A Federal DJI Ban Is Coming—Here’s Why It Matters

A federal ban on DJI drones is almost law.

The ban is detailed in the American Security Drone Act (ASDA), which has been rolled into the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) of 2024.

Specifically, the ASDA bans federal agencies from purchasing or using drones made in or made with components from countries identified as a threat to the U.S. (China, Iran, Russia, and North Korea).

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The NDAA, which includes this bill, has already been passed by both houses of Congress. All it needs to become law is a signature from President Biden.

Bans on Chinese drones—which, let’s be honest, are really bans on DJI drones–aren’t new. The 2020 NDAA banned the use of Chinese drones or drones with certain Chinese components from use by the Department of Defense (DOD).

The development here is that, while the 2020 NDAA banned the DOD from using Chinese drones, the 2024 NDAA will ban all federal agencies from using them.

Why This Matters

Ok, DJI and Autel are about to be officially banned from federal agencies.

But so what? How does this actually impact you?

Here are two immediate ways:

• Service provider impact. If you do any kind of drone work for federal agencies you probably won’t be able to use DJI drones—even if you’re a third party service provider and even if your work has nothing to do with locations connected to national security.
• Public safety agency impact. If you work for a state agency, like a police or fire department, the federal ban could influence your state to impose its own ban, as has already happened in Florida and Arkansas.

Let’s take a closer look at each of these.

1. Drone Service Provider Impact

For drone service providers who contract with federal agencies, or who want to do work on federal land, it’s quite likely they will no longer be able to use DJI drones.
In fact, we’ve already seen restrictions on using DJI drones for any kind of work on federal land, regardless of actual security considerations.

Last year Vic Moss, VP of the Drone Service Providers Alliance (DSPA), shared these three ways DJI restrictions impacted his work on federal land:

• I was scheduled to shoot part of a documentary about Rocky Flats’ transformation from plutonium trigger plant to wildlife preserve. It was for a national physics organization. They would not let me fly DJI products from their property.
• The next issue was a huge mapping job on the Air Force Academy lands. It was to map the streets of one of the residential areas, well away from anything “secret”. [Again, DJI drones weren’t allowed.]
• And the final one was earlier this year when we shot part of the new visitor center film for Mesa Verde National Park.[I wasn’t allowed to] put the Mavic 3s up I had in the car with me.

In all these instances, Moss wasn’t allowed to use the drones he wanted to—not because there were actual security concerns, but because of a “blanket ban” attitude against using DJI products on federal land.

2. State Agency Impacts

We’ve already seen states start following federal guidelines when it comes to drones, issuing rules that state agencies can only use drones approved by the Blue UAS program.

In Florida, where such a ban was enacted, police and fire departments suddenly had to ground almost all of their fleets. Arkansas has passed a similar law. (A survey from Airborne Response has found that 92% of Florida’s public safety agencies use DJI drones.)

The cost of these lost drones in Florida is estimated as $200 million, an amount that was already paid for by taxpayers, and that will be paid again by them—probably at a premium, since replacements will cost even more than DJI technology.

With the passage of this new federal ban, it’s likely that more states will pass similar restrictions, again without considering the reality of what law enforcement actually needs or providing funding to replace the banned drones.

Secondary Impacts of a Federal Drone Ban

In addition to the above direct impacts, there are likely to be secondary impacts over time.

The biggest one is that larger companies may start proactively banning DJI drones just to give the impression of maintaining high security standards.

And, over time, this practice could trickle down to any person hiring a drone pilot pushing for “American made” technology—without knowing whether there is an American option for their needs, or understanding how this provision will restrict the ability of drone pilots to do their job.

The thing to call out here is that, while we may be strongly supportive of American made drones, DJI still has a stranglehold on the market.

Skydio, one of the largest American drone companies, has stopped selling drones to consumers, and there really aren’t many U.S. options that are as inexpensive, diverse in offerings, and high-quality in technology as DJI provides.

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How We Got Here

A version of the ASDA was first drafted back in 2021, leading to a lot of debate about “country of origin” bans—bans that applied to any drone technology from a given country.
Since then, the debate has become both more and less nuanced.

On the one hand, lawmakers who originally knew very little about the realities of the drone industry began to learn that banning all drones and drone components from China would essentially mean grounding most federal drone programs, without a clear path toward getting them back up and running. And some began to include this nuanced view in their public comments on whether there should be a ban.

But on the other hand, some lawmakers continued to see the issue as a politically expedient way to show that they were tough on China, regardless of the realities we’ve covered here.

Through all of this, other restrictions and protections have been put in place:

• 2020—DJI put on Dep’t of Commerce “Entity List.” Inclusion in the list means a company might “pose a significant risk of being or becoming involved in activities contrary to the national security or foreign policy interests of the United States.”
• 2020—Blue UAS program launched. The program provides a list of thoroughly vetted drones approved for use by federal agencies.
• 2020—NDAA bans Chinese drones for DOD. The Department of Defense (DOD) was officially banned from buying Chinese drones, as well as drones made with certain components that originated in China.
• 2022—DOD Blacklists DJI. DJI is identified as a “Chinese military company” that posed a national security risk.

Scanning the above list, we can see that there are already a lot of safeguards in place when it comes to how the government buys drones.

And, given this, it’s hard not to see this new federal ban as more of a political ploy than a true move to make our country safer.

A nuanced law, for instance, could consider a ban only for sensitive infrastructure and other places where there really are security risks. As it stands, the ban that’s coming may do more harm than good for the safety of Americans.