Again, the Army insists there will be no cameras on JLENS. But in a test last year, Froomkin reports, “Raytheon equipped one of the blimps with an MTS-B Multi-Spectral Targeting System that provides both day and night imaging, laser designation, and laser illumination capabilities.” The result of that test was that JLENS operators could “watch live feed of trucks, trains and cars from dozens of miles away.” They also spied Raytheon employees “simulate planting a roadside improvised explosive device.”
Returning to the program’s impact on the majority of the population, Ginger McCall, associate director of EPIC, commented “There’s something inherently suspect for the public to look up in the sky and see this surveillance device hanging there. … It’s the definition of persistent surveillance.”