Have you ever seen a drone? They sound like an angry hornet's nest and fly about 20 minutes. The stalker stuff is pure FUD, promulgated by people who are afraid of them based on a hypothetical that has to date never happened. Once.
Read every story that claims it has and think hard.
Doesn't the noise make it more likely to cause a grudge between neighbors? If it was quiet enough to go undetected then the neighbor would never know or care about the UAVs presence.
I have been buzzed by a curious neighbor before and it was unsettling and extremely rude (it also spooked our livestock and could have cost my parents a lot of money)
Don't assume the people around you are happy to have UAVs flying near or above them or their property, regardless of whether the UAV is being used for stalking/surveillance. For one thing, they can't know for sure what it's being used for, and even if they're confident it isn't conducting surveillance it is generally seen as rude at best to invade somebody's privacy.
> Don't assume the people around you are happy to have UAVs flying near or above them or their property,
When I'm flying in public, I approach people who wander in to what I think of as a "zone" and explain what's going on. With absolutely zero exceptions across several hundred people, the reaction has been positive. Nearly everyone has a load of questions to ask me about aerial photography and drones in general; one woman in her 60s spent half an hour sitting next to me just amazed at the technology, often just watching me fly for minutes at a time, and telling me about her grandson in the Air Force.
In over two thousand hours of flying, I've had precisely one negative experience: a contract security guard at Wind River Systems in Alameda came up to me and threatened to have me arrested on the basis that I was trespassing on Wind River property, even though the specific space is Alameda public shoreline and I had done research on this beforehand. He got in my face and shouted expletives at me, no matter how much I attempted to defuse the situation. To be honest, based on comments like yours (and many more before it), I expected when I got in to this hobby to have many more experiences like it. That hasn't happened.
I've found that doing your research, not being stupid, and being open and willing to talk to people instead of confrontational and falling back on the rules ("I'm permitted to be here" instead of "hey, is it okay with you that I'm flying nearby?") has brought about a positive interaction without fail. Countless people have asked to see my work: once while flying at Berkeley Marina, an impromptu show developed from a few sailors asking to see their vessel from above.
Your assertion about people suffers from confirmation bias. You feel that way, so you think everyone feels that way. In my extensive experience operating unmanned vehicles, I regret to inform you that you are in the tiniest of minorities. I work very hard to maintain a good positive image for the hobby, which is why I'm never rude to someone. You have to return that courtesy and open a line of dialogue with me if I'm making you uncomfortable, because no matter how hard I work, I will occasionally make mistakes.
The typical expectation of privacy by most folks is completely flawed, by the way, including by your comment, but I've learned that there's no path toward arriving at any sort of agreement on that point.
Just as you have certain things you do not want me to assume (though you're assuming I assume them), I have a few to return to you: simply because there are people with more money than common sense who buy drones and harass people and disrupt safety with them, don't assume anyone you see operating a drone is one of them. Most pilots I know are very open and more than happy to talk to you -- trust me, someone showing interest and talking to you is sometimes the best part of any hobby because it's a chance to meet new people.
> The typical expectation of privacy by most folks is completely flawed
I expect to have privacy while on my own property and there is nothing flawed about that expectation.
> With absolutely zero exceptions across several hundred people, the reaction has been positive.
My reaction would be positive too, if you came and introduced yourself beforehand or were flying safely in a public space.
I wasn't saying earlier that drones are always going to cause stress. I said that having a mystery drone show up near or on their property is going to bother many people. And I'm definitely not in the minority there.
You claimed above that drones were loud and short lived, therefore useless for surveillance. But that's not the point. They can still cause people great bother if the pilot isn't careful to respect people's comfort zones. Particularly while drones are a new thing and people haven't made any room in their comfort zones for them
Edit: to be clear, the courteous piloting you describe yourself as doing is not an issue in my book at all. I would be more than happy to have pilots like you around my property. My point is that discourteous piloting, where people are left wondering about the UAV on their property, is going to cause grief.
I'm not at all comfortable with drones flying outside the windows of my apartment. I don't know if they carry cameras or not and I value being able to make my Saturdays no-pants day. And the sound is really annoying.
Read every story that claims it has and think hard.