“Rolls Royce reveals remote controlled ‘roboships’ will take to the sea by 2020…”
One of my favorite TV series is Black Sails, so I didn’t even get past this headline before I was thinking about ways to claim the prize from these unmanned ships. And I’m probably not the only one, therefore security has got to be paramount to any developer of unmanned cargo vehicles. But that’s not really the point of this post. I thought this would be a good segue for a very brief discussion of unmanned vehicle use by pirates.
When most people think of pirates, it’s probably either Captain Jack Sparrow or Somali pirates, neither of which conjure up images of unmanned vehicles flying the black. That said, it’s quite reasonable to believe that sometime in the near future, a sophisticated group of pirates could use one or more types of unmanned vehicle technologies. We have already seen UAS used for drug smuggling as well as smuggling contraband into prisons. Narco traffickers have demonstrated an incredible amount of creativity in moving their product including submarines. Like any other enterprise, if the pirates can make a good business case for using unmanned technology, they’re probably going to do it if they have the resources.
There are numerous applications for a UAS or unmanned surface vehicles (USV) in piracy. The most obvious is intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR). To a pirate, an unmanned vehicle can offer continuous ISR coverage of a target with little to no risk to their personnel. The ISR can be performed in a covert or clandestine manner to delay or prevent tip off to a potential target. Also, unmanned vehicles offer the possibility of fewer personnel, particularly as more autonomy is introduced in vehicles. That represents potentially a smaller operating budget, fewer people with which to split the prize, and lower chances of having someone betray the group (Dead Men Tell No Tales -> Drones Tell No Tales). Initial AISC red team analysis has uncovered other applications, but I won’t disclose them here. Suffice to say, unmanned vehicles could bring about new types of piracy that would put global law enforcement behind the power curve for years to come.
While all segments of the maritime community are susceptible, I believe that owners and operators of vessels in the energy, cruise line, and yacht segments should be paying close attention to this emerging threat.
l.
Refs:
Autonomous Ship Research Project AAWA Reveals First-year Findings