News, views and top stories in your inbox. Don't miss our must-read newsletter Sign up Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Invalid Email

A crashed metal drone disguised as a bird has been discovered in Mogadishu, the troubled capital of Somalia.

Early reports have suggested the downed craft could belong to NISA, the Somali intelligence agency.

It was photographed and shared on Twitter by Adam A. Omar who describes himself as a "non-pirate Somali," who "tweets on security, politics and cricket."

Very little information is available about the bird drone but it reveals a potentially scary way for governments and military contractors to disguise their aerial surveillance.

According to some reports , the US military allegedly has a secret drone base in Somalia - the site of the notorious "Black Hawk Down" incident.

However, US drones are larger and more advanced than the one pictured above, which has propellers on its wings.

(Image: Rex Features)

Both governments and drone companies are experimenting with different types of aircraft, including nanobots and swarm-style technology.

Earlier this year, Airbus Defence and Space unveiled its "Counter-UAV System" which detects unmanned aerial vehicles and then uses jamming technology to knock them out of the sky.

This "countermeasure" can also detect the location of whoever is remotely piloting the drone, allowing police to swoop in and arrest them.

"All over the world, incidents with universally available small drones have revealed a security gap with regards to critical installations such as military barracks, airports or nuclear plants”, said Thomas Müller, head of the electronics business line at Airbus Defence and Space.

(Image: Chester Chronicle)

As a specialist in defence electronics, we have all the technologies in our portfolio and the integration knowledge which are needed to set up a quick-response protection system with extremely low false alarm rates."

The Airbus defence system uses "Smart Responsive Jamming Technology" to to block the frequencies used to control a drone, rendering it useless.

Video Loading Video Unavailable Click to play Tap to play The video will start in 8 Cancel Play now