Arkansas Drone Laws (2026): Privacy, Hunting & Shoot-Down Rules

Arkansas has no authority over where a drone may fly; the FAA controls that airspace nationally. What Arkansas regulates is conduct, and since 2025 that includes a dedicated criminal and civil privacy law aimed squarely at drone-captured images, layered on top of an older voyeurism statute that already named drones by name.

This guide is part of our Drone Laws by State series, which also covers how state law intersects with surveillance camera laws more broadly.

Jurisdiction scope: This article addresses Arkansas state law on private drone surveillance, the state's video voyeurism statute, hunting regulations, and the federal baseline that applies in every state. It does not address a civilian's right to record police, which is covered separately in our guide to recording laws.

Does the FAA or Arkansas control where a drone can fly?

The Federal Aviation Administration is the exclusive regulator of the airspace itself. Under 14 CFR Part 107, a commercial or non-recreational drone operator must hold a Remote Pilot Certificate, register the aircraft, fly at or below 400 feet, and stay within visual line of sight; recreational flyers register and follow a similar, separate framework under 49 U.S.C. Section 44809. Arkansas has no power to add its own altitude limits, registration rules, or pilot licensing on top of that federal scheme. What Arkansas can and does regulate is what a person does with a drone once it is airborne over Arkansas soil: whether they are spying on a neighbor, capturing images of private property, or interfering with wildlife.

Arkansas's 2025 drone privacy law: the Arkansas Privacy Act

Signed by the governor on April 14, 2025, and known as Act 597, the Arkansas Privacy Act rewrote Arkansas Code Section 5-60-103 and added three new sections addressing what a person may lawfully do with a drone-captured image. Under Section 5-60-103(e), a person commits unlawful use of an unmanned aircraft system related to images if they purposely use a drone to capture an image of an individual or private property with the purpose of conducting surveillance on the person or property in that image. The offense is a Class C misdemeanor, and the penalty is flat: there is no enhancement for a repeat violation, unlike the critical infrastructure offense in the same section, which rises from a Class B to a Class A misdemeanor for a second or subsequent offense. A separate, newly created Section 5-60-126 covers what the person who captured an image then does with it, and it requires both elements together: the person must have captured the image in violation of Section 5-60-103 and then possess, disclose, display, distribute, or otherwise use it. That offense is a Class C misdemeanor if the person only possessed the image and a Class B misdemeanor otherwise, with each image treated as a separate offense. A third party who merely receives or holds an image someone else captured unlawfully does not commit this offense. The law defines "image" broadly to include not just video and photographs but sound, thermal, infrared, and other electromagnetic data captured about a person or their property.

Act 597 also created a civil remedy at Arkansas Code Section 16-118-119. An owner or tenant of private real property who was surveilled or photographed on that property in violation of Section 5-60-103, under circumstances giving them a reasonable expectation of privacy, can sue to enjoin the conduct and recover $5,000 in statutory damages for all images captured in a single episode, or $10,000 for a single episode of unlawful disclosure or distribution. If the person who captured the image disclosed it with malice, meaning a specific intent to cause substantial harm, the property owner can instead pursue actual damages. Fees run in both directions: Section 16-118-119(d) says the court "shall award court costs and reasonable attorney's fees to the prevailing party," so a property owner who sues and loses can be ordered to pay the drone operator's legal costs. A lawsuit must be filed within two years of the capture or disclosure.

The law is not absolute. A new Chapter 118 of Title 27, at Arkansas Code Section 27-118-101, lists twenty-five circumstances in which capturing an image by drone remains lawful in Arkansas, including capture with the consent of the person who owns or lawfully occupies the property in the image, utility and pipeline inspection, licensed real estate marketing where no person is identifiable, agricultural and wildlife research conducted through a university or the Arkansas State Game and Fish Commission, insurance underwriting and claims work, and a range of law enforcement uses covering crime scenes, missing-person searches, high-risk tactical operations, and images captured under a valid search warrant. Worth noting for anyone flying over their own land: that list contains no exception for images of one's own property. The own-property language in Act 597 sits at Section 5-60-103(c)(1), and by its own terms it limits what "subsection (b) of this section" prohibits, meaning the critical infrastructure offense, so it does not carve out the image offense at subsection (e).

Does police need a warrant to fly a drone over Arkansas property?

Arkansas has no separate, freestanding statute requiring a warrant before every law enforcement drone flight, unlike states such as Illinois or Minnesota. Instead, the lawful-use list in Section 27-118-101 gives police several ways to lawfully capture images by drone: pursuant to a valid search warrant executed by specified agencies, in immediate pursuit of a suspect, at a crime scene, in a missing-person search, during a high-risk tactical operation, or in a declared emergency, none of which independently requires a warrant. Outside of those enumerated categories, an Arkansas resident's claim that police unlawfully surveilled them by drone falls back on ordinary Fourth Amendment analysis. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that aerial observation of a yard from public airspace by a manned aircraft, without a warrant, generally does not violate the Fourth Amendment. See California v. Ciraolo, 476 U.S. 207 (1986) (fixed-wing flyover at 1,000 feet); Florida v. Riley, 488 U.S. 445 (1989) (helicopter at 400 feet). Neither case involved a drone, and lower courts have not settled whether the same reasoning extends to a small drone hovering much closer to a home, so an Arkansas resident's factual circumstances matter more than any bright-line rule.

Trespass, nuisance, and hunting with a drone

Outside the privacy statute, ordinary Arkansas trespass and nuisance law can still apply to a drone that repeatedly loiters low over a neighbor's land or interferes with the use and enjoyment of the property, though Arkansas courts have not squarely decided how far a landowner's rights extend into the airspace above their land for drone purposes. Arkansas also regulates drones through its wildlife code. Arkansas Game and Fish Commission Code 05.07, "Hunting Wildlife From Aircraft Prohibited," makes it unlawful, as a Class 2 violation, to "hunt, drive, herd, or harass wildlife from or with an aircraft or unmanned aerial vehicle (drone)." The rule names drones expressly on its face, so using one to scout, locate, or push game toward a hunter is covered by the regulation's own text rather than by an agency interpretation a hunter might contest.

The federal shoot-down rule: destroying a drone is a felony

A persistent misconception is that a landowner may legally shoot down a drone flying over their own property. Federal law says otherwise. The FAA classifies drones as aircraft within the National Airspace System, which means 18 U.S.C. Section 32, the federal Aircraft Sabotage Act, applies to them: willfully damaging, destroying, or disabling a drone is a federal felony carrying up to 20 years in prison, regardless of whose property the drone is over, because the federal government, not the landowner, controls the airspace. In practice, federal prosecutors rarely bring a full Section 32 charge over a neighbor's hobby drone; the widely publicized 2015 "Kentucky Drone Slayer" case, in which a Hillview, Kentucky, man shot down a neighbor's drone and had state criminal-mischief charges dismissed by a local judge, is often cited as evidence that shooting down a drone is low-risk. It is not. The drone owner's related federal civil suit, Boggs v. Merideth, was dismissed in 2017 for lack of federal jurisdiction without any court ever ruling on whether the shoot-down itself was lawful, and no state, including Arkansas, has passed a law authorizing landowners to disable a drone over their own property.

More Arkansas Laws

• Arkansas Data Privacy Laws
• Arkansas GPS Tracking Laws
• Arkansas Police Bodycam Laws
• Arkansas Recording Laws
• Arkansas Smart Glasses Recording Laws

Frequently Asked Questions

Is it illegal to fly a drone over someone's house in Arkansas?

Merely flying over private property is not automatically illegal. Arkansas Code Section 5-60-103(e) makes it a Class C misdemeanor to purposely use a drone to capture an image of a person or their property with the purpose of conducting surveillance on them, but incidental overflight without that surveillance purpose is not covered by the statute.

Can I sue a neighbor for flying a drone over my property in Arkansas?

Yes, if they captured images of you or your property in violation of Arkansas Code Section 5-60-103. Arkansas Code Section 16-118-119 lets a property owner or tenant recover $5,000 in statutory damages per episode of unlawful image capture, or $10,000 per episode of unlawful disclosure, without having to prove actual monetary loss. Understand the risk before filing: the same statute directs the court to award court costs and reasonable attorney's fees to the prevailing party, so if you sue and lose, you can be ordered to pay the drone operator's fees.

Is Arkansas's drone privacy law new?

Yes. The core statute was rewritten and expanded by Act 597 of 2025, the Arkansas Privacy Act, signed April 14, 2025. Before that, Arkansas Code Section 5-16-101(b), the video voyeurism statute, already separately banned using an unmanned aircraft to secretly record a person in a place where they had a reasonable expectation of privacy.

Can I legally shoot down a drone flying over my property in Arkansas?

No. Destroying, damaging, or disabling any drone is a federal felony under 18 U.S.C. Section 32, the Aircraft Sabotage Act, because the FAA controls the airspace regardless of who owns the land beneath it. Publicized cases where local shoot-down charges were dropped did not establish a legal right to do so.

Does Arkansas require a warrant before police can fly a drone over my property?

Arkansas has no standalone statute requiring a warrant for every police drone flight. Act 597 lists a warrant as one lawful basis for law enforcement to capture images by drone, alongside several warrant-free exceptions such as crime scene documentation and missing-person searches, so most disputes fall back on ordinary Fourth Amendment analysis.

Can I use a drone to scout deer or other game before hunting in Arkansas?

Arkansas Game and Fish Commission Code 05.07 bars hunting, driving, herding, or harassing wildlife from or with an aircraft or unmanned aerial vehicle, and the rule names drones expressly. Using a drone to locate or push game toward a hunter can be charged as a Class 2 wildlife violation.

What counts as an 'image' under Arkansas's drone privacy law?

Arkansas Code Section 5-60-103 defines image broadly to include sound waves, thermal, infrared, ultraviolet, or visible light, and other electromagnetic waves or conditions captured about real property or a person on it, not just conventional photographs or video.