Drones against COVID-19 propagation by controlling capacity in public spaces

Abstract

This project proposes the use of drones by law enforcement agents to fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. The main objective of the project is to allow the enforcement agents to control the capacity of potentially crowded public open places as beaches during summer or sport events. To do so, an Android application has been developed to work in conjunction with DJI drones so agents can easily deploy the system wherever necessary. Tasks to perform along the project are to analyse and select the best AI object detection algorithm. Then, using transfer learning, improve the model so it is able to detect people using top view images taken by the drone and also to detect a new object: crowd. Additionally, there are some restrictions as the need of hand-held device execution and perform the detection in real-time. Last but not least, in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), persons¿ privacy will be ensured during the whole process by applying image blurring. The resulting system will facilitate the fast agents' action in preventing the spreading of the virus.