Wildlife monitoring technologies used to intimidate and spy on women, study finds
Camera traps and drones deployed by government authorities to monitor a forest in India are infringing on the privacy and rights of local women.
Nobody could have realised that camera traps put in the Indian forest to monitor mammals actually have a profoundly negative impact on the mental health of local women who use these spaces.
Remotely operated camera traps, sound recorders and drones are increasingly being used in conservation science to monitor wildlife and natural habitats, and to keep watch on protected natural areas.
But Cambridge researchers studying a forest in northern India have found that the technologies are being deliberately misused by local government and male villagers to keep watch on women without their consent.
Cambridge researcher Dr Trishant Simlai spent 14 months interviewing 270 locals living around the Corbett Tiger Reserve, a national park in northern India, including many women from nearby villages.
His report, published today in the journal Environment and Planning F, reveals how forest rangers in the national park deliberately fly drones over local women to frighten them out of the forest, and stop them collecting natural resources despite it being their legal right to do so.
