Recently, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has been reminding drone users that they could face fines of up to $27,500 (and possibly even jail time!) for failing to register their drones. The February 19 deadline has come and gone, and the FAA says “failure to register an aircraft may result in regulatory and criminal sanctions.”
As of February 19, 368,472 drones were registered with the FAA, which surpasses the number of airplanes registered with the FAA. However, there are many complaints (and even a few lawsuits) against this registration process. Yet, the FAA defends its position and states that it has the authority to regulate all “aircrafts” flown in the United States. Now that this deadline has passed, it will be interesting to see just how strong the FAA’s enforcement will be.