While national parks usually have cameras that record movement inside the reservations, experts can review the footage every six months or so, when they replace the batteries, which is way too late to catch poachers red-handed, writes Euronews.green.

Dutch company Hack the Planet promises to solve this problem with special cameras that are powered by solar panels, so they can track people and the animals more efficiently.

Hack the Planet’s engineer, Thijs Suijten, said that "so we developed a smart camera system that can, in real time, track down people or animals in huge remote areas."

The images provided by the cameras are analyzed in real time by a computer, which allows it to detect poachers right then and there, meaning that conservationists can catch them before they harm protected species.

"This minicomputer uses artificial intelligence to automatically classify whether there's an animal, an elephant or human in the photo. And then we use the satellite modem to send that information through space directly to the phones of rangers within minutes", Thijs explained.

The company also developed a special sensor for smartphones, which can alert rangers so they can act immediately.

One smart camera system was implemented back in 2021 in Lope national park in Gabon and it helps reducing the risk of poaching, as well as protecting humans from wildlife.

Thanks to the eight-camera system, rangers and people can be notified when elephants are headed towards crop fields, as these animals have destroyed yields in search for food.

Elephants that stray off-course can be harmlessly scared by the systems, so that they don't reach human settlements.

"We have also created a system to automatically scare away elephants, so we use a big horn speaker and when our cameras detect an elephant, the alarm goes off and then we hope that elephants will automatically be chased away from the village,” Thijs explained.