drone

A drone is an unmanned aerial vehicle, also known as a UAV. It is an aircraft with no human pilot on board, instead its flight is controlled by computers in the vehicle or a remote control by a pilot on the ground.

Originally they were deployed for military and special operation units, and then also used in a number of civil applications, such as policing and firefighting, and nonmilitary security work, such as surveillance of pipelines. They are widely used for business and personal pleasure too. Drones are a wide variety of shapes and sizes and characteristics. 

Historical perspective: March 2014, was the first time a federal judge ruled that the FAA did not have the authority to stop a Detroit florist from delivering flowers by drone. By April 2017, drone purchases were booming with more than 770,000 drone registrations in 15 months. The global small drone market was valued at $14.04 billion in 2022 and was projected to grow to $16.90 billion in 2023, and $77 billion by 2030. 

When drones first became popular, people flew them over baseball stadiums, near airports, above wildfires, and active crime scenes. For safety reasons, the U.S. insisted on a series of features and restrictions, like GPS tracking and geofencing to bar drones from some areas.