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Comment by edrxty | Hacker News Reader

This will almost certainly be used for weapons in short order.

Currently if you want thermal imaging or very low light capability you have to use very expensive substrates. Being able to use CMOS detectors for MWIR/LWIR would instantly increase available resolutions by an order of magnitude at any given price point, assuming these filters are actually relatively cheap.

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I doubt it. It sounds like it has to be “charged” with visible light or something. That means it’s unlikely to be useful some time after sundown, or after being used. I don’t see a military springing for that because it would put constraints on the types of operations they can run unless it adds significant upsides (such as an increase in FOV or something). I do see it being more useful for civilians though, who don’t need them at any random point of the night.

The charge seems to be using gold's excellent ability to reflect, to concentrate all wave lengths onto a molecule that will then produce visible light.

I think you can just back(front?)light it.

Wouldn’t that defeat the purpose of everyone within 5 miles can see your glowing eyes?

The Russian T-90 tank uses infrared emitters as countermeasures, looks like a pair of angry eyes: https://www.army-technology.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2...

Wouldn't this be a great target for an IR guided missile?

Exactly. Missiles would hit the emitters, where the armor is the thickest, giving the crew and tank the best chance of survival.

But if you knew the tank model a computed offset would negate that...

It's an old system that iirc they're phasing out. It was probably designed against for older analog systems similar to the the pulsed IR jammer turrets on US helicopters.

Focal plane trackers are generally able to defeat these types of decoys through software updates

They supposedly only enable them when they know the tank is being actively targeted by a missile that the countermeasures are effective against. Supposedly.

The commander's tank doesn't have them.

The cost difference is unlikely to be relevant for a Mach 4, air to air missile. But, if this is small and cheap enough it might get added to a lot of currently unguided weapons like bombs and RPG’s etc.

Militaries constantly make cost vs effectiveness trade offs, and new technology can very easily change the equation.

You put a filter over the front that blocks your charging wavelength, so it's only used internally.

Finally, night vision goggles that look like something out of the movies

Anything and everything will be used for weapons. All, from nuclear reactions ultrafast computers to water pipes and sugar.

The problem with weapons is not that science and technology allow more and more. Say, Pol Pot's regime, or the Rwanda genocide, have shown that large-scale atrocities can be perpetrated using very low-tech means.

Yep, if it works at all, ITAR will slap it with a "Don't even think about using this for anything" label.

No, if they slap a label on it, it isn't "Don't Use It", it is "Don't even think about exporting this without permission.". It may have been relaxed, but regular IR cameras that we can buy and use here everyday in the US may land you in jail for selling them in eBay and shipping them to a customer in China or Iran. But we can buy, sell, and use them freely.

To say that's a gross oversimplification is putting it mildly.

Of course it is! It's not an essay on the details of the massive security bureaucracy surrounding military-use goods that provide the United States with a critical military or intelligence advantage.

It's merely a 2-sentence comment to slightly improve the previous oversimplification by indicating the ITAR focus is on exporting, not domestic use — it's even in the name: "International Traffic in Arms Regulations".

or even to Canada

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