Task: How to implement a Security Manager for a UAV

Hello, I’ve gotten my first task from my new manager. I’m suppose to implement a Security Manager. I’ll get other tasks in the future.

Questions: Does anyone have examples of work other people have implemented? What problems did they encounter.

Details:

In the past my product involved a truck with two people operating the system with a radio dish on the top. They communicated and controlled the UAV.

The new capability does away with the expensive truck in favor of 3 cases that are about 4’X3X1’’.

Anyway, my first tasks also involves a GUI terminal on the ground. A human first logs into a laptop which connects to the SCI (the Scalable Control Interface) which involves three cases with 3 blade servers, power strip, H/W switch, etc. inside. All communication has to be encrypted. To log in Active Directory is utilized.

Sockets, API can be used etc.

So, that’s all the information that I have about my first task. What are my options on implementing this? Do you have example code to do this?

The new product has to use many standards such as FACE and Stanag 4586. Stanag to talk to the UAV and Face to communicate with the hardware on the ground. There are tons of other standards that have to followed such at DO-178c MIL-STD 822, …

I apologize if I’ve posted a typographical error somewhere in this post.

Thank you,
Mike

It is not a very easy task that you are trying. We are doing that for the past 4 years

Here is our product: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTtz7AZb3j0

Making the system operate safely with little human intervention is hard. Our system does it with no human intervention at all :slight_smile:

1 Like

Hello, it’s me again with another account.

Based on the transcript, I don’t find the German video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTtz7AZb3j0) to be very useful. It doesn’t appear to answer any of my questions. The video shows a high level description of your product.

What should I do to implement the functionality described in the first posting of this thread?

Help,
Mike

Below is the transcript of the English version of the transcript:

The tethered drone is currently being used in a pilot project at Volkswagen’s Wolfsburg plant. Equipped with an intelligent surveillance camera, the drone can recognize a human as such, take thermal images and perform geo-referencing from a lofty height - while flying in a highly automated manner. Via the cable connection to the hangar, the drone supplies itself with power and simultaneously transmits control, image and video data, so that it is not only in operation 24/7, but can also be seamlessly integrated into an existing infrastructure and pre-existing IT systems. Another feature is the connection to the intrusion detection system and the possible automatic response to incidents.

00:00 Introduction
01:22 IAV - the strong engineering partner
03:19 Tethered drone for security applications - brief description
09:55 Winner OSPA 2020 - Category: Outstanding Safety Partnership
10:31 Sequence of the demonstration
11:54 Live - Demo 21:24 Questions for the user VW
24:00 Questions from the audience

welcome here to danger from our small test center for our and development today we are in the fourth station the if barcelona rihanna and have prepared the lecture prepared tied up without from the box a supplement for security systems of industries then as already said the lecture is in the part of the industrial danube arena hosted by vdm at this place many thanks to the pre dna and then the mrs. juliane friedrich for the organization we have prepared a program of 25 minutes which I will lead through my name is im recall neumann I am a team leader at av and responsible for the topic development of the produced threat system then I would briefly explain what we expect in the next few minutes or what you can expect in the next few minutes first I will explain the background around the technical details of the system in more detail then we actually get into the actual performance finally we have prepared a slot for questions and answers that you can use just ask the women simply a chat window and we will have you kick off is already answer accordingly all in the afterwards we have prepared a bed meeting into which we will then change directly afterwards if you have have further questions then simply and follow him and we can go on talking there well then let’s go into it first I would like to start with an introduction of the company kv itself is one of the largest other of the major engineering services players in the automotive industry we help our customers with development from concept ideas to prototypes to actual series development make that meanwhile over 35 years we have been able to more than 8000 employees and currently achieve an annual turnover of more than one million euro the whole mainly driven at the main and development center here in Germany exactly as I already mentioned is an engineering service supplier that that means our main core business is and remains or is the engineering packet then besides we also offer products the fun engineering derive and just area engineering of the automobile we have a very long history and we can a very long wealth of experience look back the automobile has indeed developed the last few years, the last few decades dramatic change and development especially in the area of software development and we are exactly with this software development and automation has grown very strongly at the latest now you will ask yourself what has that to do with the title to which I am actually here to do to me the same as the whole automotive industry is also never up currently in a year more or less great upheaval we are trying to improve our method competence that we have acquired in the automotive industry into other areas and industries and this includes among others ong others commercial vehicles work machines what also its holdings in but also the energy and water management furthermore marine and now we come to the actual topic aviation and cross-industry robotics and automation of system and especially aviation and robotics in combination then fits exactly to the title is it here are today then we are already there to what you actually want to introduce want to introduce the subject of tethered I get finished as an application we have so far managed to combine the know how automotive industry with a view beyond the end of our nose into a new to a new subject area must have supported with it of course partners for the supply of components and also partners for the piloting of the system it has turned out that the system itself is a very good or very many possibilities in the area of security, which today is 40 the step to the public have gone now the topic may be shackled thrones or the word combination fettered threatening may sound contradictory at first in itself but especially in the field of security it has very important advantages the drone is not tied up in a way that it can no longer fly it can move relatively freely within a defined it can still move relatively freely however, the tether offers two decisive advantages one advantage is the energy supply with the tether we are have permanent power like the drone that means we could theoretically be in the air 24 7 fly in the air and are not tied to the batteries bound as was between system we have during the period of operation still in availability we are dependent dependent on appropriate conditions the second advantage of the tethering represents that we can use the data connection exclusively via the tethered the cable the cable, where both the data, i.e. the image and video video information which is security and because security mainly interested as well as the command control links i.e. the actual control commands of the drone and the feedback of the control system are exclusively wired via the cable so that we have by very high physical security against external security against external attacks and exactly the combination of the power supply and the data connection exclusively via the cable naturally represents a very for the case of security a very good symbiosis to use such a system the operation should be as simple as possible possible and to realize a simple operation must of course be automated a lot has to be automated next and to automate such a system of drones and tethering we need one more component more which on the one hand would be one of the core components in the hangar the drone is in case of non-use packed accordingly and there before accesses and still give as protected from ism damage furthermore, indispensable for for the automated operation a local weather station with which the flight weather can be can observe and evaluate on site and issue appropriate flight clearance a third point is not unfortunately not visible is the software for all the components as you can imagine all single system system components the camera the drones and the tether the hangar itself the weather station integrated with each other learn and interact and for this please complete a extensive software package it therein as a result of this development we reached the properties you written on the right I suppose by now you have already read a lot of read I still want to briefly to go over we have the nevertheless the camera view without have itself is and remains a flying surveillance camera with an intelligence but we can give reason to equip this can include functions like person recognition or even if necessary a person tracking we can schedule pictures at according to the camera selection or we could also display detected objects referenced to the display a second important point and one that is very important to us is also customers is the complete integration into already existing infrastructure this is on the one hand seamless integration into the it systems but perhaps even more important also the seamless integration to the customer working processes which means that the system requires as little training effort for the people who will use it later who will use it and that it should be easy to use and a very important point in the context is that our philosophy is the data management especially data of the keeping of the user data should exclusively in the grounds system happen which are already released anyway are therefore have different releases pass through works councils data protection responsible persons and so on and the drone as such only as another camera in this approach developed to the function the above mentioned to be able to realize must however process data on the without itself this data processing is done in streaming process i.e. frame by frame hd-video recording the data is evaluated accordingly and the insights gained from it our display and already in the fractions of a second the picture is forgotten and the next error is system we now come to the operation itself as already mentioned the system is fast and automated in use it has have automatic startup various self-diagnostics the monitoring of the weather for example once called the dealer itself is usually finalized that means the drone is relatively independent of environmental influences accommodated and we could currently have a time between approx. one minute from an incoming state requests to the actual take off stress where the main time is needed and exactly for this purpose the highly automated operation we have already mentioned several times still important to mention is that we have an automatic mission subway critical conditions conditions, i.e. when the weather changes or what other critical situations occur which are the operation of the flight can be very challenging then so-called field same mode activated and the apartment with either safely in the trade or on a predefined motorcycle at the site return what we will show today is a so called event based version that that means we will play an alarm signal and then the crown will fly will fly to its location the topic data security by design as a seven player tethering we have already can skip so to my next prepared foil with this system features we were able to win volkswagen as a pilot customers on the other hand but also the the jury of the bakery so we succeeded we succeeded that we times before pretty exactly four months ago the oscar in the category out at the safety partnership together with volkswagen and in the laudatio of the ostbaar organizer was thereby in seals cooperation between volkswagen and the r v youth but also the system at feel positively evaluated so and now enough with my introductory words I would now the procedure in the next minutes we have here an aerial view of the the clarity in which we find ourselves we ourselves are stationed here in this building I am sitting here in this little green boxes inside here in a few seconds my colleague lukas will take over the place and from here he will continue software we will continue with the program have outside also in the next seconds then for the visible the hangar stationed and we will here in the north of the the north of the site artificially trigger an alarm also simulate the apartment will be called when the alarm system arrives it will fly once over our center over it will bring itself into position and will then overview back to the control center with the operator can assess the situation can observe with the camera make different settings and if he thinks that he has the mission can be aborted whereupon the drone will automatically flies back to its hangar and flies there with high precision in the galant well that is such a short introduction let’s go out moreover acts and we will briefly continue outside then welcome here in our foreigners in this small field as you have just seen as you have just seen on the map our drones on heart and kidneys lead them to the booths system states can basically check what we develop what we have built here is of course a complete system of hunger and weather stations the material of the hangar itself is is gps permeable as we will see over here in a moment that is one goes what compatible and so we can boot the drone very quickly boot up without being immediately ready for use to the left of the hangar we have the weather station the weather stations transmits the local weather data which we are currently very well suited for the flight into the control center where my colleague amerika lukas is already has taken his seat and will will lead the program thank you very much the figure you would be may we first have a look together at the web interface important for the drone operation are the the speed recorded by vestas precipitation and temperature you should be formation for the operation the weather situation is automatically system automatically evaluates our system is controlled by an easy to use web-based graphical interface so everybody is able to use the drone as a security camera rest from this we see the flying models throne followed by her ear above the ground and the one on its distance to your transport her home her the power consumption of the crown shown and emphasized is the condition of the user battery see this is a flying device and takes over the power supply as soon as an error idea wired power supply should be present here reminders it is the state indicated there where is a hangover of the flight with the predefined way points - 40 at 12 emergency landing point and transport our home further the position of the drone shown the way points are linked in real system linked with the burglary value system so that the trainer automatically flies to the to the waypoint that is closest to the closest to the triggered alarm. our drone has a built-in mounted dual camera with color and thermal infrared image you can see it like this but the combat system is basically configure according to your wishes was with the deployed there came both mothers always available and your one of them is chosen what we see on the screen is the interview pink transports at this point the user can at any time the state of internal tests see click here that will show him more than the loops and there are also details barrier test one of them there are monitoring that run continuously others run only before during or after the flight the transport the status open or closed is shown on this icon now we have the whole user interface also already seen completely that we can real flight can come before that anne will draw an alarm message our system has received the message and informs the user at this pot regardless of the reactions of the user before that the topic many butt test through and checks in particular the weather situation of the user can acknowledge the messages at any point of time the drone was also without his action take off is ok hopes itself the hangar and the drone goes through the last preflight checks before takeoff and can confirm it and the hand for it will soon be ready with and now our throne lifts up that have been the broke now points from we see our test site and the held up to 35 meters high above the floor and there we have it when our flight reaches unfortunately we can not be able to serve drinks who flies now closer to the alarm so 1 it is also a bit lower that it can see better in the meantime we have reached the predefined waypoints and survey the situation from the air the object recognition identifies your a car outside the area probably a person inside the cameraman is also to see the corner there jette we know create now on the subject rage around then we see that the car after the train is appearing from so just to have arrived and could so person belong then again looks so wog on the normal camera with object detection we can now zoom in a little closer and try to identify the person identify let’s try it with zoom level 3 ok there it is do your we also bring you desperation because of the cable we can keep the the drone in the air for as long as you want and observe the situation because we know that the person and we have clearly identified the person have clearly recognized the person, we abort the mission at this point there is your word button and is confirmed the drone is now flying again so grew and report that cambodia is continuously retracted so that it nowhere can change in the choice the approach points must of course be care must be taken that none of the projecting structures are in the way antennas and lightning conductors for example should be avoided to be avoided in the flight path above the hangar arrived at the hangar the threat starts automatically with the landing call before that the landing light switched on the landing system with the help of a camera and a special marker on the loading area of the transport with the illumination by the trainer and the special features of the marker we can land safely even in the dark in basic word landing straight on the leicester city rental we need a very high accuracy which the gps signal cannot provide for this we calculate our position with the help of so called computer vision from mettmann and as exact as possible with lies in hangars landing thereby we avoid vulnerable mechanics for positioning the drone now comes the last centimeters and we are safely landed so the drone has meanwhile arrived back home and I give so rog to the ricoh neumann outside yes thank you america for conducting the demonstration various institutes in the meantime back home arrived home wifey has meanwhile joined us free of charge volkswagen woman have a few questions you run such a system what is in the house besides the technical challenge what else do you have still so many requirements as a user thanks for the invitation mr. neumann for us was in addition to the technical measures were organizational measures were of importance this includes coordination with key players early integration of data protection the works council of course, informing local residents the affected employees of the authorities and the police well thank you very much for the very detailed answer second prepared question we have here a system with the shackle more addressed not only technically it is a special feature maybe also as operator what special features the the restraint so first of all the tethering has the advantages of a permanent power and data supply this led to the simplification with discussions with the data protection and the works council furthermore the risk assessment in the approval process is also lower due to the tethering turned out to be lower and approval procedure is a very good keyword we are here in lower saxony that means the lower saxony state authority for for road construction and traffic is responsible for us here. I would like to report on the concrete experiences of the authority have collected yes gladly that can I also report briefly for us was the very early involvement of the involvement of the state authority was of individual project steps were coordinated were coordinated I perceived the process overall, I perceived the process as positive then I think we go back to our to our hunger and were not at all our control room maybe one last question on the way to such a system like the one demonstrated today is cost-wise not comparable with what you can buy on the shelf how can you then or how can you despite the high costs an added value I such systems achieve yes, so the system is for us a proof-of-concept so a system in pilot project in prototype status with with the objective of a faster faster deployment for alarm interventions have a higher degree of self-protection and also a targeted deployment on site this is especially true for remote properties we achieve a higher higher added value through greater automation well then may I briefly to the back and hope that we have more questions in the chat thank you in rico we have two questions from our viewers one would like to know hertha pinos what is the maximum altitude of the drone depends on what you want to have since what we have currently provided its maximum altitude of 120 meters limited by the cable length we would recommend to fly around 50 meters high this makes the approval process much easier and I would like to know how large the radius of action and sun is taken is again defined by the maximum cable length as said currently 120 meters in the system we suggest that we say that the cable is inclined at a maximum of 45 degrees this then results in a radius of action of 120 meters around that it is also at the point only at lauterbach besides wonderful start is beautifully worked out has many thanks many thanks thanks we still live a question I would like to have another look into the future what does your vision for the future your vision with this project exactly this project are throwing the the public of course with the motivation to convince further interested parties to carry out further drilling as you already heard we are the prototype stadium and would like to deposit who has interest can join us afterwards and the letten with the accompany and exactly with that we will also at the end of today’s session thank you very much for you have tuned in today and if you are interested can contact us directly with the poles

Are you using ArduPilot in this?
Impressive if you are. A couple of things.

  1. FACE involves interoperability and security standards, so you really need to start there in order to ensure that the final product meets requirements for a FACE Unit of Conformance.
  2. The other standards don’t explicitly cover your security problem (from memory), they relate to safety and interoperability.
  3. This sounds like an activity within a major prime. The community here is very helpful, but it might be worth reaching out to the dev team via partners@ardupilot.org for a more detailed/specific discussion, or getting a consultant on board.

I’ve heard nothing about the use of ArduPilot with the product I’m working on. I doubt it very much.

Id be more surprised if you were!
Good luck with your task. If you have specific questions - such as routing and securing MAVLink streams - feel free to ask, but I’m not sure we can be of much assistance for things completely outside our ecosystem.

As you can imagine, I’m really at a loss on how to proceed. If anyone has practical but useful information I’d be glad to work on any realistic ideas.

Can you point me to another web site?

Thank you,

https://www.opengroup.org/face/docsandtools
You’ll need to register to download most of the stuff in there, but it’s decent start point for you.

Which documents should I start with? Which are most important and which are least important?

Thank you,

That’s impossible for me to guess, as I have no knowledge of your system, project scope, requirements or priorities.
Respectfully, ensuring security requirements are met in these types of systems is not a trivial task, and if you don’t have experience in that area I would urge you to have a discussion with your manager about reassigning the task to someone who is a specialist. But have a read of these:
https://www.opengroup.us/face/documents.php?action=show&dcat=&gdid=22676
https://www.opengroup.us/face/documents.php?action=show&dcat=&gdid=51500
I’m going to close this thread, as it’s off topic for this forum and we really can’t provide you the help and guidance you need.