Integrating Comprehensive Human Oversight in Drone Deployment: A Conceptual Framework Applied to the Case of Military Surveillance Drones
Year: 2021
Type: article
Abstract: Accountability is a value often mentioned in the debate on intelligent systems and their increased pervasiveness in our society. When focusing specifically on autonomous systems, a critical gap emerges: although there is much work on governance and attribution of accountability, there is a significant lack of methods for the operationalisation of accountability within the socio-technical layer of autonomous systems. In the case of autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles or drones—the critical question of how to maintain accountability as they undertake fully autonomous flights becomes increasingly important as their uses multiply in both the commercial and military fields. In this paper, we aim to fill the operationalisation gap by proposing a socio-technical framework to guarantee human oversight and accountability in drone deployments, showing its enforceability in the real case of military surveillance drones. By keeping a focus on accountability and human oversight as values, we align with the emphasis placed on human responsibility, while requiring a concretisation of what these principles mean for each specific application, connecting them with concrete socio-technical requirements. In addition, by constraining the framework to observable elements of pre- and post-deployment, we do not rely on assumptions made on the internal workings of the drone nor the technical fluency of the operator.
Source: Information
DOI: 10.3390/info12090385
Institutions: Delft University of Technology, Umeå University
Language: English
Subfield: Safety Research
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $1,512
OpenAlex ID: W3199442479