In response to the threat, Ukrainian software engineers have thrown themselves into learning everything from electronic warfare to soldering in order to build drone-detecting devices. Many devices are cheap, costing less than $250 for handheld models, and upwards of $400 for more sophisticated stationary models.
Another Dmytro, the founder of prominent drone-detecting company Drone Spices, first responded to Russia’s full-scale invasion by ginning up psychological operations. Using lists of phone numbers purchased online, he sent text messages to Russian soldiers fighting in Ukraine encouraging them to stop.
But Dmytro found that his texts were “pointless,” he said, because most Russian soldiers believed totally in the war. After other projects, he switched to trying his hand at building drone detectors.
At the time, some Ukrainian soldiers were using software-defined radios like the HackRF to scan the electromagnetic spectrum for telltale signals. Such devices, like the RTL SDR, cost just $34, but weren’t made for military use; they drained batteries, required laptops, and couldn’t tell drones from other emitters, Dmytro said.
Other options, like foreign-made systems, could cost $10,000 to $20,000—too expensive for Ukraine, he said. They were also only capable of identifying commercial drones, not Russian military drones.
Dmytro began by reverse-engineering the Orlan-10, widely used by Russian forces to coordinate artillery. Ukraine had downed a number of the drones, and pictures of its cheap, commercially available components were available in Ukrainian social media forums.
Using his reverse-engineered Orlan, Dmytro designed a drone detector. A software engineer by training with no hardware background, he first attempted to use a sugar box for a case.
The design was a failure, but inspired the company’s name and product line, including detectors such as “Candy” for Orlans, “Salt,” which scans for Russian’s cell signals, and “Cinnamon,” a detector for the popular DJI-brand drones. Each sells for less than $100, which Dmytro said pays for the cost of materials and labor.
Other founders, meanwhile, focused on the commercial photography and racing drones that Russia was using to cause havoc.
Kara Dag, co-founded by tech entrepreneurs Ivan and Eric, produces handheld sensors that can detect a drone up to 2.4 miles away, send out a vibrating alert, and tell users what direction it’s coming from.
Unlike some drone detectors, Kara Dag uses artificial intelligence to help identify a drone’s signals—even if the drone has not previously been identified or if its emission pattern is disrupted by its speed or other factors.
The detectors can also recognize Ukrainian drones by taking data from Russian social media channels that share information about Ukrainian drones, Ivan said.
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