Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch on Thursday cited the proliferation of weaponized drones on the battlefields of Ukraine and Iran and said it is the one threat that "keeps me up at night."
She declined to elaborate when asked whether there was a specific threat involving weaponized drones but said, "It would be a mistake to ignore the technology."
The Justice Department is expected to issue new rules granting local police departments the ability to take down drones, an ability until now reserved largely for the FBI.
"It wasn't a threat years ago," NYPD Deputy Commissioner for Counterterrorism Rebecca Weiner said. "It is now."
The NYPD is buying $6.5 million in drone mitigation equipment and giving counterterrorism officers special training.
"We are preparing for this threat with the seriousness it deserves," Tisch said.
(ABC News contributed to this report.)
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