Regulation of Drones

The increased use of drones for civilian applications has presented many countries withregulatory challenges. Such challenges include the need to ensure that drones are operatedsafely, without harming public and national security, and in a way that would protect areas ofnational, historical, or natural importance. A variety of the countries surveyed in this report havealso made efforts to address concerns regarding the property and privacy rights of landowners orother persons impacted by the operation of drones.International standards to regulate certain aspects of drone operations are currently beingconsidered by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). In 2011 the ICAO issued acircular titled Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) (CIR328). Serving as a first look at the subject,the circular calls on states to provide comments, “particularly with respect to its application andusefulness,” in an effort to proceed with the development of “the fundamental internationalregulatory framework through Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs), with supportingProcedures for Air Navigation Services (PANS) and guidance material, to underpin routineoperation of UAS throughout the world in a safe, harmonized and seamless manner comparableto that of manned operations.” 1Efforts to harmonize rules of drone operations are currently being undertaken by the EuropeanCommission, which has introduced a proposal to integrate all drones, regardless of their size,into the EU aviation safety framework.While some individual countries have adopted legislation or implemented temporary provisionson the operation of drones, various regulatory and legislative proposals are currentlybeing considered.This report surveys the regulation of drone operations under the laws of twelve countries as wellas the European Union. Countries surveyed use different terminology in regulating drones.Such terms include “unmanned aircraft systems” (UAS); “unmanned aerial [or air] vehicles”(UAVs), and “remotely piloted aircraft” (RPA). For the purpose of uniformity and to reflect theterminology used by the ICAO, this summary refers to drones as UAS, to include all types ofunmanned systems, vehicles, and aircraft, excluding model aircraft used for hobby orrecreational purposes.