SUBANG JAYA, Aug 13 — Police will soon trial aerial drone units to improve surveillance in neighbourhoods as well as monitor rallies for criminal activities.

When announcing this today, Inspector-General of Police (IGP) Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar said the unmanned unit was already with the police’s aerial division, and that the testing phase would start soon with small-sized drones.

“We will start with small drones because it is not (so) costly; it will be deployed in Klang Valley first before year-end,” he told reporters at a news conference here.

Each drone will be equipped with a camera interface capable of live-streaming videos back to the police base.

Khalid said that the plan is also to equip the drones with “biometric” scanners that will enable these to immediately identify those recorded on camera.

He did not specify if police already have a biometrics database with which they would compare the videos.

“We will start small, maybe three or four drones.

“We will start using it for managing rallies, to record the activities of those who are involved in rallies,” Khalid explained.

He added that the drones will also be used to patrol neighbourhoods and housing areas.

“Would that bring about privacy intrusion? Well, that is why we will do a lot of training first. We have to licence it, look into laws, [preventive] standard operational procedures for that,” he said, adding that they are currently in the process of preparing these.