One thousand dollars may not seem like a lot of money, but it was enough for a team of researchers from a Texas college to hack into and hijack a drone on a dare from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
The scientists led by Professor Todd Humphreys from the University of Texas at Austin Radionavigation Laboratory managed to take control of a small but powerful drone in midair through a technique called spoofing, where a signal from hackers imitates the one sent to the drone’s on-board GPS.
The hostile takeover of the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) owned by the college was done before the weary eyes of DHS officials, Fox News reported.