Bloomberg Businessweek - USA (2019-10-07)

60

Bloomberg Businessweek

Andurilexecutivesarequicktopointoutthat

manyDemocratshavesupportedelectronic bor-

der surveillance as a more humane alternative to

a physicalborderwall.

Ontheotherhand,immigrationrightsadvo-

catessaycompanies 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-

mentofautonomousweapons.

T

hepossibleuseofminiaturequadcopters

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.Theideawastoequipsmalldroneswith

computervisionsoftwarethatwouldscana

sliceofairspacethatneededprotecting,thenautomatically

ramanyobjectsdeemedhostile.Theybuilta roughprototype

thatcouldknockdownitstargetsomeofthetime,thenshot

a smartphonevideoofa successfulattemptandpassedit to

theircontactsatthePentagon.

AsAndurilrushedtorefineitsearlyprototypes,themil-

itaryordereda handfultotryout.Bysummerthecompany

wasclaiminga near-perfectsuccessrate.Newerversionsof

thedronescanreachspeedsof 200 mphormore—potentially

enough to knock larger projectiles from the sky. Anduril has

begunbuildingprototypestotakeoutlargertargets,too.

Luckeyenvisionsclientswhosay,“We’dliketoapplythisto

peoplewhoarenotjustattackinga basewithaquadcopter—

maybethey’reattackingit inanultralightaircraft,ora helicop-

ter,ora cruisemissile.”Andurilplanstosellthecounter-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 undoubtedly

Anduril’s surveillance towers are used on the U.S.-Mexico border and on military bases