Federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies are increasingly borrowing border-patrol drones for domestic surveillance operations, a harbinger of what is expected to become the commonplace use of unmanned aircraft by police, reports the Washington Post.

Customs and Border Protection, which has the largest U.S. drone fleet of its kind outside the Defense Department, flew nearly 700 such surveillance missions on behalf of other agencies from 2010 to 2012, according to flight logs released recently in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil-liberties group.

The records show that the border-­patrol drones are being commissioned by other agencies more often than previously known. Most of the missions are performed for the Coast Guard, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and immigration authorities. But they also aid in disaster relief and in the search for marijuana crops, methamphetamine labs, and missing persons, among other missions not directly related to border protection.