Drone policy and regulation news from UASFeed — FAA rulemaking, BVLOS, Part 108, the DJI debate, export controls, and the rules shaping the uncrewed sky.
SFPD's drone order, DGO 10.12, goes to the Police Commission on Oct. 14. Its key term, 'public safety response', is never defined, and the EFF and the Public Defender say that could let drones fly to every call while Flock, valued at $8.4B, bets heavily on police drones.
Read the story →Intel has asked the FCC for an expedited waiver so the foreign-made automated guided vehicles that have run its US fabs for 20+ years can still get hardware, software and firmware changes. Robots were added to the Covered List on July 28, through the same origin-based rule used for drones and routers.
The FCC used its new logic-bearing component rules for the first time, blocking an unnamed dash cam and a wireless video transmitter over a HiSilicon chip. The test is who made the part, the same one that can keep DJI or Autel components out of new US-built drones.
US spray-drone sales fell 59% in 2025 as CBP held up DJI shipments, while sprayed acreage rose 58.7%. Now the dealers' coalition is asking the FCC to drop Part 137 crop sprayers from a proposed 'military-grade' import ban.
Birmingham now has a $500 citation to enforce Alabama's new ticketed-event drone law before the Magic City Classic, but on game day the FAA's stadium restriction around Legion Field likely cancels the state law's exemption for anyone flying lawfully under federal rules.
A California company that DroneXL flagged as a suspected DJI front asked its certification body to dismiss its year-old FCC drone grant, saying it never sold the aircraft. The 30-day limit in the FCC's own rules makes the route it took unclear.
A one-year TFR now bars unauthorized drones within one nautical mile of the whole southern border, surface to 400 ft. CBP is the only waiver route, and its approval list has no category for routine commercial or hobby flights.
The FCC filed redacted cover pages of eight Pentagon letters to Congress in the DJI and Autel dockets and said it never relied on them for the Dec. 22 Covered List action. A day later it docketed Sen. Rick Scott's letter backing the ban. The public pages name DJI but describe no specific threat.
A 100% tariff on thermal drones and a pending FCC rule that spares federal buyers are landing on local police, who mostly fly DJI. One New Jersey sheriff's office puts its deputy kit at $29,427.99, and the National Sheriffs' Association wants the same exemption federal users get.
A new paper warns that drug networks could sell armed drones and the skills to use them to African armed groups, but its own author calls the drugs-for-drones barter claim an unconfirmed lead. The strongest data still comes from Mexico and Colombia.
A Dallas grand jury charged a 24-year-old with four federal counts over alleged drone flights near Love Field and DFW. The 8-year maximum is in the headlines, but the runway charge itself carries just one year.
FAA Order JO 7200.23E, effective Oct. 31, lets Part 107 tower and high-rise inspectors fly above facility-map ceilings without ATC coordination, puts Class E surface-area rules in writing, and adds a see-and-avoid waiver to every Part 91 UAS approval.
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