Let’s say a drone is flying over enemy territory and gets shot down. Generally speaking, our enemies are not as technologically advanced as we are. If they capture the drone, study it, and get a good look at its onboard processors, they might re-create one for themselves. Obviously, we don’t want that to happen. DARPA’s VAPR (Vanishing Programmable Resources) program plans to solve this by creating electronics that can vanish, either by remote control or a specific variable (for example, a certain temperature). So let’s go back to the drone that gets shot down. DARPA’S idea is to send a signal to the drone as it’s going down, turning its processor into dust. Or even better, the drone’s chip detects when its altitude changes drastically as it’s falling and fries all its circuits or even blows the entire thing up. The enemy doesn't get their hands on the drone, or any sensitive information that it may contain.