FLYING drones fitted with heat-seeking cameras are being used by criminals to find cannabis farms in Halesowen, Cradley Heath and Oldbury so they can steal the crops.
The explosion in the number of cannabis farms has led to countless violent robberies as the intruders know the victim will not call the police.
However, the use of drones in discovering cannabis farms in residential homes is the first instance of cheaper drones being used in this way.
One tech-savvy criminal said: "I bought my first drone for a few hundred quid and learnt how to fly it over wasteland and fitted a wifi camera to it so I could look into people's windows.
Full story at www.halesowennews.co.uk
Comments
There is nobody in England or anywhere else finding indoor grow operations with hobby drones. This is total BS and this thread contains some incredibly lame and ignorant remarks. Which would usually be fine, but here people who have no idea what they are talking about need to STFU, becasue they are placing drone hobbyists at risk by spreading a dangerous and stupid rumor. There are a lot of indoor grows in many areas, more than one might think. And many of them are operated not by "silly hippies" or such but by hard-asses who will do what they think is needed to protect their crop (as is evident from the seizure of assault-type weapons at just about every bust). Many or these people are paranoid and jumpy and if they get the mistaken impression from rumors like this that some guy down the street is scoping them out with his little Phantom, well that just might get real ugly real fast.
i think its totally worth it if you want to run the risk of getting shot, especially if a two car garage can grow almost half a mill worth of skunk , i dont think its propaganda at all , the picture doesn't exactly inspire much trust in the honesty of the reporter. i accidentally stumbled on a grow operation in the foothills where i used to fly , i assumed there was no one up there as its a national park, i had no idea at the time but reviewing the footage in edit i found dozens of plants hidden under the canopy , i didnt need thermal for that but i wouldn't dare go up there on foot and no way was i going to use the footage i got , if anyone is paranoid about getting "found" get something like this http://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/FRS-Cell-Phone-Bug-jammer_397...
All you folks who believe this tale (Mommy, Mommy, I know it's true, I saw it on the Intra-Net!!) please send me all of your money and I will send you a notarized title to all of my rights to the Brooklyn Bridge.
Hmm, time for the growers to start looking into directional high powered jammers ;P
Let the games begin !
Hmmmm, there's just no honor among thieves these days.
the money involved in ripping off some poor hippys grow operation is huge , it happens all the time , amazing they are turning to the same tech the cops use, scary stuff
Pretty impressive that a common thief criminal is savvy enough to not only assemble the quad properly but also mount a FLIR that is not an easy feat for many of us here, not to mention the cost of that FLIR. Sadly though as with every technology it is being used for bad.
This is such a funny story ".....the victim will not call the police...." Well imagine if it did :) Hilarious. My canabis crop just got robbed... It's not long before we read about some serious assassin who decided to mount a silent pistol on his multicopter and started closing Death contracts.