Congressional Hearing, Part 2: Counter Drone Experts Urge Decentralized Innovation, Collaboration

For clarity and depth, we’ve divided our coverage of the recent Congressional hearing titled “Safeguarding the Homeland from Unmanned Aerial Systems,” into two parts.  Part 1, found here, focused on federal officials’ testimony regarding unexplained drone incursions in New York and New Jersey and the broader challenges facing counter-drone operations. This is Part 2, delving into insights from private-sector experts on this pressing issue. 

Counter-drone experts call for turning to Ukraine, local law enforcement

By DRONELIFE Features Editor Jim Magill

(Part 2 of a two-part series)

A national security expert on Tuesday told members of Congress seeking solutions for protecting the homeland from unwanted drone incursions that America should take lessons from the Ukrainians, while a second expert called for increased cooperation among private infrastructure owners and state and local law enforcement agencies.

Paul Schwennesen, PhD, co-director of the Global Strategy Decisions Group, and Jeffrey Baumgartner, vice president of national security and resilience at Berkshire Hathaway Energy, testified before a joint congressional subcommittee hearing entitled, “Safeguarding the Homeland from Unmanned Aerial Systems.” The speakers comprised a panel representing private sector experts, which followed presentations from a three-person panel of federal security officials.

Schwennesen characterized the U.S. government’s ability to respond to threats posed by drones operated by malicious actors as “below average.” He suggested that federal officials should work with Ukrainian defense officials, who have led the world in their development of UAVs used for military purposes as well as counter-drone technology.

“The world’s most advanced weapons and tactics are being developed and deployed at scale in the Ukraine/Russian front at remarkably low cost and without central direction,” he said. “We need to learn from Ukraine.  In short, the rules of the arms race have been fundamentally rewritten to favor small, cheap, easily mastered weapons systems.”

He said the U.S. armed forces and those of its NATO allies are falling behind in the new arms race to develop small, relatively inexpensive unmanned systems and the technology to counter them.

“The Ukrainians are sinking Russian ships in the Black Sea with little boats with maybe five or six hundred pounds of TNT on them, a whole bunch of them, and (the Russians) can’t possibly take them all out,” Schwennesen said.

In addition, he said that the Russia/Ukrainian war has created a rapid evolution in the development of counter-drone technology.

 “Jamming doesn’t work the way we think it does. And there are so many new developing technologies on countering the counters,” he said. For example, Schwennesen said the combatants in that conflict are operating drones using AI pixel-lock technology to guide the aircraft, leaving those trying to counter the drone threat with no RF frequency to jam. “They’re doing ambush technology where they’re not needing to have any kind of communication between operator and drone.”

Schwennesen said U.S. security forces should adopt an innovative, decentralized approach toward the development of new counter-drone technology. “I do think Yankee ingenuity is one of our comparative strengths that we need to take advantage of it,” he said.

Critical infrastructure, stadiums at risk

On the home front, Baumgartner said that more needs to be done to protect critical infrastructure, such as electric power plants and substations, as well as oil and gas facilities, such as pipelines and LNG export terminals, from attacks by drone. In a recent example of such a threat, last month federal agents arrested a Tennessee man for allegedly plotting to use an explosive-carrying UAV to try to attack a large power substation.

While drones equipped with explosive payloads pose an obvious danger, Baumgartner said some facilities are vulnerable to a kamikaze-style attack by an unarmed UAV as well. “You could simply ram a drone into some of our infrastructure,” he said. “We do take a defense-in-depth approach and try to add shielding and obfuscate certain targets.”

Noting that the most of the critical infrastructure in the U.S. is held in private hands, Baumgartner stressed the need for cooperation among facility owners and state and local officials as the best way to protect infrastructure from unwanted drone incursions. “Protecting these assets is a collaborative effort,” he said.

He cited the creation of fusion centers, where multiple agencies gather to analyze and share threat-related information, as well as analysis centers that bring together private businesses with state and local partners as good examples of such collaboration.

He observed that the temporary authority given to the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice to protect critical infrastructure is set to expire this month and urged Congress to take action to extend and strengthen that authority.

“The window of opportunity to address these challenges is closing and by modernizing our defenses, updating our legal frameworks and fostering collaboration, we can safeguard critical infrastructure, protect public safety and maintain our leadership in security and innovation,” Baumgartner said.

Cathy Lanier, chief security officer of the National Football League, who had been scheduled to address the hearing, submitted written comments instead. In her comments, Lanier said the number of drone-related incidents at NFL games has risen exponentially over the past five years, from about a dozen in 2017 to 2,845 in 2023, an increase of almost 24,00 percent.

“In January 2024, the AFC championship game between the Ravens and the Chiefs was paused because a drone violated the restricted airspace. Stadium authorities notified state law enforcement officials, who located the drone operator,” Lanier wrote. “The operator subsequently pled guilty to a misdemeanor.”

Sports stadiums full of fans remain a favorite target of terrorists and other malevolent non-state actors, she said. “Earlier this year, Islamic State propaganda specifically encouraged attacks on stadiums, including referencing the Paris Summer Olympics. And social media posts recently threatened drone attacks at the Cricket World Cup on Long Island.”

Lanier called up Congress to pass legislation that would extend to state, local and tribal law enforcement agencies the authority to conduct counter-drone measures, a right currently held by only a handful of federal agencies. The proposed legislation, Senate bill 1631 and the companion House bill 4333, “provides more robust and effective protections for the Homeland in general, and major sporting events in particular.”

In addition, she wrote that the NFL continues to work with Congress to revise and improve H.R. 8610, the Counter-UAS Authority Security, Safety and Reauthorization Act. The current version of the Act would ensure that existing authorities for the DOJ of DHS do not expire, and it starts the process of empowering local law enforcement to keep fans safe, Lanier wrote

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Read more:

• Congressional Hearing Reveals Gaps in Counter-Drone Readiness Amid Concerns About N.Y./N.J. Drone Sightings
• Understanding the New Jersey Drone Sightings: Separating Fact from Fiction
• Counter UAS Update, From the Floor of National Public Safety UAS Conference

Jim Magill is a Houston-based writer with almost a quarter-century of experience covering technical and economic developments in the oil and gas industry. After retiring in December 2019 as a senior editor with S&P Global Platts, Jim began writing about emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, robots and drones, and the ways in which they’re contributing to our society. In addition to DroneLife, Jim is a contributor to Forbes.com and his work has appeared in the Houston Chronicle, U.S. News & World Report, and Unmanned Systems, a publication of the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International.