Drones could soon help search for murder victims in remote areas. In recent tests, drones equipped with laser scanners identified graves in Australian bushland. Now, the nation's police want to use the technology in an ongoing case. In the investigation, the police suspect that a missing person is buried in a densely forested area. However, all searches so far have come up empty.

Earlier, the students spent two days in workshops where they were versed in computer learning and object recognition with Microsoft's Custom Vision solution and Azure cloud computing platform. After forming 15 teams, they were assigned a DJI Phantom 4 Pro drone. They were given flying lessons and also tasked with training it to recognize different objects using AI. On competition day, each team was set a common challenge: maneuver their pre-trained drone over an area where different pieces of fruit had been placed, then operate the craft's camera so that AI technology could recognize each as an apple, a pear, a pomelo, a banana, or a mango. The teams were ranked and scored on the number accurately identified as well as physical drone flying skills and completion time.

Tech workers are increasingly uneasy about their employers' work with the US government, especially the military. Some protests have led to real change: Google last year decided not to renew a contract with the Pentagon to apply artificial intelligence to drone footage, after 4,000 employees signed a petition protesting the arrangement. Last week, a group of Microsoft workers published a petition asking executives to terminate a contract to develop augmented reality technology for the US military. "We did not sign-up to develop weapons, and we demand a say in how our work is used," the petition, which was published on Twitter, says. Monday, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella rebuffed the plea.

As a result, its manufacturing line in Israel will be closed. Some of the 20 workers in Israel have been offered to relocate to its new global headquarters in Arizona, while Airobotics said it planned to expand its U.S. staff.

A drone being used to help search for a missing dog ended up getting shot out of the sky by a man on New York's Long Island on Saturday, police said. The Suffolk County Police Department said in a news release Sunday that 26-year-old Gerard Chasteen is facing charges of third-degree criminal mischief and prohibited use of a weapon after firing at the drone from his yard. The incident took place around 4:45 p.m. after members of Missing Angels-Long Island, an organization that searches for missing pets, were using a Mavic 2 Zoom drone to search for a missing dog. The volunteer members lost contact with the drone, whicht retails over $1,300, and GPS placed it above Chasteen's home in Saint James, according to police. A man shot a drone out of the sky on New York's Long Island on Saturday, officials said.

The FAA will require drone operators in the United States to display their registration numbers on the outside of their small UAVs starting on February 25, 2019. The new regulation revises an existing policy that allows drone owners to put a UAV's registration number inside of the device's battery compartment. Drone operators in the US must register their aerial vehicle with the FAA, at which time they're given a registration number. Since launching the registration requirement, the FAA has permitted drone owners to conceal their identifier within an enclosed compartment on the drone, assuming the compartment could be opened without using tools. This permission aimed to'grant flexibility to the diverse types of small unmanned aircraft commercially available.'

ONCE THOUGHT OF AS A NICHE TOY for early adopters, drones can now be found buzzing over parks, in select cities, and are even being increasingly used for video production as the popularity of aerial photography soars. However, drones aren't only for fun and entertainment, and the high-pitched hum of their spinning propellers could replace the wail of ambulance sirens for global citizens as drones are put to work for humanitarian purposes. In March of 2017, DJI, the manufacturers of the most popular commercial drones, published a report about drones' life-saving capabilities, citing cases in which drones manned by volunteers or bystanders were used in emergency situations like floods and avalanches, resulting in 59 life-saving rescues in China, Canada, the U.S., and Turkey. Given that it takes 25 people 35 hours to search one square mile for missing persons, compared to the 30 minutes it takes a drone to cover the same area, regardless of treacherous conditions on the ground, drones are uniquely suited for search and rescue, even when piloted by hobbyists. Based on the increasing trend of drone use in the last 10 months covered by the report, DJI estimated that drones would be directly responsible for saving at least one person per week in the future.

Naval technology is developing so rapidly that Australia's new $50 billion fleet of submarines may one day have to face deadly underwater drones, an expert has warned. Earlier this month, the federal government announced the signing of the Attack class submarine Strategic Partnering Agreement with French shipbuilder Naval Group. It will build 12 attack submarines to replace the Royal Australian Navy's ageing Collins class vessels, with the first one scheduled to be delivered in the early 2030s, the federal government said. But Russia has already provided a glimpse of underwater autonomous – or drone - weaponry. The Russian Ministry of Defence released testing footage of its'Poseidon' – a high-speed nuclear torpedo. Naval chiefs said the weapon is capable of carrying both conventional and nuclear warheads and will have a maximum speed of 200 km/h.

The growth in the profile of drones has surely by now moved out of the folder marked "Fad." Where once flying model aircraft was seen as a fairly niche hobby, enjoyed by men with sensible jackets and thick-rimmed glasses, now seemingly everyone wants to get in on the drone act. Drones are now used extensively to carry out inspections or survey and map terrain in harsh or hazardous environments. For work on power lines or oil rigs, the benefits to the health and safety of human workers are clear. After all, why would you send a human up a tower to assess a fault when it takes a camera-equipped drone 10 seconds to get there?

Drones are playing a vital role in the delivery of much-needed superfast broadband to some of England's most remote areas, as well as helping farmers fight back against rural crime. Alnwick-based technology and communications company Alncom is harnessing the power of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for its ground-breaking work in connecting isolated communities to the internet and providing farms with survelliance cameras. The firm uses drones to carry out wireless broadband and CCTV surveys – an approach which is dramatically reducing the time of each job and yielding more reliable results and aiding decision making. Stephen Pinchen, Alncom managing director, said: "Our first'proper' drone (a DJI Phantom 2) was a game-changer. We immediately saw the potential for using drone images for wi-fi and CCTV surveys."