Abstract
This chapter explores the challenges underlying the policy choice of deploying drone technology in the area of border surveillance, with specific reference to the surveillance of European Union (EU) member states’ external southern borders.
Border surveillance is one of the top priorities of the member states of the EU for several reasons: the most prominent is the fight against irregular migration and cross-border crime. Within this context, public agencies (at both the national and the European level) are investing important resources in deploying the most up-to-date technologies, in an attempt to stop undesired migrants. The deployment of drones for border policing purposes is already a reality in the USA, and also in some EU member states. Frontex has also devoted attention and resources to exploring the possibility of deploying drones in border surveillance, as they are seen as beneficial assets in the perspective of European Border Surveillance System (EUROSUR).
The aim of this chapter is to explore the recent developments constituted by the deployment of drone technology in border surveillance. The chapter first introduces the actors, policies and practices in the sphere of border management, specifically in the area of border surveillance (1); then it discusses the use of drone technology for border surveillance, looking not only at its potentialities but also at its current shortcomings (2); it will then move toward the regulatory framework enabling the safe deployment of drones under aviation law and on border surveillance (3) and presents the constraints represented by fundamental rights and data protection rules on drone technology and the challenges drones represent for the human rights of migrants (4), before concluding that drone technology might entail a further securitisation of border surveillance, together with a shift toward preventive border surveillance (5).
Though the chapter is the product of a common conception, sections ‘Introduction’, ‘Current Instruments and Practices: The Challenges Ahead’, ‘The Legal Framework for Border Surveillance and Its Constraints’, ‘The Limitations for Drone Surveillance from Privacy and Data Protection’ and ‘The Challenges for Human Rights Created By EU’s Cooperation with Third Countries in the Area of Border Management’ can be attributed to Luisa Marin and sections ‘Actors in Border Surveillance’, ‘The Deployment of Drone Technology in Border Surveillance’ and ‘General Aviation Law Issues’ are attributed to Kamila Krajčíková. The conclusions are common.
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Notes
- 1.
In this chapter, the terms “border policing” and “border surveillance” are used interchangeably.
- 2.
Estimates on migrants’ deaths at sea are uncertain, but according to the Fortress Europe blog, run by journalist Gabriele del Grande, in the past few decades about 20,000 people have lost their lives in the attempt to cross the Mediterranean Sea from Africa to Europe.
- 3.
In computer sciences, data mining is the practice of examining large pre-existing databases in order to generate new information (Oxford University Press 2014). Media analysis constitutes the monitoring of open and media sources and analysing its effects on its audience, trends as well as reliability when reporting news (Dictionary Central 2012).
- 4.
These diversion and interception practices were carried out, for example, by Italy or Spain on the basis of bilateral agreements with third countries (Italy–Libya, Spain–Morocco/Mauritania/Senegal) (European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights 2013; Heijer 2011). These agreements also allowed the member state to join the national border patrols and participate in the surveillance of those third states’ territorial waters (Heijer 2011). The criticism of these practices mainly involves the fact that these activities are actually against international refugee law, that is, they constitute a breach to the non-refoulement principle (Marin 2011) that no state should “expel or return (“refouler”) a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the frontiers of territories where his/her life or freedom would be threatened on account of his/her race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion” (Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees 1951, p. 30). These practices were challenged before the European Court of Human Rights in the case of Hirsi Jamaa and Others v. Italy (Case of Hirsi Jamaa and Others v. Italy 2012).
- 5.
Frontex has already signed working arrangements with 18 countries: Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Canada, Cape Verde, Croatia, Georgia, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Nigeria, Russia, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine. Further working arrangements are being negotiated with Libya, Morocco, Senegal, Egypt, Brazil and Tunisia (Frontex 2014c).
- 6.
According to the (then) Commissioner for Home Affairs, Ms Cecilia Malmström, JO Triton should be seen as complementary rather than alternative to Mare Nostrum (Nielsen 2014).
- 7.
See two emblematic cases among many: the case of the left-to-die boat and the Salamis case of summer 2013.
- 8.
The Italian Navy has not disclosed how many drones are deployed for border surveillance. The operation Mare Nostrum is an Italian border surveillance and “humanitarian operation to save human lives” in the Mediterranean; the assets deployed confer a clearly military nature on it (Ghelli 2013; Day 2013).
- 9.
This is not the case of Italy, which has also enacted regulations enabling drones to fly in its skies for civil purposes, thanks to resorting to “smart segregation” (ENAC 2013).
- 10.
Nonsegregated airspace is the airspace open to all civil air transport. Current aviation law prohibits the deployment of fully automated drones in nonsegregated airspace (Hayes et al. 2014).
- 11.
This workshop included live demonstrations of mini-RPAs (Patria MASS, Rafael Orbiter, SIM Skyeye, Selex ASIO) and Aerostats (Skystar 180) (Kolev 2012).
- 12.
Among the companies that attended the workshops in the past were, for example, Thales (UK), Aerovisión (Spain), Scotty Group (Austria), Israel Aerospace Industries (Israel), L−3 Communications (USA), AeroVironment (USA), Selex (Italy), Safran Group-Sagem, Inmarsat (UK), Diamond Aircraft (Austria), Altus (USA) and Lockheed Martin (UK).
- 13.
ICAO is an UN agency created in 1944. It works with global industry and aviation organizations on development of international Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs), which are then used by national states for the development of their legally binding national civil aviation legislation (ICAO 2014).
- 14.
VLOS differs across states. Usually, it means an area of about 500 m horizontally and about 120 m vertically (UK Civil Aviation Authority: Directorate of Airspace Policy 2014).
- 15.
This is an applied principle of proportionality (Sauter 2013).
- 16.
A border crossing point is any crossing point authorised by the competent authorities for the crossing of external borders (Regulation (EC) No 562/2006 2006).
- 17.
Distress as defined by the SAR Convention is a “situation wherein there is a reasonable certainty that a person, a vessel or other craft is threatened by grave and imminent danger and requires immediate assistance” (IMO 1985).
- 18.
In 2011, a Spanish naval force rescued about 100 migrants and it took 5 days of negotiations till those people could be disembarked in Tunisia. The FRA report found that migrants often report that they encounter a military vessel during their journey but are mostly turned away without the migrants’ vessel being reported or assistance being rendered (FRA 2013).
- 19.
In the case of Peck v. UK, the ECtHR stated that: “The monitoring of the actions of an individual in a public place by the use of photographic equipment which does not record the visual data does not, as such, give rise to an interference with the individual’s private life” (Case of Peck v. The United Kingdom 2003).
- 20.
According to Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC, personal data are defined as “any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person; an identifiable person is one who can be identified, directly or indirectly, in particular by reference to an identification number or to one or more factors specific to his physical, physiological, mental economic, cultural or social identity” (Directive 95/46/EC 1995).
- 21.
In the case of Peck v. UK, the ECtHR stated that: “The monitoring of the actions of an individual in a public place by the use of photographic equipment which does not record the visual data does not, as such, give rise to an interference with the individual’s private life” (Case of Peck v. The United Kingdom 2003).
- 22.
Article 20, para. 4. See also para. 5, which states that: “Any exchange of information under paragraph 1, which provides a third country with information that could be used to identify persons or groups of persons whose request for access to international protection is under examination or who are under a serious risk of being subjected to torture, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment or any other violation of fundamental rights, shall be prohibited.”
- 23.
In the context of law, a chilling effect is the inhibition or discouragement of the legitimate exercise of a constitutional right because of the fear of potential or threatened prosecution or sanction (Wallace and Wild 2010).
- 24.
Among those states, we can name Turkey as a departure country of unauthorised migration and cross-border crime in the Mediterranean. Furthermore, Frontex is also planning to expand its cooperation with other North African countries (such as Libya, Morocco, Egypt, Tunisia as well as Mauritania and Senegal), which have been involved in the Hera operation on the basis of bilateral agreements with Spain (Frontex 2014c).
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Marin, L., Krajčíková, K. (2016). Deploying Drones in Policing Southern European Borders: Constraints and Challenges for Data Protection and Human Rights. In: Završnik, A. (eds) Drones and Unmanned Aerial Systems. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-23760-2_6
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