLOS, which I’m not authorised to do, and again I can’t do it with anything greater than 250grams. Though I’ll openly admit that during lockdown I flew a fixed wing FPV (with a spotter) from my decking and around the neighbourhood. Did it weigh more than 250grams? I don’t know, I didn’t weigh the components. Did I go beyond visual line of sight? Didn’t care, that was my spotter’s decision to make, and VLOS is so subjective. But nobody died, in fact I doubt very much that anybody but myself (and my spotter) even knew. Ten to fifteen years ago such an activity would have been considered eccentric and comedic, today I’d be looking at a sizable stretch with no chance of parole, even though the laws of physics, to the best of my knowledge, haven’t changed.
We are not pilots. We fly relatively expensive toys. If we were truly treated like pilots we wouldn’t have to pay out of our own pockets for RID technology but it would be heavily subsidised just as ADS-B was for general aviation, nor would we be subjected to the kind of persecution and ill measured legislation, just so that we can levitate a small amount of plastic/foam/balsa/carbon fibre a few feet above the ground.
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@mpaull They would probably ask if you had a licence to do that Paul and insist you tattoo your knuckles with your Op ID. 
Thanks for replying so quickly! The 4 guys from the video are fascinating and I will look up the building of an ICMB with everyday parts (blimey!).
I agree, we are not pilots however if UA or model aircraft flying is regulated into extinction then, I would argue, we are closing off another path for someone to create or invent something. That is the genius of the USA - kids in garages building stuff with accesible and low cost parts and able to experiment. Regulation strangles all of that. And the regulation we have here, all put into law by ministers who don’t put in the work to understand what they are doing having trusted in some experts to tell them.
I used to be a fan of Heliguy. Don’t get me wrong, success is great and they seem to be very successful but they rather like regulation as that keeps the rest of us out of the game: I took my PfCO with them and nowadays, when I ask the training team a question I am asked a bunch of irrelevant questions to do with my safety assessment. Only once they are satisfied I have dome everything right will any query be addressed. Bizarre behaviour. There are 2 guys there, Ben and Tom, who lectured on my course and I would love to get in touch with them but they are fenced off at that company and there’s no chance of contact. So Heliguy I leave well alone now - a shame.
Sorry for the red herring there - what can we do? Must we sit back and let SAPIENT shaft us all? Might it not be an idea to use the heft of this remarkable club to try and alter the course, even if only a little? I’m also not yet 60 and would like a couple more years trying to earn a few quid more flying and flying for fun. I’ll write to my invisible MP (Boris’s replacement) and see what reply comes 
If it’s of any interest I’ll post it here. The problem is our PM seems to like everything tech except the plebs who get their hands dirty building and testing 
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And the results are in.
Ian @UAVHive on X / Twitter found:
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i’ve just had 20 drone sightings near me… I’ve got a few drones on the table and I keep seeing them… do i need to add the sightings to a database? hang on, it only needs to be “suspected” sightings… i think i’ve seen a few drone parts too… does that count… do i need to log those
Even if drones really were involved in all those reports, there is no information as to whether they were valid complaints or simply a Karen/Ken whining about something they have no knowledge of, and the drone was actually being operated fully legally 
As we know from various incidents discussed in GreyArrows, even the police often misunderstand what is legal for drone fliers to do
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It’s nothing but a load of BS. Reported drone sightings ? How many were related to “ criminal activity” ? How many were reported by “Karen’s and Ken’s “? ( amounting to absolutely nothing ) How many of these reports were actually investigated by sending a cop out looking for someone pursuing a legal hobby?
I honestly think the CAA are losing the plot ( that’s assuming they had the plot in the first place)
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As I mentioned above, CAA Consultation - Review of UK UAS Regulations - #74 by nxsynjs Even if every single report was valid, that still represents one complaint every 1000 flights. Which begs the question, are the proposed measures proportional to the effect on the industry and expenses to the tax payer that would be involved