- Home insurance companies are using drone footage to find reasons to drop customers.
- They have drones, manned planes, and surveillance balloons at their disposal.
Here's another reason to hate drones.
Insurance companies across the nation are now using drones to aerially scope out customers' homes and suss out reasons to cancel their home insurance, The Wall Street Journal reported.
That's what happened to Cindy Picos, who told the Journal her insurance provider used a drone to take pictures of her California home's roof prior to deciding to drop her.
"I thought they had the wrong house," Picos told the Journal. "Our roof is in fine shape."
To prove it she got an independent inspection that found her roof had another 10 years of life expectancy, the newspaper reported. Still, her insurance company upheld their decision to cancel her plan, citing the aerial photos, which they refused to let her see.
Though it may seem dystopian, insurance companies have drones, manned planes, and high-altitude balloons at their disposal for aerial surveillance, offering nearly full coverage of the country, the Journal reported.
But the tech is imperfect. Companies have dropped customers over images that are outdated or misrepresented. In one example cited by the Journal, a photo that initially appeared to show fallen tree limbs was actually just shadows.
Despite the problems, the technology is developing quickly. At this rate, properties could be surveilled in high-definition on a daily basis, the Journal reported.