Blue Mark DroneScout User manual

DroneScout User Manual - version 1.1 November 2021 - © BlueMark Innovations BV 2021
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DroneScout - User Manual
November 2021 - version 1.1

Drone Scout User Manual - version 1.1 November 2021 - © BlueMark Innovations BV 2021
2/26
The latest version of this manual is located here:
https://download.bluemark.io/dronescout_user_manual.pdf
Intended audience: system integrators, security intelligence firms, professional users with an IT
background
Disclaimer: we are not responsible or liable for errors or incomplete information in this document.
Version history
version
date
description
0.9
September 2020
Initial release
1.0
April 2021
Adding missing parts
Updated document with new portal and sensor version
1.1
November 2021
Updated document with the features of the latest
firmware release (web-interface)

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Contents
1 Introduction.............................................................................................................................................................................. 4
1.1 What is it?......................................................................................................................................................................4
1.2 Drone detection.........................................................................................................................................................4
2 Product........................................................................................................................................................................................5
3 Sensor.......................................................................................................................................................................................... 6
3.1 Installation....................................................................................................................................................................6
3.2 Configuration..............................................................................................................................................................9
4 Portal..........................................................................................................................................................................................10
4.1 Basic concepts..........................................................................................................................................................10
4.2 Alarms..........................................................................................................................................................................11
4.3 Projects........................................................................................................................................................................12
4.4 Zones............................................................................................................................................................................13
4.5 Sensors........................................................................................................................................................................15
4.6 Users.............................................................................................................................................................................17
4.7 Detection range.......................................................................................................................................................19
4.8 Email settings........................................................................................................................................................... 20
4.9 Guard time period..................................................................................................................................................20
4.10 Realtime alarms.....................................................................................................................................................20
5 Reports......................................................................................................................................................................................21
5.1 Daily briefings.......................................................................................................................................................... 21
5.2 Realtime alarms.......................................................................................................................................................22
6 More information.................................................................................................................................................................26

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1 INTRODUCTION
1.1 What is it?
DroneScout is a product to detect (consumer) drones near your house or other objects of interest
by detecting the wireless signal between drone and remote controller/pilot. Focus of DroneScout is
on consumer drones (quadcopters ) with a live video feed. The product consists of sensors that are
installed in the area of interest and a portal for managing sensors and generating alarms.
1.2 Drone detection
There is a large variety of drones: air, water, ground. DroneScout focuses on drones that have a
wireless video link between drone and pilot/remote controller. Those are the ones that affect your
privacy most and also transmit continuously wireless video signals (and control signals).
Detection algorithm
DroneScout scans the RF spectrum for drone signals. The detection algorithm identifies RF sources
that both suddenly appear and moving. The product does not try to decode the wireless signal,
instead it relies on the basic characteristic of a moving RF source.
Consumer drones transmit wireless signals in the 2.4 GHz band and the 5.8 GHz band. The preferred
wireless band for drones is 2.4 GHz, as the transmission range is the largest. The 5.8 GHz is typically
used as alternative ban. In case there is a lot of RF interference/signals in the 2.4 GHz band, such as
in dense urban areas with many WiFi networks, the drone switches to the 5.8 GHz band.
DroneScout is also able to detect control signals, however the detection range for such signals is
much less; up to 100 meter due to the lower transmit power.
WiFi interference
WiFi networks use the same 2.4 GHz band. The 5.8 GHz band on the other hand is rarely used by
WiFi networks. Nearby WiFi networks will limit the detection range of DroneScout as the drone
signal needs to be stronger than the signal of the WiFi network (‘noise floor’), otherwise it can’t be
detected. It means that the DroneScout sensor should be installed at a location where only weak
WiFi signals are present. (I.e. the signal strength of nearby WiFi networks should be less than -95
dBm.) In that case, the sensor has maximum detection range. Of course, most drones will try to use
the most empty channel for communication, so one strong WiFi network won’t affect the
performance much. However, the drone and remote controller will determine the best channel
based on their location, which is different from the sensor location. So there may still be a
probability that the drone chooses the frequency of your nearby WiFi network.
Bluetooth interference
Bluetooth signals use also the 2.4 GHz band. Compared to WiFi, Bluetooth uses the whole 2.4 GHz
band; it hops very fast to a new channel. WiFi on the other hand has a fixed channel. It means that
Bluetooth does not affect much the detection range of DroneScout. Only active Bluetooth
connections within 25 meter of the sensor may reduce the maximum detection range to some
extend.

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2 PRODUCT
DroneScout is a product to detect consumer drones near your house or other objects of interest by
detecting the wireless video signal between drone and remote controller/pilot. The product
consists of sensors that are installed in the area of interest and a portal for generating alarms and
managing sensors.
Figure 1 - How does it work? Detect the wireless signal of the video link between drone and remote controller and send it to
the portal for generation of alarms.
Sensor
The sensor (DS100) is a device that detects the wireless drone signal. It needs power and internet
using PoE (Power over Ethernet/802.3af). For the object of interest you can use one or multiple
sensors and divide them into zones . For instance use sensor A detect drones in the zone garden .
And use sensor B for detection in zone main entrance . The range of the sensors depends on the
type.
Portal
The main purpose of the platform is to generate alarms and manage sensors.
Alarms
DroneScout offers two kinds of alarms. First, there is the daily briefing via mail, that gives an
overview of detected drones in the last 24 hours. It is also possible to receive real time alarms via
MQTT. MQTT is a popular publish/subscribe protocol for sensor data. (See http://mqtt.org/ for
background information.) To receive real time alarms you need to have a MQTT client and subscribe
to the alarm topic. For most platforms ( Windows , macOS , Android , iOS ) there are MQTT clients
available.