NAMIC releases white paper on drones, privacy and regulation

While Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approved drones could be useful tools for insurance providers, privacy concerns and a web of laws will make their use complicated, according to a National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies (NAMIC) white paper.

“You have the legal right to have your neighbor removed from standing in your front yard,” Tom Karol, NAMIC general counsel-federal, said. “You can have his dog removed and keep his tree limbs from growing over your yard. But under the FAA’s definition of ‘navigable airspace,’ you can’t stop a drone from flying over your property, even at low altitude, and it may be a federal crime to try.”

Titled “Unmanned Aircraft: Defining Private Airspace,” the white paper focuses on the privacy concerns and the actions local and state governments have taken to counter them. Drone users can take images from wherever their drones are allowed to fly, and without private airspace, this covers most properties. The issues inherently raised by this are generating a patchwork of standards and regulations.

“While property/casualty insurance companies see the benefits in using unmanned aircraft systems to serve policyholders, as well as to provide coverage for policyholders that use [unmanned aircraft systems (UAS)], the industry is stymied by a smorgasbord of differing and often competing standards of privacy,” Karol said. “Questions surrounding private airspace must be resolved in order to define how insurers will use and insure UAS, as well as to determine what regulations are needed to facilitate both. If the FAA won’t take action, then it’s up to Congress.”