Ukrainian drones use 'target lock' to autonomously complete strikes after Russian electronic warfare severs operator links, a drone analyst told Business Insider.
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Ukraine is fielding drones that can complete their attacks even after Russian electronic warfare severs the link to their human operators.
Dmytro "Liber" Zhluktenko, a former drone operator now working as a lessons-learned analyst with Ukraine's 413th Unmanned Systems Regiment "RAID," told Business Insider that many Ukrainian drones use a capability he called "target lock." It lets the drone continue toward its target and hit it even when the operator loses control.
The feature is "quite useful," Zhluktenko said, because Ukrainian operators frequently lose signal before reaching their target. Russian jamming and the design of some drones both contribute to the problem.
The target-lock capability is built into systems such as Perennial Autonomy's Hornet mid-range strike drone. That drone communicates with its operator through a Starlink terminal mounted onboard, Zhluktenko said. Deep dives and aggressive maneuvers can interrupt the Starlink connection, causing the antenna to lose its satellite lock.
Giving drones that kind of autonomy is "just great," he said.
Ukraine is not fighting with fully automated weapons. Humans still select and confirm targets. That creates a challenge as Russian electronic warfare disrupts GPS and cuts the command and video links connecting drones to their operators. The limited autonomy is a way to work around those disruptions.
A growing number of drones in Ukraine operate with a human identifying a target, then designating it for the drone's camera and guidance software. The drone's onboard technology can adjust its course to keep tracking the target. If jamming cuts the video feed or command link, the drone continues toward the target the operator selected.
The sophistication of that terminal guidance varies. It may be a pre-programmed process or a more advanced system using artificial intelligence. But the ability to operate without constant human input has become increasingly important.
Zhluktenko said some systems are "able to navigate themselves and fly by the route without human input" by matching imagery from their cameras with stored satellite maps. But all of the currently deployed systems on the battlefield "have a human in the loop to a very significant extent," he added.
Early forms of this targeting technology were observed in June 2025 during Operation Spiderweb. Ukraine reported that the attack, which involved sneaking drones close to target positions in trucks, hit 41 Russian aircraft stationed at bases. Ukraine said that when some of the drones lost signal, they used AI to continue along their pre-planned route and have their warheads automatically activate upon finding their targets.
Ukraine's defense ministry has highlighted the work of Ukrainian company F-Drones, which makes the LITAVR drone. The ministry says the drone has an automatic terminal-guidance system that "identifies the target and autonomously guides the drone to impact." During the terminal phase of flight, the ministry said, the operator "controls only the speed, while all other functions are performed automatically."
Ukrainian companies are also making equipment that can attach to multiple types of drones. The Fourth Law makes the TFL-1 terminal-guidance module, which lets a human operator select the target before machine vision locks onto it. That allows the drone to complete its final attack even if the operator's connection is lost.
Mykyta Rozhkov, the chief business development officer of Ukrainian drone and weapons maker Frontline Robotics, told Business Insider that many drones in Ukraine can navigate autonomously toward targets operators have identified. That is helpful when the signal drops, but autonomy could also help Ukraine manage a rapidly growing fleet of drones and robots. "You need some level of autonomy in order to achieve it," he said.
Many companies see autonomy as a way for smaller militaries to field more systems without requiring an equivalent increase in personnel. Latvian drone maker Origin Robotics, which supplies Ukraine, makes the Blaze interceptor drone. The company says it uses radar-based detection and AI-powered computer vision for autonomous target acquisition and interception, while humans still confirm whether to engage. In that case, the autonomy is not intended to let the drone strike after communication is lost. The drone self-destructs if its connection is severed. CEO Agris Kipurs told Business Insider that autonomy is important for smaller militaries like Latvia's or Ukraine's because it allows them to effectively scale. "We don't have the numbers in terms of infantry," he said.
Ukraine is supporting the development of more autonomous weapons. Brave1, a Ukrainian government-backed defense technology platform and accelerator, said last year that autonomous detection and destruction of targets "is critical to preserving resources and increasing combat effectiveness." The operation said: "The key role is played by the time between target detection and destruction."
The amount of autonomy in weaponry varies widely. Bohdan Sas, the president and cofounder of Ukrainian defense company Buntar Aerospace, told Business Insider that some companies have been "able to automate some simple tasks. For example, final target acquisition and final targeting is relatively easy." Buntar makes drones and software that use optical navigation and other tools to operate in areas affected by electronic warfare. Sas said developers can use software such as OpenCV, a widely used open-source computer-vision library, alongside a machine-learning algorithm to "automate a small step," allowing the drone to recognize and track a target with its camera and steer toward it.
Ukraine's defense ministry said in June that a company had developed technology that automated 95% of an interceptor drone's engagement cycle: A human operator selects a target and tells the drone to engage, while the system autonomously identifies the enemy drone, tracks it, and conducts the intercept.
Ukraine's then-defense minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, said in March that "in modern warfare, we must defeat Russia in every technological cycle. Artificial intelligence is one of the key areas of this competition." He added: "The future of warfare belongs to autonomous systems. Our task is to enhance the autonomy of drones and other combat systems so that they can detect targets more quickly, analyze the situation, and help inform decisions on the battlefield."
For now, most Ukrainian systems use narrower forms of automation, with human operators selecting targets and onboard software handling tasks such as recognition, tracking, navigation, or terminal guidance. But many in the industry predict rapid progress. Rozhkov said Frontline expects "not fully autonomous, but pretty much autonomous operations done by robots in real battlefield conditions in 12 months."
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