Counter-UAS

DroneBane

A three-tier counter-UAS product family covering the full kill chain — detection, engagement, and authorized kinetic response. Built around a single insight: most facilities can't afford a $100,000 sensor array, and most warfighters can't carry one. The phone in your pocket is the first sensor; the same architecture scales to a 16-point interlock weapons release running in ATAK.

8
USPTO provisionals
129K
Lines (Java + Dart)
273
Total classes/files
DoD 3000.09
Design alignment

Product family

Three tiers, one architecture

Each tier shares core sensor abstractions, telemetry models, and the same backend. The difference between Watch and Mobile is not what they detect — it's what they're authorized to do about it.

DroneBane Watch

Detect Production

Force protection, base security, critical infrastructure

46K LOC
Dart, 227 tests passing

A passive airspace awareness app that turns the phone in every operator's pocket into a Remote ID receiver. BLE + WiFi scan, multi-sensor fusion, zone management, FAA-format incident reporting. Built for the security director, the watch officer, and the FOB perimeter team.

Stack   Flutter (iOS / Android / Web / Desktop), Supabase backend, BLE Remote ID, MQTT sensor fusion

DroneBane Pro

Engage Roadmap

Critical infrastructure, base defense, force protection

$499
/month + hardware kit

Everything in Watch plus full MAVLink C2, sensor fusion hub, autonomous patrol, and fleet management. Connects any ArduPilot/PX4 flight controller via USB OTG to a compact radio modem. Drop-in interface for any RF/radar/acoustic/EO-IR sensor that speaks REST or MQTT. The bridge between detection and kinetic response.

Stack   Flutter + Riverpod, MAVLink, USB OTG serial, RTSP video, Supabase realtime

DroneBane Mobile

Authorize TRL 3

DoD / IC / coalition counter-UAS units

83K LOC
Java, 150 classes

C2 designed for kinetic counter-UAS interceptors, fully integrated as a native ATAK plugin. Full F2T2EA kill chain with 16-point safety interlocks, multi-level authorization, on-device DRL guidance, and audit-grade engagement logging. Anduril Lattice integration prepped for COP interoperability. Design aligned with DoD Directive 3000.09.

Stack   Native Java, ATAK SDK 4.6, MAVLink, ONNX Runtime (DRL), SQLCipher, FIPS 140-2

Kill chain

F2T2EA — Find, Fix, Track, Target, Engage, Assess

DroneBane Mobile implements the full military kill chain as a phase-gated state machine. Phases progress only forward (or abort to STANDBY). AUTHORIZE and ENGAGE require explicit Weapons-level human authorization — they cannot proceed automatically under any condition.

I STANDBY
Observer

System idle, no active engagement

II DETECT
Pilot

Target detected by sensors

III TRACK
Pilot

Target being actively tracked

IV IDENTIFY
Pilot

Target classification in progress

V AUTHORIZE
Weapons

Awaiting human engagement authorization

VI ENGAGE
Weapons

Active weapon engagement

VII ASSESS
Pilot

Battle Damage Assessment

Defense in depth

16-point safety interlock system

All sixteen interlocks must pass before weapon release is authorized. They cover the weapon system, target validation, operator authorization, vehicle state, and the operational envelope. Source code refuses to instantiate the interlock checker with checks disabled — the only way to bypass an interlock is in unit tests, gated by a separate constructor.

Weapon System
  • WEAPON_ARMED
  • VEHICLE_ARMED
  • IN_FLIGHT
Target Validation
  • TARGET_LOCK
  • TARGET_HOSTILE
  • RANGE
Operator Authorization
  • AUTHORIZATION
  • NO_FRIENDLIES
System State
  • AMMO
  • LINK
  • WATCHDOG
  • BATTERY
  • GPS
  • STABILIZED
Geofence / Safety
  • GEOFENCE
  • ALTITUDE

Engagement envelope: 2m AGL minimum altitude (must be airborne), 5–120m AGL engagement window, 5–500m effective weapons range, >15% battery, 3D GPS fix with ≥4 satellites, <15°/s angular rate, >20% link quality, watchdog fed within 5s.

Failsafe

Priority-coordinated failsafes

Six failsafe types under one coordinator. Higher-priority failsafes preempt lower-priority ones — there's never a race condition where two failsafes both try to execute. Critical failsafes retry up to three times. Every trigger and action is audit-logged for after-action review.

P1
WATCHDOG_TRIP
DISARM + RTL
Software hang detected — main loop stopped feeding watchdog
P0
EMERGENCY_KILL
Motor cutoff
Operator override — last-resort prevention of greater harm
P2
LINK_LOSS
RTL + Land
Telemetry lost for >10s — recovery on reconnect
P3
GEOFENCE_BREACH
RTL
Aircraft exited operational area
P4
LOW_BATTERY
RTL + Land
Power below safe-return threshold (15%)
P5
GPS_LOSS
Hold + Descend
GPS fix lost — controlled descent until reacquired

Autonomy

On-device DRL intercept guidance

A trained deep reinforcement learning policy runs on-device on a companion computer (Raspberry Pi 5 or Jetson Orin Nano) at 3 Hz via ONNX Runtime. The 34-dimensional observation vector includes zero-effort-miss, time-to-go, closing velocity, off-boresight angle, and predicted kill probability.

A three-stage fallback chain ensures graceful degradation: DRL policy → classical proportional navigation → return-to-launch / hover. Human override is available at all stages via the RC transmitter. Multi-target priority queuing supports P1/P2/P3 prioritization with a strict single-engagement safety constraint.

Guidance pipeline

1
Observation
34-dim vector: ZEM, time-to-go, closing velocity, off-boresight angle, kill probability
2
DRL Policy
Trained policy via ONNX Runtime, 3 Hz on Pi 5 / Orin Nano
3
PN Fallback
Classical proportional navigation if DRL inference fails
4
RTL / Hover
Final fallback if both DRL and PN unavailable
5
Human Override
RC transmitter override available at all stages, regardless of stage

Interoperability

Anduril Lattice integration prepped

DroneBane Mobile ships with a complete Anduril Lattice client integration: entity publisher, entity stream subscriber, task agent listener, and tracker — verified live against the Anduril sandbox environment. Drone detections publish as Lattice Track entities, interceptor telemetry as Asset entities, geofences as Geo entities, and kill-chain transitions as task agent events. The DUSTY SHIELD scenario simulator runs a complete C-UAS engagement (FOB exclusion zone → hostile detection → IFF identification → engagement authorization → BDA → RTL) entirely through Lattice's COP.

Whatever common operating picture a unit is running — TAK, Lattice, both — DroneBane appears as a friendly track and accepts task agents from the same screen the operator already uses for everything else. Zero context switching between situational awareness and weapons control.

Lattice Entities Task Agents Sandbox Verified TAK + Lattice

Compliance

Security engineering targets

The features below are implemented in source but no formal security assessment, third-party audit, or accreditation has been completed. FIPS-validated cryptographic module (not product-level validation), certificate-pinned mutual TLS, encrypted engagement chain-of-custody, multi-tier RBAC, and audit trails. Design aligned with DoD Directive 3000.09.

Cryptography

FIPS 140-2 validated cryptographic module (Bouncy Castle BC-FJA, CMVP #3514) — product-level FIPS validation not yet initiated

Engagement DB

SQLCipher AES-256 encrypted engagement chain-of-custody database

TAK Auth

Mutual TLS, certificate pinning, hardware-backed Android KeyStore enrollment

Audit

JSON-Lines audit log with command tracking, operator ID, ack status, BDA outcome

Authorization

4-tier RBAC: Observer / Pilot / Weapons / Commander

Doctrine

DoD Directive 3000.09 alignment (autonomy in weapon systems)

Development status

TRL 3

DroneBane Mobile is in active development and lab testing. Bench power-on through first hover is complete. Every C2 command — ARM, DISARM, six flight modes, takeoff, land, RTL, guided waypoints, manual control at 20 Hz — has been verified on live hardware with command acknowledgment confirmed across all modes. 53 of 55 SITL test cases pass.

MS0–MS5

Bench power-on, initial firmware, manual flight, MAVLink integration, ATAK plugin install, first hover

Complete
MS6

Companion computer integration — Pi 5 MAVLink routing, sensor fusion finalization

Next
MS7

Multi-radio hardware abstraction (RFD900x, mLRS, SiK), full C2 delivery

Planned
MS8

Intercept geometry — bearing-to-target, pursuit guidance, lead computation

Planned
MS9

Autonomous intercept with TX override, full DRL autonomy stack air-validated

Planned
MS10

Multi-drone fleet operations validation, environmental testing, ATO documentation

Operational prototype

Want to put DroneBane on your perimeter?

Watch is available upon request. Pro and Mobile are licensed by application — defense / IC / coalition only for the Mobile tier.

THRN-001 / 006 / 007 / 008 / 009 / 011 / 014 / 017