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Bloomberg BusinessweekAnduril executives are quick to point out that
many Democrats have supported electronic bor-
der surveillance as a more humane alternative to
a physical border wall.
On the other hand, immigration rights advo-
cates say companies that work with law enforce-
ment agencies can’t ignore how those agencies
treat the people being apprehended. “Assisting
in that cruelty, facilitating that cruelty, mak-
ing sure they have access to more people to be
cruel to, it makes the whole situation worse,”
says Jacinta Gonzalez, an organizer with Mijente,
an advocacy group that’s put together protests
against technology companies it believes are aid-
ing in implementing the administration’s immi-
gration policies. The American Civil Liberties
Union, meanwhile, has said technologies imple-
mented in conflict zones such as border areas or
battlefields tend to seep into civilian life.
Anduril says it now takes in twice as much rev-
enue from the military as from CBP and argues
that there should be nothing controversial about
providing security on bases. But the Interceptor
project steers it toward another hot-button tech-
nological issue: the development and deploy-
ment of autonomous weapons.T
he possible use of miniature quadcopters
for spying or terrorism has concerned the
U.S. military for years. The fear was underscored
this year when military-grade drones were impli-
cated in attacks in Saudi Arabia and the Strait of
Hormuz, and last year during an assassination
attempt in Venezuela using hobbyist drones. The
Defense Department has pursued various rem-
edies, including jamming drones’ signals and
netting them like butterflies. But the idea of elec-
tronically disabling or ensnaring a drone without
destroying it seemed ludicrous to Luckey. Why
not just shoot it down? “All the soft kill systems
are a waste of time,” he says.
He, Levin, and a handful of colleagues came
up with the idea of the Interceptor while hang-
ing around the office one weekend earlier this
year. The idea was to equip small drones with
computer vision software that would scan a
slice of airspace that needed protecting, then automatically
ram any objects deemed hostile. They built a rough prototype
that could knock down its target some of the time, then shot
a smartphone video of a successful attempt and passed it to
their contacts at the Pentagon.
As Anduril rushed to refine its early prototypes, the mil-
itary ordered a handful to try out. By summer the company
was claiming a near-perfect success rate. Newer versions of
the drones can reach speeds of 200 mph or more—potentially
enough to knock larger projectiles from the sky. Anduril hasbegun building prototypes to take out larger targets, too.
Luckey envisions clients who say, “We’d like to apply this to
people who are not just attacking a base with a quadcopter—
maybe they’re attacking it in an ultralight aircraft, or a helicop-
ter, or a cruise missile.” Anduril plans to sell the counter-drone
systems to commercial customers and has held preliminary
discussions with oil and gas companies and others that have
to police large, wide-open spaces.
The prospect of a 2-year-old startup building and distribut-
ing a new class of potentially lethal weapons will undoubtedlyAnduril’s surveillance towers are used on the U.S.-Mexico border and on military bases