Though we all know and love the Western world’s arsenal of high-flying, hard-hitting drones, there are also different types of robot in the works.

Very much like the Star Wars creation it appears to be based on, the catchily-named EASE (Extreme Access System for Entry) is not a bot that’s designed to hunt you down and zap you into submission. Rather, it’s a surveillance drone that’ll fly around until it finds the rebel base enemy, and then go back and report to Darth Vader and his Sith overlords the friendly soldier who’s operating it. Being an tiny little drone, it can flit around the urban space with ease, hopping through doors and windows like the robot version of a freerunning master.

Unusually for most techy things made in the 21st century, this drone isn’t wireless; rather, it has a very thin copper wire that stretches all the way back to the ground station, which provides the little bot with power, and the operators with lots of HD video. Although this is a good system in terms of providing round-the-clock signal and limitless flight time, it does seem to give it a big Achillies heel; actually, screw that, a mile-long, bright copper Achilles heel that just begs to be cut, stamped on, or nicked by cable thieves.

As a fancy new thinking-outside-the-box idea, it’s nice, but I’m not sure how useful it’s gonna be. Still, the US Army is reportedly interested, and I’m not gonna be the one to argue with them. Especially if they’ve got an army of creepy new stalker-drones. [Wired]

Image credit: CyPhy Works