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.'

New rules mean drones are set to take off in India at last. But the legislation also requires pilots of all but tiny craft to get approval for every flight, even a zip around the local park. The regulations came into force earlier this month, overturning a 2014 ban on drone use by anyone other than government agencies. Now, commercial and recreational drones can fly during daytime, as long as they stay below 120 metres and within sight of operators.

The Hong Kong's Civil Aviation Authority (HKCAA) suggests that UAV users may need to register their drones with authorities, undertake training, pass tests and meet certain insurance requirements. As per the new rules, drone weighing over 9 ounces would need to be registered and the operators need to undertake short web-based training. But before making any changes, Hong Kong needs to go through a three month period of public consultation. The proposal will also include making certain parts of the island into no-fly zones. Still, there are number of countries that require proper registration and a license to fly.

File photo - An airplane flies over a drone during the Polar Bear Plunge on Coney Island in the Brooklyn borough of New York Jan. 1, 2015. While it seems unlikely that everyday drone hobbyists would want to make a beeline for their nearest nuclear facility to grab some aerial shots, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has nevertheless announced a ban on drone flights over such locations in the U.S., namely: As you can see, they're mainly labs, while the Hanford Site, for example, is a mostly decommissioned nuclear production complex. Another of those listed, the Pantex Site, is an active nuclear weapons assembly and dismantlement plant. The restrictions, which come into force on December 29, have been put in place "to address concerns about unauthorized drone operations over seven Department of Energy (DOE) facilities," the FAA confirmed on its website. It added that "operators who violate the airspace restrictions may be subject to enforcement action, including potential civil penalties and criminal charges."

In March, the FAA noted that over 100,000 hobby drone owners had registered their machines since the year began, bringing the total in the US over 770,000. Owners have filed their non-commercial UAVs with the agency ever since the DoT passed a law in December 2015 that made registration mandatory. But a Washington, D.C. court has struck down that legislation, freeing just-for-fun drone owners from notifying the government of their purchases -- for good and ill. Model aircraft enthusiast John Taylor brought his case against the FAA back in January 2016, shortly after the regulations came in place. The DC court of appeals ruled (PDF) in his favor, effectively classifying non-commercial drones as model aircraft and subject to the FAA's 2012 Modernization and Reform Act, which prohibited the agency from making new laws restricting flying hobbyist craft. But the drone industry isn't celebrating this turn: Turns out, keeping track of owners and making sure they're trained to fly was useful for everyone.

Over 770,000 drone owners have registered to fly in the US since the FAA made it mandatory in December 2015, Administrator Michael Huerta told drone group AUVSI yesterday. As Recode notes, that's up from 670,000 at the beginning of the year, meaning 100,000 users have signed up in the last three months alone. The FAA has also issued 37,000 Remote Pilot Certificates that let drone owners do filming, inspection and other commercial operations. It's likely that a lot of folks are ignoring the pilot license and registration rules, so it's hard to say how many drones that are supposed to be registered ... aren't. Nevertheless, there are only 320,000 manned aircraft registered, from ultralights to jumbo jets, and the FAA has been doing that process for 100 years.

Drones will start getting digital identification certificates under a new service being launched on Tuesday that hopes to bring trust and verification to the skies. The Drone IDs will be SSL/TLS certificates from DigiCert issued through AirMap, a provider of drone flight information data, and will first be available to users of Intel's Aero drone platform. Under the system, drone owners receive the digital ID in the form of an SSL/TLS certificate when they register for AirMap services. The ID is different from the identification number issued to drone owners by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and isn't part of any government scheme. Initially, the IDs will be used to authenticate drones into AirMap's system, which provides data about local weather and obstacles that could impede a drone's flight.