• Axon Enterprise attracted controversy when its CEO proposed drones as a method for stopping mass shooters.

• The company's CEO backed down from the plan in a blog post Sunday.

• Members of Axon's ethics board resigned over the drone controversy.

Law-enforcement technology company Axon Enterprise revealed that it was dropping its idea for a program to develop stun gun-armed drones to combat mass shooters. This announcement dropped on Sunday, after several members of the company's ethics board resigned over the controversy that followed.

On June 2, Axon CEO and founder Rick Smith published a post on the company's website, speculating that drones and non-lethal energy weapons "could offer hope" to bring an end to mass shootings.

"Put together, these two technologies may effectively combat mass shootings," Smith wrote. "In brief, non-lethal drones can be installed in schools and other venues and play the same role that sprinklers and other fire suppression tools do for firefighters: Preventing a catastrophic event, or at least mitigating its worst effects."

Smith acknowledged that his proposal could sound "faintly ludicrous to some" and noted that, "We cannot introduce anything like non-lethal drones into schools without rigorous debate and laws that govern their use."

The post elicited widespread controversy, including condemnation from the ACLU. And some of the criticism appears to have stemmed from the company's own AI ethics board. Ethics-board member and University of Southern California professor Wael Abd-Almageed told Reuters: "What we have right now is just dangerous and irresponsible, and it's not very well thought of and it will have negative societal consequences." The news service reported that several members of the company's ethics board had resigned over concerns about public safety and privacy.

In a follow-up statement posted on the company's website on Sunday, Smith wrote that, "... in light of feedback, we are pausing work on this project and refocusing to further engage with key constituencies to fully explore the best path forward."