Hacker News Reader

How well would a towed decoy be able to fool a missile equipped with a camera and a neural net trained on pictures of fighter jets? Are the distances and speeds too extreme for a visible light camera? Is there some technology to "blind" a visible light camera?

View on HN

missiles work with radar signature or heat signature, not the visible spectrum. and yes, there are countermeasures available to 'blind' an IR sensor (like those used on short range A/A missiles)

Right, I know that you’d want to use radar for longer distances, but if the towed decoy is meant to appear as a juicy target, to take a hit for the fighter, couldn’t you just follow it until you’re in close range, and then switch to a better discriminating sensor (visible light camera in my example) to hit the jet instead?

>pictures of fighter jets You mean pictures of fighter jet backs?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com