Message-ID:

Arithmetic is being able to count up to twenty without taking off your shoes. -- Mickey Mouse

Hey Jim,

Here's a little more information to broaden your knowledge of GPS signal
security.

Larry

PS: Have a look at the bottom of the page here old man:
http://kj6yvt.com/computer_automation.htm

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
The problem is that the GPS signal is very weak. Its like a car headlight
20,000 kilometres away, says consultant David Last, former president of the
UKs Royal Institute of Navigation. You cant boost the signal any further
because of the limited power supply on a satellite.
<https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20202-gps-chaos-how-a-30-box-can-jam-your-life/>

==============

Building a basic electronic warfare setup to disrupt these weak signals is
trivially easy <https://hackaday.com/tag/gps-jammer/>, says Humphreys:
Detune the oscillator in a microwave oven and you've got a superpowerful
jammer that works over many kilometers." Illegal GPS jamming devices
<https://www.gps.gov/spectrum/jamming/> are widely available on the black
market, some of them marketed to professional drivers who may want to avoid
being tracked while working.
https://spectrum.ieee.org/faa-files-reveal-a-surprising-threat-to-airline-safety-the-us-militarys-gps-tests

------------------------------------------------
GPS Jamming Tests Frustrate Pilots, Controllers
Russ Niles - October 10, 2021
https://www.avweb.com/aviation-news/gps-jamming-tests-frustrate-pilots-controllers/
Just as civil aviation has become thoroughly addicted to GPS, the military
is trying to wean itself off that dependence and thats causing some
fractious conflicts in the Southwest. The military uses the wide-open spaces
to purposely jam GPS signals to see how its equipment and personnel cope
with the GPS denial. But according to IEEE Spectrum
<https://spectrum.ieee.org/gps-jamming>, the military and the FAA are not
always on the same frequency when it comes to managing those tests and
controllers and pilots have put their frustrations in writing in NASAs
Aviation Safety Reporting System. Aircraft are greatly affected by the GPS
jamming and its not taken seriously by management, says one report gleaned
by IEEE Spectrum. Weve been told we cant ask to stop jamming, and to just
put everyone on headings.

The military does notify the FAA about jamming activity but that doesnt
always seem to get to the frontline workers in the system and the loss of
GPS can be dangerous. One of the reports involved a business jet that made a
wrong turn and ended up in the highly restricted airspace of the White Sands
Missile Range, which, ironically, is the source of much of the jamming.
Another pilot reported he lost his terrain mapping at a critical time and
worried hed end up in a smoking hole. When the jamming starts jamming up
the system, controllers have the option to request a stop buzzer to get
the military to turn off the electronic interference but some controllers
complain theyve been told not to make those requests and to just issue
vectors to affected traffic. The FAA told IEEE Spectrum that controllers
can, indeed, stop the tests if they think its necessary but those requests
are automatically reviewed by upper management.
------------------------------------------------------------------------

https://spectrum.ieee.org/gps-jamming
FAA Fumbled Its Response To a Surge in GPS Jamming Confusion over stopping
military tests had flight controllers fuming
MARK HARRIS07 OCT 20213

Air traffic controllers in a control tower monitoring the airfield.
ETHAMPHOTO/GETTY IMAGES

FAA MILITARY GPS JAMMING NAVIGATION AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL SAFETY AEROSPACE
FAA air traffic controllers supervising flights over Arizona, New Mexico and
Texas were confused and frustrated by an increase in military tests that
interfered with GPS signals for civilian aircraft, public records show.

In March and April this year, flight controllers at the Albuquerque Air
Route Traffic Control Center filed reports on NASA's Aviation Safety
Reporting System (ASRS), a forum where aviation professionals can
anonymously share near misses and safety tips.

The complaints accused the FAA of denying controllers permission to ask the
military to cut short GPS tests adversely affecting commercial and private
aircraft. These so-called "stop buzzer" (or "cease buzzer") requests are
supposed to be made by pilots only when a safety-of-flight issue is
encountered.

"Aircraft are greatly affected by the GPS jamming and it's not taken
seriously by management," reads one report. "We've been told we can't ask to
stop jamming, and to just put everyone on headings."

In a second report, a private jet made a wrong turn into restricted airspace
over the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico after being jammed. On that
occasion, the air traffic controller called a stop buzzer. "[The] facility
manager on duty later informed me we can't ask them to 'stop buzzer' and to
just keep putting aircraft on headings," their ASRS report reads.

Putting an aircraft on headings requires giving pilots precise bearings to
follow, rather than letting them perform their own navigation using GPS or
other technologies. This adds work for controllers, who are already very
busy at certain times of day.

"Busy traffic, bad rides, frequency congestion, then GPS jamming," reads one
report. "Limit the length and what time of the day that facilities can GPS
jam and have it taken seriously when we call and ask them to stop."

"Give controllers the ability to have White Sands stop GPS jamming during
high traffic periods," agrees the other.

The Pentagon uses its more remote military bases, many in the American West,
to test how its forces operate under GPS denial. A Spectrum investigation
earlier this year discovered that such jamming tests are far more prevalent
than had previously been thought, possibly affecting thousands of civilian
flights each year.

The FAA does not share how many stop buzzer requests are made, but
Spectrum's investigation obtained FAA data detailing four stop buzzers over
the skies of California during a nine-week period in 2017. These included
passenger jet flights operated by Frontier and Southwest.

The White Sands Missile Range (WSMR), whose tests appear to have caused the
GPS jamming in both recent complaints, estimates it receives "in the low
single digits" of stop buzzer requests a year.

A spokesperson for WSMR told Spectrum: "The US Army takes the safety of its
operations extremely seriously. Calls for a cease buzzer are taken seriously
and range control has not denied or ignored any cease buzzers. WSMR has also
never requested or required any internal organization or outside agency to
not make use of the cease buzzer in the event of an emergency, or unsafe
event."

The FAA provided the following statement:

"The FAA cooperates with Department of Defense to mitigate the effects of
the military's planned interference activities to levels of acceptable
risk. The primary mitigation when GPS is lost is for a pilot to use another
means of navigation. Air Traffic Control (ATC) will assist the pilot with
navigation on rare occasions, upon request. Should multiple pilots encounter
problems, then ATC has the option to stop the underlying cause through [a]
stop buzzer."

When a stop buzzer call is made by a controller, the FAA then has a review
process to analyze the appropriateness of the action and the associated
operational risk.

However, an FAA source also admitted that one ATC facility "expressed some
confusion as to the scope of their authority to suspend operations using
stop-buzzer protocols when GPS testing had ramped up significantly." The FAA
now believes it has cleared up and abated those field concerns.

Although flight controllers may no longer be instructed not to issue stop
buzzer calls when planes are in trouble, pilots continue to experience
difficulties in the airspace around White Sands.

In May, the pilot of a light aircraft taking off at night in the Albuquerque
area suddenly lost their GPS navigation and terrain warnings. Air traffic
control told the pilot that WSMR was jamming, and instructed them to use
other instruments. That pilot was ultimately able to land safely, but later
submitted their own ASRS report: "Being unfamiliar with this area and
possibly a different avionics configuration I feel my flight could have
possibly ended as controlled flight into terrain."

Such an outcomea likely deadly crashwould surely not meet anyone's
definition of "acceptable risk."

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES
FAA Files Reveal a Surprising Threat to Airline Safety: the U.S. ...
Will GPS Jamming Cause Future Shipping Accidents? - IEEE ...
RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB
GPS chaos: How a $30 box can jam your life | New Scientist
Information About GPS Jamming - GPS.gov

Mark Harris
is an investigative science and technology reporter based in Seattle, with a
particular interest in robotics, transportation, green technologies, and
medical devices.

Robert Munsey8 OCT, 2021
Just look at the National Defense Strategy and statement by Space Command
"..Both China and Russia have weaponized space with the intent to hold
American space capabilities at risk. China's communist government has
exercised and continues to develop the capability to jam, targeting SATCOM,
ISR and GPS."
https://www.defense.gov/News/Transcripts/Transcript/Article/1809882/remarks-by-acting-secretary-shanahan-at-the-35th-space-symposium-colorado-sprin/
The point is that anyone should expect the military to request GPS jamming
to allow units to train in a GPS denied environment. Readers should also
know that such requests HAVE to go through the particular service Spectrum
Management Office (after the unit's SMO), then to the FCC and FAA for
approval. Such DOD requests are not always guarantee and quite frequently
disapproved. With exceptions, most GPS jamming occurs during nocturnal hours
when most civil aircraft are no flying. Also once approval is granted NOTAMs
still have to be published. SO if civil aircraft flies over restricted
airspace in the published NOTAM, then there is a larger problem.
---------------------------------------------------

https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20202-gps-chaos-how-a-30-box-can-jam-your-life/
GPS chaos: How a $30 box can jam your life
Signals from GPS satellites now help you to call your mother, power your
home, and even land your plane but a cheap plastic box can scramble it all

SPACE 4 March 2011
By David Hambling

New Scientist Default Image
Which way?

Mark Lambert / Alamy

IT WAS just after midday in San Diego, California, when the disruption
started. In the tower at the airport, air-traffic controllers peered at
their monitors only to find that their system for tracking incoming planes
was malfunctioning. At the Naval Medical Center, emergency pagers used for
summoning doctors stopped working. Chaos threatened in the busy harbour,
too, after the traffic-management system used for guiding boats failed. On
the streets, people reaching for their cellphones found they had no signal
and bank customers trying to withdraw cash from local ATMs were refused.
Problems persisted for another 2 hours.

It took three days to find an explanation for this mysterious event in
January 2007. Two navy ships in the San Diego harbour had been conducting a
training exercise. To test procedures when communications were lost,
technicians jammed radio signals. Unwittingly, they also blocked radio
signals from GPS satellites across a swathe of the city.

Read more: The forgotten navigation system that could show GPS the door
Why would a GPS outage cause such disruption? These satellite signals now do
a lot more than inform your cars satnav. GPS has become an invisible
utility that we rely on without realising. Cellphone companies use GPS time
signals to coordinate how your phone talks to their towers. Energy suppliers
turn to GPS for synchronising electricity grids when connecting them
together. And banks and stock exchanges use the satellites for time-stamps
that prevent fraud. Meanwhile, our societies reliance on GPS navigation is
growing by the year.

Some are worried that we are now leaning too heavily on a technology that
can all too easily fail and it doesnt need a freak navy training exercise
to cause havoc. Their biggest concern is a GPS jammer a plastic device
that can sit on car dashboards. These can be bought on the internet, and
tend to be used by say, truckers who dont want their bosses to know where
they are. Their increasing use has already caused problems at airports and
blocked cellphone coverage in several cities. One jammer can take out GPS
from several kilometres away, if unobstructed. No surprise, then, that
researchers across the world are scrambling to find ways to prevent
disastrous GPS outages happening.

Weak signal
GPS works thanks to radio signals from satellites. The dominant provider is
still the US militarys NavStar network, with at least 24 satellites
operating at any given time, positioned so that you can always see four of
them from anywhere on the planets surface.

Each satellite continually broadcasts its location and the time as measured
by its on-board atomic clock. A GPS receiver compares the time with its own
clock, and then calculates how far it must be from each satellite. Once it
locks on to at least four satellites and has accounted for errors, it will
discover its precise location (see graphic). Nowadays, many receivers also
use GPS for cheap and convenient access to the accurate time given by the
satellites clocks.

The problem is that the GPS signal is very weak. Its like a car headlight
20,000 kilometres away, says consultant David Last, former president of the
UKs Royal Institute of Navigation. You cant boost the signal any further
because of the limited power supply on a satellite.

New Scientist Default Image

Last has first-hand experience of how easy it is to block a GPS signal, and
the effects it can have on modern technology. In 2010, he conducted an
experiment in the North Sea, aboard the THV Galatea, a 500-tonne ship. The
Galatea is the pride of its fleet, with all the latest navigation equipment.
Last wanted to find out how it would cope without GPS. So he used a simple
jamming device that overwhelmed the GPS signal by broadcasting noise on the
same frequency as the satellites.

When Last activated the jammer, the ship went haywire. According to the
electronic display on the ships bridge, the Galatea was suddenly flying at
Mach speeds over northern Europe and Ireland. Then alarms sounded. The
ships navigation backup its gyrocompass crashed, because it uses GPS to
provide corrections. The radar did the same. Even the ships satellite
communications failed, because GPS points the antenna in the right
direction. The crew were well trained and briefed, so they knew what was
going on, says Last. But, like us, they were surprised.

Truck cheats
Last deliberately simulated a simple, commercially available jammer. Though
illegal to use in the US, UK and many other countries, these low-tech
devices can be bought on the internet for as little as $30. Sellers claim
theyre for protecting privacy. Since they can block devices that record a
vehicles movements, theyre popular with truck drivers who dont want an
electronic spy in their cabs. They can also block GPS-based road tolls that
are levied via an on-board receiver. Some criminals use them to beat
trackers inside stolen cargo. We originally expected that jammers might be
assembled by spotty youths in their bedrooms, says Last. But now theyre
made in factories in China.

Last is worried that jammers could cause as much havoc on land as he
discovered on the Galatea, and hes not alone. In November 2010, a
NASA-appointed executive committee for space-based positioning, navigation
and timing warned that jamming devices could cause disaster if activated in
cities. It is not known how many are out there, but the panel is concerned
that the risk of interference is growing fast. And in future, devices called
spoofers which subtly trick GPS receivers into giving false readings
may make the problem even worse (see Faking it).

An event last year at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey
showed that it only takes one jammer to cause disruption. Airport
controllers had installed a new GPS-based landing system, so that aircraft
could approach in bad visibility. But it was shutting itself down once or
twice a day. It took several months to find the culprit: a driver on the
nearby New Jersey Turnpike using a portable GPS jammer to avoid paying the
highway toll. This trucker was cruising past twice a day, crippling an
airport as he went.

Future generations of air-traffic control wont work without GPS nor will
train routing. The US Federal Railroad Administration has GPS at the heart
of its plan for smart management of rail traffic. GPS is also increasingly
relied upon for guiding emergency services to the scene.

Invisible utility
Whats more, a lot more than navigation ability is lost when GPS fails
today. We rely upon GPS without even being aware of it, says Donald
Jewell, who helped to establish GPS from its inception in the US air force,
and is now editor of GPS World magazine. It is estimated that more that a
billion GPS receivers are now in operation, he says, and more than 90 per
cent use the signals only for the accurate time provided by the satellites.

Cellphones are a key user of this invisible utility. Towers must synchronise
with each other to pass calls to other towers as you move a GPS time
signal offers a cheap and accurate way to do this. The timing offset for
each tower is also used to identify it. In fact, many wireless communication
technologies use GPS timing for synchronisation. Thats probably why the
harbour traffic control and emergency pagers failed in San Diego in 2007.

Time is money
GPS timing can time-stamp financial transactions, such as stock-market
trading. And ATMs sometimes communicate wirelessly, using a time-based
encrypted code that requires synchronisation. Though it is not known why the
cash machines stopped working during the San Diego event, this might have
something to do with it.

Energy suppliers use GPS time to keep alternating current from various power
plants in phase across the grid. If frequency cycles are not matched, two
supplies will partially cancel each other out, creating inefficiency. A
precise time signal allows operators to pinpoint the start of each cycle.
The US power grid, for instance, requires synchronisation between the
supplies of over 5000 companies. Yet in 2006, a temporary GPS outage due to
sunspot activity <http://www.springerlink.com/content/yvp8227244218371/>
meant that energy companies were not able to see where the power was going,
which resulted in false billing. Blackouts due to GPS failure are not out of
the question.

Given the potential for disruption, law-enforcers are trying to crack down
on GPS jamming. In February, the US Federal Communications Commission
announced a new effort to fine jammer sellers and owners
<http://www.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2011/db0209/DOC-304575A1.pdf>.
The problem for western authorities is that most sellers are in east Asia
and laws tend only to cover the use of a jammer, not its ownership.

Safety net
Thats part of the reason why navigation researchers are calling for a
back-up. To discuss what to do next, many of them will gather for a meeting
next week at the National Physical Laboratory in Teddington, UK.

Fortunately, theres a backup right under our noses, and the idea been
around since the 1940s. Just like GPS, it provides navigation and accurate
timing. Its called Enhanced LORAN (eLORAN).

Basic LORAN (for long range navigation) is similar to GPS but uses
ground-based radio signals rather than from satellites. It doesnt have
global coverage, but does beat GPS on some things. LORAN operates at a far
longer wavelength than GPS signals and is more powerful. Both of these
features make it virtually impossible to jam.

A new version, eLORAN, uses more reliable transmitters and features improved
caesium atomic clocks. With software modifications, it is accurate to about
10 metres, as well as providing a time signal of similar accuracy to GPS. It
would be easy to modify future receivers to switch over to eLORAN without
the user even noticing, says Last.

In Europe, a team at the UKs General Lighthouse Authorities has been
testing eLORAN, and is now recommending that the UK government rolls it out.
Across the Atlantic, however, the US government is taking its current LORAN
out of service. And it has so far rejected all advice to fund eLORAN: which
would cost about $20 million per year less than it costs to launch one GPS
satellite. We still hold out hope that someone with some foresight and
technical know-how in our government will see the light, says Jewell.

Happily, a few decades from now a GPS signal might not be required at all
for many things. If atomic clocks get cheaper, then they could be built into
everything that needs accurate time. And eventually youll be able to
navigate without any external signals, thanks to devices called inertial
measurement units, which track your movements from a known start point.
Today, these IMUs use gyroscopes to measure orientation, plus accelerometers
to tell how fast it is accelerating. Using this information, plus time, the
acceleration is converted into speed and distance to reveal relative
location.

Today, IMUs drift about 1.5 kilometres per hour of travel, and are large and
expensive. Yet the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency plans to
improve performance with a microchip-sized atomic clock and an equally
diminutive, accurate acceleration sensor.

In the meantime, however, a generation is growing up that has never known
life without GPS. As jammers proliferate, GPS outages like San Diego are
likely to become more common. So next time you lose your cellphone signal,
blame the little black box on a car dashboard a few kilometres away.

Get there in a flash
Your satnav might one day find its route thanks to the faint flashes of
distant lightning.

Both GPS and LORAN (see main story, above) are navigation techniques that
rely on radio signals to pinpoint your location, but these signals cant
penetrate underground or deep inside buildings.

Now the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is testing the
idea of using radio pulses from lightning instead. These natural atmospheric
radio sources or sferics have a very low frequency, so can penetrate
deep underground and even underwater. The military is interested because it
would improve navigation in caves and tunnels or for submarines.

DARPAs S-BUG receivers detect radio waves emitted by lightning thousands of
kilometres away at any given moment there are around 2000 storms active on
the planet. Another device feeds the receiver the exact location and
emission time of the sferic so that it can calculate how far away it is.
Once several sferics are recorded, the receiver can then use this to
discover its location.

DARPA is still testing S-BUG. But once a lightning receiver network is fully
in place, existing GPS users should require nothing more than an antenna and
a software upgrade to use the system, says programme manager Stephanie
Tomkins.

Faking it
Todd Humphreys can trick you into thinking you are somewhere else. He uses a
spoofer device that causes a GPS receiver to give an inaccurate reading.

Humphreys, at the University of Texas at Austin, has no mischief in mind,
but built the device to demonstrate how straightforward it is to do. Such
spoofers are not on the market yet, but when they are, could cause all sorts
of havoc.

Unlike a GPS jammer, which has fairly obvious effects, the spoofers impact
is slow and subtle. The victim usually wont realise theyre being
spoofed, says Humphreys. It leaves no trace.

Humphreys GPS spoofer looks like a wireless internet router. It picks up
genuine GPS signals and synchronises its output to resemble them. Any nearby
receiver will treat this output as a genuine signal from a GPS satellite.
The spoofer then gradually alters its time output, changing from the true
value by, say, 3 nanoseconds per second. Since GPS receivers use the time
signature in a signal to find location or as an easily accessible clock, the
error builds up.

The biggest risk is probably complicit spoofing, where someone deliberately
misleads their own GPS, says Humphreys. For example, unscrupulous fishing
boat captains could spoof GPS to fake their location and fish in forbidden
waters. If mass-produced, they could be made for perhaps $400 to $500,
says Humphreys. Such a spoofer could push another ship off course, just as
ship-wreckers used to lure vessels onto rocks with false lighthouse lights.

Criminals could also spoof GPS timing for profit. The US National
Association of Securities Dealers requires financial traders to time-stamp
transactions with an accuracy of within 3 seconds. The bad guys would spoof
the timing at their preferred site and, watching an upward trend, buy stock
a few seconds in arrears, says Humpreys. Those three seconds could be
worth a lot of money.
--------------------------------------------------------------

https://web.archive.org/web/20180606054048/https://link.springer.com/article/10.1134/S1028334X07080223

November 2007, Volume 417, Issue 1, pp 12311235| Cite as

Total failure of GPS during a solar flare on December 6, 2006
Authors
Authors and affiliations
E. L. AfraimovichEmail authorG. A. ZherebtsovG. Ya. Smolkov
1.
Geophysics
Received: 26 June 2007
44
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Keywords
Solar Flare DOKLADY Earth Science Elevation Angle Space Weather Radio Noise
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is
experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm
improves.
Original Russian Text © E.L. Afraimovich, G.A. Zherebtsov, G.Ya. Smolkov,
2007, published in Doklady Akademii Nauk, 2007, Vol. 416, No. 6, pp.
817821.

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-----------------------------------------------------------

https://spectrum.ieee.org/faa-files-reveal-a-surprising-threat-to-airline-safety-the-us-militarys-gps-tests
FAA FILES REVEAL A SURPRISING THREAT TO AIRLINE SAFETY: THE U.S. MILITARY'S
GPS TESTS
Military tests that jam and spoof GPS signals are an accident waiting to
happen
MARK HARRIS21 JAN 202111 MIN READ
Image of a plane being tracked by GPS.
PHOTO-ILLUSTRATION: STUART BRADFORD
EARLY ONE MORNING LAST MAY, A COMMERCIAL AIRLINER was approaching El Paso
International Airport, in West Texas, when a warning popped up in the
cockpit: GPS Position Lost." The pilot contacted the airline's operations
center and received a report that the U.S. Army's White Sands Missile Range,
in South Central New Mexico, was disrupting the GPS signal. We knew then
that it was not an aircraft GPS fault," the pilot wrote later.

The pilot missed an approach on one runway due to high winds, then came
around to try again. We were forced to Runway 04 with a predawn landing
with no access to [an instrument landing] with vertical guidance," the pilot
wrote. Runway 04has a high CFIT threat due to the climbing terrain in the
local area."

CFIT stands for controlled flight into terrain," and it is exactly as
serious as it sounds. The pilot considered diverting to Albuquerque, 370
kilometers away, but eventually bit the bullet and tackled Runway 04 using
only visual aids. The plane made it safely to the ground, but the pilot
later logged the experience on NASA's Aviation Safety Reporting System, a
forum where pilots can anonymously share near misses and safety tips.

This is far from the most worrying ASRS report involving GPS jamming. In
August 2018, a passenger aircraft in Idaho, flying in smoky conditions,
reportedly suffered GPS interference from military tests and was saved from
crashing into a mountain only by the last-minute intervention of an air
traffic controller. Loss of life can happen because air traffic control and
a flight crew believe their equipment are working as intended, but are in
fact leading them into the side of the mountain," wrote the controller. Had
[we] not noticed, that flight crew and the passengers would be dead. I have
no doubt."

There are some 90 ASRS reports detailing GPS interference in the United
States over the past eight years, the majority of which were filed in 2019
and 2020. Now IEEE Spectrum has new evidence that GPS disruption to
commercial aviation is much more common than even the ASRS database
suggests. Previously undisclosed Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) data
for a few months in 2017 and 2018 detail hundreds of aircraft losing GPS
reception in the vicinity of military tests. On a single day in March 2018,
21 aircraft reported GPS problems to air traffic controllers near Los
Angeles. These included a medevac helicopter, several private planes, and a
dozen commercial passenger jets. Some managed to keep flying normally;
others required help from air traffic controllers. Five aircraft reported
making unexpected turns or navigating off course. In all likelihood, there
are many hundreds, possibly thousands, of such incidents each year
nationwide, each one a potential accident. The vast majority of this
disruption can be traced back to the U.S. military, which now routinely jams
GPS signals over wide areas on an almost daily basis somewhere in the
country.

----
How to access reports on NASA's Aviation Safety Reporting System
1: To investigate a report, go to the ASRS database:
https://asrs.arc.nasa.gov/

2: On the top ribbon, click Search ASRS Database," and then choose Search
ASRS Online." Click on Start Search."

3: Follow the steps under How to Search" at the top. Then, under 7 Text:
Narrative/Synopsis," click on [words]." Then click on Text contains Click
Here."

4: In the pop-up window, enter some of the text that is quoted in this
story. In the Fields to search" field at the bottom, click Narrative" (but
you can also try Synopsis").

5: If you're searching on more than one word, you need to format it inside
parentheses, thus: (GPS JAMMING).

6: Click Save." The pop-up will disappear.

7: Click Run Search" at the bottom right.

8: Under Display your results," click View all reports."
----

The military is jamming GPS signals to develop its own defenses against GPS
jamming. Ironically, though, the Pentagon's efforts to safeguard its own
troops and systems are putting the lives of civilian pilots, passengers, and
crew at risk. In 2013, the military essentially admitted as much in a
report, saying that planned EA [electronic attack] testing occasionally
causes interference to GPS based flight operations, and impacts the
efficiency and economy of some aviation operations."

In the early days of aviation, pilots would navigate using road maps in
daylight and follow bonfires or searchlights after dark. By World War II,
radio beacons had become common. From the late 1940s, ground stations began
broadcasting omnidirectional VHF signals that planes could lock on to, while
shorter-range systems indicated safe glide slopes to help pilots land. At
their peak, in 2000, there were more than a thousand very high frequency
(VHF) navigation stations in the United States. However, in areas with
widely spaced stations, pilots were forced to take zigzag routes from one
station to the next, and reception of the VHF signals could be hampered by
nearby buildings and hills.

Everything changed with the advent of global navigation satellite systems
(GNSS), first devised by the U.S. military in the 1960s. The arrival in the
mid-1990s of the civilian version of the technology, called the Global
Positioning System, meant that aircraft could navigate by satellite and take
direct routes from point to point; GPS location and altitude data was also
accurate enough to help them land.

The FAA is about halfway through its NextGen effort, which is intended to
make flying safer and more efficient through a wholesale switch from
ground-based navigation aids like radio beacons to a primarily
satellite-enabled navigation system. Along with that switch, the agency
began decommissioning VHF navigation stations a decade ago. The United
States is now well on its way to having a minimal backup network of fewer
than 600 ground stations.

Meanwhile, the reliance on GPS is changing the practice of flying and the
habits of pilots. As GPS receivers have become cheaper, smaller, and more
capable, they have become more common and more widely integrated. Most
airplanes must now carry Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B)
transponders, which use GPS to calculate and broadcast their altitude,
heading, and speed. Private pilots use digital charts on tablet computers,
while GPS data underpins autopilot and flight-management computers. Pilots
should theoretically still be able to navigate, fly, and land without any
GPS assistance at all, using legacy radio systems and visual aids.
Commercial airlines, in particular, have a range of backup technologies at
their disposal. But because GPS is so widespread and reliable, pilots are in
danger of forgetting these manual techniques.

When an Airbus passenger jet suddenly lost GPS near Salt Lake City in June
2019, its pilot suffered a fair amount of confusion," according to the
pilot's ASRS report. To say that my raw data navigation skills were lacking
is an understatement! I've never done it on the Airbus and can't remember
having done it in 25 years or more."

I don't blame pilots for getting a little addicted to GPS," says Todd E.
Humphreys, director of the Radionavigation Laboratory at the University of
Texas at Austin. When something works well 99.99 percent of the time,
humans don't do well in being vigilant for that 0.01 percent of the time
that it doesn't."

Losing GPS completely is not the worst that can happen. It is far more
dangerous when accurate GPS data is quietly replaced by misleading
information. The ASRS database contains many accounts of pilots belatedly
realizing that GPS-enabled autopilots had taken them many kilometers in the
wrong direction, into forbidden military areas, or dangerously close to
other aircraft.

In December 2012, an air traffic controller noticed that a westbound
passenger jet near Reno, Nev., had veered 16 kilometers (10 miles) off
course. The controller confirmed that military GPS jamming was to blame and
gave new directions, but later noted: If the pilot would have noticed they
were off course before I did and corrected the course, it would have caused
[the] aircraft to turn right into [an] opposite direction, eastbound [jet]."

So why is the military interfering so regularly with such a safety-critical
system? Although most GPS receivers today are found in consumer smartphones,
GPS was designed by the U.S. military, for the U.S. military. The Pentagon
depends heavily on GPS to locate and navigate its aircraft, ships, tanks,
and troops.

The U.S. military routinely jams GPS signals over wide areas on an almost
daily basis
For such a vital resource, GPS is exceedingly vulnerable to attack. By the
time GPS signals reach the ground, they are so faint they can be easily
drowned out by interference, whether accidental or malicious. Building a
basic electronic warfare setup to disrupt these weak signals is trivially
easy, says Humphreys: Detune the oscillator in a microwave oven and you've
got a superpowerful jammer that works over many kilometers." Illegal GPS
jamming devices are widely available on the black market, some of them
marketed to professional drivers who may want to avoid being tracked while
working.

Other GNSS systems, such as Russia's GLONASS, China's BeiDou, and Europe's
Galileo constellations, use slightly different frequencies but have similar
vulnerabilities, depending on exactly who is conducting the test or attack.
In China, mysterious attacks have successfully spoofed" ships with GPS
receivers toward fake locations, while vessels relying on BeiDou reportedly
remain unaffected. Similarly, GPS signals are regularly jammed in the
eastern Mediterranean, Norway, and Finland, while the Galileo system is
untargeted in the same attacks.

The Pentagon uses its more remote military bases, many in the American West,
to test how its forces operate under GPS denial, and presumably to develop
its own electronic warfare systems and countermeasures. The United States
has carried out experiments in spoofing GPS signals on at least one
occasion, during which it was reported to have taken great care not to
affect civilian aircraft.

Despite this, many ASRS reports record GPS units delivering incorrect
positions rather than failing altogether, but this can also happen when the
satellite signals are degraded. Whatever the nature of its tests, the
military's GPS jamming can end up disrupting service for civilian users,
particularly high-altitude commercial aircraft, even at a considerable
distance.

The military issues Notices to Airmen (NOTAM) to warn pilots of upcoming
tests. Many of these notices cover hundreds of thousands of square
kilometers. There have been notices that warn of GPS disruption over all of
Texas or even the entire American Southwest. Such a notice doesn't mean that
GPS service will be disrupted throughout the area, only that it might be
disrupted. And that uncertainty creates its own problems.

In 2017, the FAA commissioned the nonprofit Radio Technical Commission for
Aeronautics to look into the effects of intentional GPS interference on
civilian aircraft. Its report, issued the following year by the RTCA's GPS
Interference Task Group, found that the number of military GPS tests had
almost tripled from 2012 to 2017. Unsurprisingly, ASRS safety reports
referencing GPS jamming are also on the rise. There were 38 such ASRS
narratives in 2019nearly a tenfold increase over 2018.

Chart describing GPS Problems.
New internal FAA materials obtained by Spectrum from a member of the task
group and not previously made public indicate that the ASRS accounts
represent only the tip of the iceberg. The FAA data consists of pilots'
reports of GPS interference to the Los Angeles Air Route Traffic Control
Center, one of 22 air traffic control centers in the United States.
Controllers there oversee air traffic across central and Southern
California, southern Nevada, southwestern Utah, western Arizona, and
portions of the Pacific Oceanareas heavily affected by military GPS
testing.

This data includes 173 instances of lost or intermittent GPS during a
six-month period of 2017 and another 60 over two months in early 2018. These
reports are less detailed than those in the ASRS database, but they show
aircraft flying off course, accidentally entering military airspace, being
unable to maneuver, and losing their ability to navigate when close to other
aircraft. Many pilots required the assistance of air traffic control to
continue their flights. The affected aircraft included a pet rescue shuttle,
a hot-air balloon, multiple medical flights, and many private planes and
passenger jets.

In at least a handful of episodes, the loss of GPS was deemed an emergency.
Pilots of five aircraft, including a Southwest Airlines flight from Las
Vegas to
Chicago, invoked the stop buzzer," a request routed through air traffic
control for the military to immediately cease jamming. According to the
Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, pilots must use this phrase only
when a safety-of-flight issue is encountered.

To be sure, many other instances in the FAA data were benign. In early March
2017, for example, Jim Yoder was flying a Cessna jet owned by entrepreneur
and space tourist Dennis Tito between Las Vegas and Palm Springs, Calif.,
when both onboard GPS devices were jammed. This is the only time I've ever
had GPS go out, and it was interesting because I hadn't thought about it
really much," Yoder told Spectrum. I asked air traffic control what was
going on and they were like, 'I don't really know.' But we didn't lose our
ability to navigate, and I don't think we ever got off course."

Indeed, one of the RTCA task group's conclusions was that the Notice to
Airmen system was part of the problem: Most pilots who fly through affected
areas experience no ill effects, causing some to simply ignore such warnings
in the future.

We call the NOTAMs 'Chicken Little,' " says Rune Duke, who was cochair of
the RTCA's task group. They say the sky is falling over large areasand
it's not realistic. There are mountains and all kinds of things that would
prevent GPS interference from making it 500 nautical miles [926 km] from
where it is initiated."

GPS interference can be affected by the terrain, aircraft altitude and
attitude, direction of flight, angle to and distance from the center of the
interference, equipment aboard the plane, and many other factors, concluded
the task group, which included representatives of the FAA, airlines, pilots,
aircraft manufacturers, and the U.S. military. One aircraft could lose all
GPS reception, even as another one nearby is completely unaffected. One
military test might pass unnoticed while another causes chaos in the skies.

This unreliability has consequences. In 2014, a passenger plane approaching
El Paso had to abort its landing after losing GPS reception. This is the
first time in my flying career that I have experienced or even heard of GPS
signal jamming," wrote the pilot in an ASRS report. Although it was in the
NOTAMs, it still caught us by surprise as we really did not expect to lose
all GPS signals at any point. It was a good thing the weather was good or
this could have become a real issue."

Sometimes air traffic controllers are as much in the dark as pilots. They
are the last line of defense," Duke told Spectrum. And in many cases, air
traffic control was not even aware of the GPS interference taking place."

The RTCA report made many recommendations. The Department of Defense could
improve coordination with the FAA, and it could refrain from testing GPS
during periods of high air traffic. The FAA could overhaul its data
collection and analysis, match anecdotal reports with digital data, and
improve documentation of adverse events. The NOTAM system could be made
easier to interpret, with warnings that more accurately match the
experiences of pilots and controllers.

One aircraft could lose all GPS reception, even as another one nearby is
completely unaffected.
Remarkably, until the report came out, the FAA had been instructing pilots
to report GPS anomalies only when they needed assistance from air traffic
control. The data has been somewhat of a challenge because we've somewhat
discouraged reporting," says Duke. This has led the FAA to believe it's not
been such a problem."

NOTAMs now encourage pilots to report all GPS interference, but many of the
RTCA's other recommendations are languishing within the Office of Accident
Investigation and Prevention at the FAA.

New developments are making the problem worse. The NextGen project is
accelerating the move of commercial aviation to satellite-enabled
navigation. Emerging autonomous air systems, such as drones and air taxis,
will put even more weight on GPS's shaky shoulders.

When any new aircraft is adopted, it risks posing new challenges to the
system. The Embraer EMB-505 Phenom 300, for instance, entered service in
2009 and has since become the world's best-selling light jet. In 2016, the
FAA warned that if the Phenom 300 encountered an unreliable or unavailable
GPS signal, it could enter a Dutch roll (named for a Dutch skating
technique), a dangerous combination of wagging and rocking that could cause
pilots to lose control. The FAA instructed Phenom 300 owners to avoid all
areas of GPS interference. Embraer said that it fixed the issue in 2017.

As GPS assumes an ever more prominent role, the military is naturally taking
a stronger interest in it. Year over year, the military's need for GPS
interference-event testing has increased," says Duke. There was an increase
again in 2019, partly because of counter-UAS [drone] activity. And they're
now doing GPS interference where they previously had not, like Michigan,
Wisconsin, and the Dakotas, because it adds to the realism of any type of
military training."

So there are ever more GPS-jamming tests, more aircraft navigating by
satellite, and more pilots utterly reliant on GPS. It is a feedback loop,
and it constantly raises the chances that one of these near misses and stop
buzzers will end in catastrophe.

When asked to comment, the FAA said it has established a resilient
navigation and surveillance infrastructure to enable aircraft to continue
safe operations during a GPS outage, including radio beacons and radars. It
also noted that it and other agencies are working to create a long-term GPS
backup solution that will provide position, navigation, and timingagain,
to minimize the effects of a loss of GPS.

However, in a report to Congress in April 2020, the agency coordinating this
effort, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, wrote: DHS recommends
that responsibility for mitigating temporary GPS outages be the
responsibility of the individual user and not the responsibility of the
Federal Government." In short, the problem of GPS interference is not going
away.

In September 2019, the pilot of a small business jet reported experienced
jamming on a flight into New Mexico. He could hear that aircraft all around
him were also affected, with some being forced to descend for safety. Since
the FAA is deprecating [ground-based radio aids], we are becoming dependent
upon an unreliable navigation system," wrote the pilot upon landing. This
extremely frequent [interference with] critical GPS navigation is a
significant threat to aviation safety. This jamming has to end."

The same pilot was jammed again on his way home.

This article appears in the February 2021 print issue as Lost in Airspace."

This article was updated on 26 January 2021.

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES
FAA Fumbled Its Response To a Surge in GPS Jamming
Protecting GPS From Spoofers Is Critical to the Future of Navigation - IEEE
Spectrum
AVIATION NETWORKS FAA GPS INTERFERENCE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Mark Harris
is an investigative science and technology reporter based in Seattle, with a
particular interest in robotics, transportation, green technologies, and
medical devices.

AEROSPACE
NEWS
FAA Fumbled Its Response To a Surge in GPS Jamming Confusion over stopping
military tests had flight controllers fuming MARK HARRIS07 OCT 20213 MIN
READ
Air traffic controllers in a control tower monitoring the airfield.
ETHAMPHOTO/GETTY IMAGES

FAA MILITARY GPS JAMMING NAVIGATION AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL SAFETY AEROSPACE
FAA air traffic controllers supervising flights over Arizona, New Mexico and
Texas were confused and frustrated by an increase in military tests that
interfered with GPS signals for civilian aircraft, public records show.

Keep Reading ?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

https://hackaday.com/tag/gps-jammer/
GPS JAMMER
1 ARTICLES
A TEARDOWN OF SOMETHING YOU SHOULD NOT OWN
December 1, 2017 by Brian Benchoff 67 Comments
GPS jammers are easily available on the Internet. No, were not linking to
them. Nevertheless, GPS jammers are frequently used by truck drivers and
other people with a company car that dont want their employer tracking
their every movement. Do these devices work? Are they worth the $25 it costs
to buy one? Thats what [phasenoise] wanted to find out.

These tiny little self-contained boxes spew RF at around 1575.42 MHz, the
same frequency used by GPS satellites in high Earth orbit. Those signals
coming from GPS satellites are very, very weak, and its relatively easy to
overpower them with noise. Thats pretty much the block diagram for these
cheap GPS jammers put some noise on the right frequency, and your phone or
your bosss GPS tracker simply wont function. Note that this is a very
low-tech attack; far more sophisticated GPS jamming and spoofing techniques
can theoretically land a drone safely.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incident>

[phasenoise]s teardown of the GPS jammer he found on unmentionable websites
shows the device is incredibly simple. There are a few 555s in there
creating low-frequency noise. This feeds a VCO with a range of between
1466-1590 MHz. The output of the VCO is then sent to a big ol RF transistor
for amplification and out through a quarter wave antenna. It may be RF
wizardry, but this is a very simple circuit.

The output of this circuit was measured, and to the surprise of many, there
were no spurious emissions or harmonics this jammer will not disable your
cellphone or your WiFi, only your GPS. The range of this device is estimated
at 15-30 meters in the open, which is good enough if youre a trucker. In
the canyons of skyscrapers, this range could extend to hundreds of meters.

It should be said again that you should not buy or use a GPS jammer. Just
dont do it. If you need to build one, though, theyre pretty easy to design
as [phasenoise]s teardown demonstrates.

Posted in Teardown
Tagged gps, GPS jammer, jammer, teardown

67 THOUGHTS ON A TEARDOWN OF SOMETHING YOU SHOULD NOT OWN
Megol says:
December 1, 2017 at 4:24 am
One would think that someone would create a jammer for this specific
purpose. One that is directed and have a maximum range of a few meters at
most.

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natsfr says:
December 1, 2017 at 4:33 am
You can find the same kind of schematic in a GSM jammer. A basic NE555 or uC
is used to generate a sawtooth, its then fed to a VCO.
http://wiki.rfporn.org/lib/exe/detail.php?id=wiki%3Ahardware_porn%3Acheap_gsm_jammer&media=wiki:hardware_porn:picture:20151005_130434.jpg

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natsfr says:
December 1, 2017 at 4:34 am
Im not sure why links are not working
http://wiki.rfporn.org/lib/exe/detail.php?id=wiki%3Ahardware_porn%3Acheap_gsm_jammer&media=wiki:hardware_porn:picture:20151005_130434.jpg

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bentwookiee says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:44 am
The links are there, but I think the text is being blocked because of the
NSFW wording of the URL.

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Elliot Williams says:
December 1, 2017 at 1:02 pm
Confirmed. Thats funny.

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Sheldon says:
December 1, 2017 at 4:47 am
Given the power levels of things like this jammer are way more than the
signal levels that a GPS receiver would ever expect, Im surprised that they
(the devices) couldnt self-diagnose that they were being jammed.
Okay, they cant do anything about it but at least logging it (plus, where
it last known location and how long it lasted for) could highlight anything
suspicious/nefarious going on.

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D-Lite says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:06 am
>Im surprised that they (the devices) couldnt self-diagnose that they were being jammed.

They can :) See e.g.
http://www.gpsbusinessnews.com/u-blox-6-GPS-Firmware-Gets-Better-Sensitivity-Jamming-Detection_a3151.html

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WeirdScience06 (@WeirdScience06) says:
December 1, 2017 at 4:49 am
Strangely in the UK these devices are legal to buy but not to use or sell,
unless they closed the loophole

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JDX says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:14 am
Seems like proper policy to me. It remains legal to purchase one,
reverse-engineer it, and develop countermeasures.

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noblea149 says:
December 1, 2017 at 4:51 am
Considering the GPS signals are so weak would it not be possible to
passively block them with something like a little Faraday Cage? That way you
are not disrupting any near by GPS devices that are not your intended
target.

On the more advance GPS spoofing attacks, a team of students a few years ago
demonstrated that you can make a ship think its in a completely different
position to where it actually is with out raising any alarms on the bridge.
In this case it was a luxury yacht and just a demonstration but the
potential of such an attack method is quite scary. For example you could
spoof an oil tanker to thinking it was 50km away from a dangerous reef when
actually its been steered directly on to it and if you are a pirate with the
right resources you could steer a ship towards an ambush.

Doing a little research before posting this it would seem someone is already
testing a system in the Black Sea:
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2143499-ships-fooled-in-gps-spoofing-attack-suggest-russian-cyberweapon/

Story about students hacking Ship GPS:
https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/07/31/80-million-yacht-hijacked-by-students-spoofing-gps-signals/

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bentwookiee says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:46 am
Yes it is possible :)
http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a13953308/electrician-turned-chip-bag-into-faraday-cage/

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AKA the A says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:33 am
If you think this is scary, you probably should know that ADS-B, which is
used as secondary radar for civil air traffic is completely open to
spoofing and has no verification whatsoever on whos actually transmitting
what information

Furthermore, Airbus and Eurocopter have the collision detection systems
connected with ADS-B and if on autopilot and with no pilot action despite
the alarms, it will actually change course in order to avoid collision.
Needless to say that high rise buildings do not have collision avoidance
systems, so it probably is possible to steer a jetliner into one without
being on the plane or doing any modifications to it.

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Whatnot says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:44 am
Or instead of boosting the signal with that power transistor simply connect
the output to the antenna, or right next to it a few millimeter away.

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Greenaum says:
December 1, 2017 at 10:08 pm
No, that was James Bond in Tomorrow Never Dies.

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dave says:
December 1, 2017 at 4:57 am
If GPS satnavs werent avilable it would certainly improve driving
standards.
People might plan ahead and read the 50ft tall junction signs than rely on a
little box and swerve across traffic at the last possible moment without
thought for anyone behind them.

If people cannot function at all without technology to do it for them, more
fool them.

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Max Siegieda (@CampGareth) says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:13 am
I think youll find we had bad drivers before GPS systems. In fact the
average fatalities per capita are lower now than they were in 1921.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_motor_vehicle_deaths_in_U.S._by_year

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RunnerPack says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:20 am
But is that due to better drivers, or to cars that arent made mostly of
wood, cast iron, and plate glass?

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David says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:46 am
I guess its a little bit of A and a little bit of B. Cars are also a lot
easier to drive, roads are built with some safety standards, people are
better drivers due to the fact that cars are an everyday thing now and yes,
cars are not death traps anymore.

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Pirate Labs says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:21 am
Good question.

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dave says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:59 am
Seatbelts. Airbags. Deforming bodyshells. ABS. and so on

Its commonly found that devices in the car distracting people from the road
are a major cause of accidents.
That has gone up with time and gadgets massively.
Fines and loss of license from using portable devices is rocketing in the
UK.

Ever seen someone on their mobile phone in traffic using the cars collision
avoidance features to keep crawling along while they text? Look for it. Its
happening more and more.

Google, Apple et al are making facial recognition for the front camera, why
the hell are they not stopping them from working when people are driving and
holding/looking at them?
It wouldnt be hard.
Front cam sees face looking up and down constantly with a pattern akin to
driving distracted.
Back cam sees steering wheel, car cockpit.
GPS sees movement and location.
Put it all together. Lock phone for 10mins as punishment except emergency
calls.
Keep upping the time if it happens again.
People would get the lesson fast.

Change the law so the makers are legally responsible for the use and can be
sued for injuries by 3rd parties.
Watch it get implemented in days.

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Code and Solder says:
December 1, 2017 at 12:15 pm
I totall agree, this would mean finally mainstream adoption of open source
ROMs!

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Luke says:
December 1, 2017 at 9:03 pm
The real reason perpetual traffic jams forcing cars to drive slower.
Seriously. The number of cars on the roads have increased faster in the last
40 years than the number of highway lanes to drive on. Traffic speeds in
most NA cities are slower than back then as a result. Slower traffic = fewer
accidents and less severe accidents. Weekend driving, with fewer traffic
tie-ups, results in more accidents and higher death/injury rates. Forget the
ABS/airbags/etc. Speed kills now and in the past. We are experiencing lower
speeds on the average (over 25 year period ending about a decade ago, L.A.
saw a 30% drop in rush hour speed).

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Greenaum says:
December 1, 2017 at 10:14 pm
Since most phones have GPS, and all can be triangulated from base stations,
it wouldnt be hard for a phones OS to disable it, if it detected it was
moving above, say, 5mph. You could probably do 5mph on foot but it wouldnt
be safe to use your phone anyway.

AFAIK 4G relies on triangulating a phones location. So its probably just a
couple of lines of code.

On the other issue though, yep, there is far far far too much distracting
crap in cars these days.

Maybe for people who are particularly independence-minded, you can set the
phone to still work while youre moving, but it disables the airbags.

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Alex Rich says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:46 am
Yeah 1921 would not be a good year to compare to, too many other variables
have changed. However you could compare it to like 2000 or something, I was
still using Mapquest at the point Im pretty sure. And that cant be safer
than GPS because it cant dictate the turns to me.

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sneakypoo says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:22 am
Preeetty sure people swerve like idiots without GPS Personally I would be
f-cked without GPS. My brain is broken when it comes to having a sense of
direction so GPS is my saviour (just need it for indoors as well). And I
find that I plan even more in advance with it. I keep a close eye on how far
I need to go before the next turn/lane change and make sure Ive done it
waaay ahead of time because Im afraid of being stuck in the wrong lane
and get lost

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TacticalNinja says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:29 am
This. Although I dont rely on it turn-by-turn, it forces me to plan ahead
rather than risk turning way too late. Street signs are not very well
maintained where I live.

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John says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:28 am
If GPS satnavs werent avilable it would certainly improve driving
standards.

Yes indeed. Gone would be the inconsiderate drivers, because they would be
mostly dead after crashing while trying to read a map. or to look for a
house number. Lets hope this doesnt happen to be where you are standing..
eh?

People might plan ahead and read the 50ft tall junction signs than rely on
a little box and swerve across traffic at the last possible moment without
thought for anyone behind them.

Or..they might be the exact same kind of drivers, without GPS as they are
with one less thing to occupy their attention..

If people cannot function at all without technology to do it for them, more
fool them.

If people blame technology for ignorance and indifference in others, more
fool them.

GPS is a tool.
The internet is a tool.
A smartphone is a tool.

And sadly.. so are you.

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dave says:
December 1, 2017 at 8:09 am
In the old days of maps if you missed the junction because you werent
paying attention youd more than likely drive on to the next one.
Now youve got a little box that tells you you are going to miss it. So jam
on the brakes and take that exit.
Or worse, back up because it tells you that its a 20mile detour so
reversing will save you time.

Yes, GPS doesnt make fuckwits any more inconsiderate. It just enables them
a lot more to be that way.
Because some people rely on it to replace what they themselves should be
doing: paying attention, reading the road, etc.
Some people will blindly follow their satnav into the sea read the news at
all ??

If you cannot fathom how technology is enabling people to be more ignorant
and less considerate then sorry chap the ignorance lies with your good self.

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Alex Rich says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:41 am
I wonder what the net effect of GPS navigation is on overall car emissions.

On the one hand, it makes routes more efficient and reduces wrong turns,
etc. I remember days when youd miss a highway exit, if you didnt know the
mile marker you could drive for 20 miles before realizing it.

On the other hand, people are more confident to jump in their car and drive
somewhere unfamiliar, so maybe it has added trips that otherwise wouldnt
have happened.

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Steven-X says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:23 am
If you swerve across all lanes to make a last minute turn with GPS, then you
are doing it wrong. I had more issues when driving blind, or in the past
with a hand drawn map. I did try at least to indicate landmarks or earlier
exits/intersections so I knew it was approaching, but it was an imperfect
system.

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bluecollarcritic says:
December 1, 2017 at 8:16 am
You dont fix stupid people by increasing the governments reach/control over
all people. Same goes for allowing private entities/corporations to force a
users legally owned device to act in some way or do something they did not
OK and I dont mean OKing via some legalese Terms Of Conditions that no one
reads because they are written to be difficult to understand. Terms of
Service and Agreements often use all caps and similar techniques to
obfuscate the meaning of the thing.

More Laws/Government Control Safety !

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Murdock says:
December 1, 2017 at 9:27 am
With a GPS I can see where the street is supposed to be well before I am
there.

With directions I dont know where Im going until I see the road sign.

So I really dont see how having less information where you are going makes
you a better driver.

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Alexander says:
December 1, 2017 at 4:58 am
Also used by car thieves

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GnakFlak says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:12 am
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/11/australian-man-uses-snack-bags-as-faraday-cage-to-block-tracking-by-employer/
Seems like a hassle compared to this guy.

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Thinkerer says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:19 am
I was going to say that aluminum foil would be the simpler solution, but
jammers would most likely be used where the GPS (and particularly its roof
antenna) are hard-mounted in a vehicle and foil hats would be difficult.

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sneakypoo says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:23 am
Difficult perhaps, but think of how stylish your car would look!

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Ostracus says:
December 1, 2017 at 8:26 am
Certainly ties in with the reason why its not good to interfere with GPS,
even if achieved in a different way.

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me says:
December 1, 2017 at 3:10 pm
dudes like this GPS jammers are frequently used by truck drivers

I would about 2-3 times a year help with some dude doing exactly this. We
would have the terminal manager make a loud example out of one driver and
the rest usually fell in line quickly. We made it perfectly clear we can
tell. It is dead easy to tell. The truck is going 60MPH passed through
dozens of cell towers (which also have a form of GPS) and yet the GPS still
says the truck stop 100 miles ago. How very odd The terminal managers who
liked to give the benefit of the doubt would do a ride along and magically
the driver was 2-3 hours ahead of schedule. With a nice stern warning of we
know dont screw up again. The ones who usually got fired were the ones
after 2 total equipment swaps and it would fail in the same way every time
and after a ride along. Some managers would do a dual set of hardware and
track it in a different way then show it. Or a camera to watch them disable
it.

Our favorite was to scare them into leaving the thing alone. I can put a
bucket over that thing and hahaha no signal well you could but it has
enough energy to bounce the data off a satellite I sure would not want to
expose my balls to that A lie sure but plausible enough they would stop
doing it.

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Ostracus says:
December 1, 2017 at 3:26 pm
Wonder how many gave up their cell phones? ;-)

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w1retap (@w1retap) says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:25 am
I bought a nice 2G/3G/4G/CDMA/GPRS/GPS jammer thats good for a 50ft radius.
Its great for movie theaters with everyone texting and their phone ringing.
I just flip it on and instantly hear everyones lost signal tone so I can
enjoy the movie.

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eletrax says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:48 am
I hate to say this but a time may come when somebody behind a wall will,
unbeknownst to you, try to dial 112.

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bluecollarcritic says:
December 1, 2017 at 8:21 am
And if that theatres structure and or location resulted in someones signal
being unavailable would that mean that the theatre is at fault if that
patron needs to access emergency services?> or should it be on the patron to
seek alternative means like going to the theatre mgt and asking them to call
emergency services?

I get what wiretap would use such a device in a theatre. Its not like loud
patrons where you can get mgt to ask them to quiet down or leave. Too many
people are disrespectful of others and thus do things that cause problems
for others and because of there F em attitude others like wiretap are
forced to empty counter measures. Ever been at a theatre where some idiot
has brought theyre baby/toddler to an adult movie and the baby/kid cries
most if not the whole time?

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Megol says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:10 am
Hope you are kidding. Otherwise you should be in prison.

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Ostracus says:
December 1, 2017 at 8:30 am
Lets start defining cellular communications as a right, and roll from there,
so theater owners can go to jail for using passive techniques like Faraday
cages.

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Rog Fanther says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:46 am
Now we just need something to disable the lights from their phone screens
also

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Murdock says:
December 1, 2017 at 9:30 am
Because fuck that guy with his on call phone set to vibrate. He didnt need
to be alerted that he has to get the backup generators running for the water
treatment plant. Who even needs those?

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ThisGUy says:
December 4, 2017 at 2:05 am
And what do you think the pager uses to communicate?? Hint: its one of
these 2G/3G/4G/CDMA/GPRS/GPS

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DainBramage says:
December 1, 2017 at 5:34 am
Any kind of RF jamming equipment is illegal in the USA, and probably in most
other jurisdictions also.
There, somebody had to say it.

That being said, Im surprised at how such a simple circuit could produce
such a clean output. NO harmonics? None at all? Have the laws of physics
looked the other way, or is there far more filtering going on than just what
we can see?
Of course, the spectrum analyzer screen shot doesnt actually show the
frequency where the 2nd harmonic would be expected, right around 3150 MHz,
in a part of the spectrum reserved for space research and radiolocation

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jon says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:04 am
I have no insight into the equipment that was used to generate that spectrum
graph, but I suspect its a very reasonable possibility that the equipment
didnt go up to 3.15Ghz, very possible a failure to measure created the
opinion that it must not exist.

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Thinkerer says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:12 am
Okay, if jamming is this easy, what about spoofing? It would be a lot of fun
to have whoevers watching think youre in the middle of the Pacific Ocean
one minute and downtown Des Moines the next, particularly when youre
supposed to be in London.

(Yes, I know this kind of signal manipulation would be very difficultbut
thats what makes it fun)

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Queeg says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:24 am
http://money.cnn.com/2017/11/03/technology/gps-spoofing-russia/index.html

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BillyG says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:31 am
That requires a significant amount of more work, but the hardware is
commercially available. And pretty low cost too.
http://sine.ni.com/nips/cds/view/p/lang/en/nid/204980

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eletrax says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:42 am
Watch this! The means vs goal ratio is a bit overkill, though ;)
https://hackaday.com/2016/07/26/we-declare-the-grandmaster-of-pokemon-go-gps-cheats/

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John says:
December 1, 2017 at 6:56 am
How long has GPS left to run? It cant be many more years I dont think.

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John says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:00 am
Hmm, I thought they had stopped launching them in 2014 but it seems not,
last launch early 2016.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_GPS_satellites

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Ostracus says:
December 1, 2017 at 8:33 am
Naturally, since GPS is good for more than navigation (still needs to be
better), but atmospheric research as well.

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Koplin says:
December 1, 2017 at 3:17 pm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPS_Block_IIIA

Planed next launch 2018

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tz says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:07 am
315MHz that remote control frequency times 5 (as in 5th harmonic) is
1575MHz. Overdriving one to make a nice square wave

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2ftg says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:28 am
That would be amusing. Ebay 315MHz transmitter being being modulated (to
widen the spectrum), then fed to soem MMIC amplifer and then to a 1575Mhz
SAW filter and maybe amplified a bit more.

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DougM says:
December 1, 2017 at 7:47 am
You say that now but when waves of autonomous killer drones are headed your
way youd wish you had an array of these in your go-bag ready to deploy.
Although random location spoofers might be more suitable.

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Reply
cde says:
December 1, 2017 at 10:26 am
Couldnt you do the same just by grounding the antenna?

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Reply
Greenaum says:
December 1, 2017 at 10:22 pm
If you can get to it. GPS in vehicles, particularly ones where the owner
isnt the driver (trucks), is often hidden away somewhere hard to get to.
And they dont always tell the driver where. Since the machines job is to
spy on the driver, theyre intrinsically enemies. And a sneaky company might
put 2 GPSes in. A jammer solves that problem.

If the driver was in charge of the GPS, he could just not fit it in the
first place!

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Reply
echodelta says:
December 1, 2017 at 11:52 am
If the GPS is in the roof of the car, get a rubber magnetic stick on to
cover it up. The stuff in magnet should be a poor window to RF. Better to
laminate some tin foil on it.

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Reply
DavidCG says:
December 1, 2017 at 12:01 pm
The jammer wont work if the system uses GLONASS as a backup which I
understand is more common than you might have realized.

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Greenaum says:
December 1, 2017 at 10:23 pm
Sure you can get something that blocks GLONASSs frequency though right? But
yep, certainly in mobile phones, anything with GPS usually has GLONASS too,
they put them in the same chip.

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DNA says:
December 2, 2017 at 10:26 am
Some receiver might use multiple bands of each system too (not sure about
consumer product, but my survey-grade GNSS do use multiple band). Thatll
sure make jamming even more complicated.

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Roberts says:
December 4, 2017 at 1:10 pm
A running SJCAM 4000 (possibly any other cheap gizmo with LCD) placed
closely to GPS antenna makes a quite good GPS jammer. People that do HABs
know this. The RF crap is apparently generated by that thing come from (most
likely) poorly terminated LCD control lines.

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Reply
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

How to access reports on NASA's Aviation Safety Reporting System
1: To investigate a report, go to the ASRS database:
https://asrs.arc.nasa.gov/

2: On the top ribbon, click Search ASRS Database," and then choose Search
ASRS Online." Click on Start Search."

3: Follow the steps under How to Search" at the top. Then, under 7 Text:
Narrative/Synopsis," click on [words]." Then click on Text contains Click
Here."

4: In the pop-up window, enter some of the text that is quoted in this
story. In the Fields to search" field at the bottom, click Narrative" (but
you can also try Synopsis").

5: If you're searching on more than one word, you need to format it inside
parentheses, thus: (GPS JAMMING).

6: Click Save." The pop-up will disappear.

7: Click Run Search" at the bottom right.

8: Under Display your results," click View all reports."

NOTAMs now encourage pilots to report all GPS interference, but many of the
RTCA's other recommendations are languishing within the Office of Accident
Investigation and Prevention at the FAA.

The same pilot was jammed again on his way home.

This article appears in the February 2021 print issue as Lost in Airspace."

This article was updated on 26 January 2021.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incident
IranU.S. RQ-170 incident
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to navigationJump to search

RQ-170 in Iran
On 5 December 2011, an American Lockheed Martin RQ-170 Sentinel unmanned
aerial vehicle (UAV) was captured by Iranian forces near the city of Kashmar
in northeastern Iran. The Iranian government announced that the UAV was
brought down by its cyberwarfare unit which commandeered the aircraft and
safely landed it, after initial reports from Western news sources disputedly
claimed that it had been "shot down".[1] The United States government
initially denied the claims but later President Obama acknowledged that the
downed aircraft was a US drone.[2][3] Iran filed a complaint to the UN over
the airspace violation. Obama asked Iran to return the drone. Iran is said
to have produced drones based on the captured RQ-170.

Contents
1 Capture of the drone
2 US acknowledgement
3 Complaint to UN Security Council
4 Request for return by the United States
5 Reverse engineering of the drone
6 Decoded footage obtained from captured US drone
7 See also
8 References
Capture of the drone

Images of the RQ-170 Sentinel taken from a US Army recognition manual
The government of Iran announced that the aircraft was brought down by its
cyber warfare unit stationed near Kashmar and "brought down with minimum
damage"[4] They said the aircraft was detected in Iranian airspace 225
kilometers (140 mi) from the border with Afghanistan.[5]

The government of the United States initially claimed that its forces in
Afghanistan had lost control of a UAV on 4 December 2011 and that there was
a possibility that this is the vehicle that crashed near Kashmar. According
to unnamed U.S. officials, a U.S. UAV operated by the Central Intelligence
Agency was flying on the Afghan side of the AfghanistanIran border when its
operators lost control of the vehicle.[6][7] There have been reports that
"foreign officials and American experts who have been briefed on the effort"
state that the crashed UAV was taking part in routine surveillance of
Iranian nuclear facilities inside Iranian airspace.[8]

The drone appeared to be largely intact, except for possible minor visible
damage on its left wing. Dan Goure, an analyst at the Lexington Institute,
stated the largely intact airframe ruled out the possibility of an engine or
navigational malfunction: "Either this was a cyber/electronic warfare attack
system that brought the system down or it was a glitch in the
command-and-control system."[9] At least one US source admitted that Iran
could have interrupted the data-link and brought it to a soft landing.[10]
Some US officials stated the drone broke into three pieces during impact.
They claimed that it was reassembled for display purposes and was painted by
Iran to hide the damage.[11]

The U.S. Department of Defense released a statement acknowledging that it
had lost control of a UAV during the previous week, claiming that it was
"flying a mission over western Afghanistan" when control was lost. The
statement did not specify the model of the aircraft. The U.S. government
also stated that it was still investigating the cause of the loss.[12]

A Christian Science Monitor article relates an Iranian engineer's assertion
that the drone was captured by jamming both satellite and land-originated
control signals to the UAV, followed up by a GPS spoofing attack that fed
the UAV false GPS data to make it land in Iran at what the drone thought was
its home base in Afghanistan. Stephen Trimble from Flight Global assumes UAV
guidance could have been targeted by 1L222 Avtobaza radar jamming and
deception system supplied to Iran by Russia.[13] In an interview for Nova,
U.S. retired Lt. General David Deptula also said "There was a problem with
the aircraft and it landed in an area it wasn't supposed to land".[14][15]

American aeronautical engineers dispute this, pointing out that as is the
case with the MQ-1 Predator, the MQ-9 Reaper, and the Tomahawk, "GPS is not
the primary navigation sensor for the RQ-170... The vehicle gets its flight
path orders from an inertial navigation system".[16] Inertial navigation
continues to be used on military aircraft despite the advent of GPS because
GPS signal jamming and spoofing are relatively simple operations.[17]

US acknowledgement
On 5 December 2011, U.S. military sources confirmed that the remains of an
RQ-170 had been captured by Iranian forces. Media reports indicated that
various U.S. officials declined to confirm whether or not the drone in the
video released by Iranian state television was authentic.[18] On 8 December
2011, a senior U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told the
Washington Post that the U.S. cannot be certain the drone shown was real
because the U.S. does not have access to it, but also stated that "We have
no indication that it was brought down by hostile fire."[12] A second senior
U.S. military official said that a major question is how the drone could
have remained "virtually intact," given the high altitude from which it is
said to have crashed. U.S. Navy Captain John Kirby, a Pentagon spokesman,
told a news conference on 8 December 2011 that Pentagon analysts were
examining the video.[19] Both Kirby and fellow spokesman George Little would
not comment further on whether the U.S. military believed the drone was the
one missing, both did say that the missing drone had not been recovered.[19]
Later that day, CBS reported that the US officials had confirmed in private
the authenticity of the drone shown by the Iranians.[20]

On 6 December 2011, U.S. officials acknowledged that a drone crashed in or
near Iranian airspace and that this belonged to the CIA and not to ISAF as
was earlier stated. U.S. officials did not state that the drone shown on
Iranian television was actually a real RQ-170 (which has been public
knowledge since 2009),[21] although a former U.S. official confirmed that
the drone shown on the Iranian state media was a U.S. RQ-170, used for
surveillance of Tehran's nuclear facilities.[citation needed]

Complaint to UN Security Council
On 9 December 2011, Iran lodged a formal complaint to the United Nations
Security Council over the UAV violating its airspace. Iran's U.N. ambassador
stated in the letter that "My government emphasizes that this blatant and
unprovoked air violation by the United States government is tantamount to an
act of hostility against the Islamic Republic of Iran in clear contravention
of international law, in particular, the basic tenets of the United Nations
Charter."[22]

Request for return by the United States
On 12 December 2011, the U.S. administration asked Iran to return the
captured U.S. drone.[23] The day before, on 11 December, General Salami
stated that "no nation welcomes other countries' spy drones in its
territory, and no one sends back the spying equipment and its information
back to the country of origin."[24] On 13 December 2011, Defence Minister of
Iran, dismissed the request and said "Instead of apologising to the Iranian
nation, it is brazenly asking for the drone back." And the ministry
spokesman, Mehmanparast, stated that "it seems he [Obama] has forgotten that
Irans airspace was violated, spying operations were undertaken,
international laws were violated and that Irans internal affairs were
interfered with... . Instead of an official apology and admitting to this
violation, they are making this request."[25]

Former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney criticized Obama's decisions on the
drone, saying that, after the aircraft went down, the president should have
ordered an airstrike within Iran: "The right response to that would have
been to go in immediately after it had gone down and destroy it. You can do
that from the air ... and, in effect, make it impossible for them to benefit
from having captured that drone." Instead, "he asked nicely for them to
return it, and they aren't going to".[26]

On 17 January 2012, an Iranian company said it would send miniature, pink,
toy versions of the captured drone to President Obama as a response to the
request for sending the drone back.[27]

Reverse engineering of the drone
Main articles: Shahed 171 Simorgh and Saegheh (UAV)
On 10 December 2011, Iran announced that it intended to carry out reverse
engineering on the captured RQ-170 Sentinel stealth aircraft.[citation
needed] In April 2012, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps claimed to have
succeeded in extracting the entirety of the data collected by the drone and
are currently in the process of building a replica of the aircraft.[28] Iran
claimed to have been approached by countries, including China and Russia,
seeking information on the drone.[29] Although U.S. officials expressed
concern over the possibility of China or Russia receiving the drone's
technology, they cast doubt on whether Iran could replicate the technology
of the aircraft, as well as the amount of intelligence data available, due
to the precautions installed for malfunctioning drones.[30]

In May 2014, Iranian state TV displayed what was claimed to be a
reverse-engineered RQ-170. Sources familiar with the RQ-170's design say
that the Iranian RQ-170 is merely a static mock-up rather than a flyable
aircraft.[31] In November 2014 Iran claimed to have carried out a successful
test flight of an aircraft based on reverse engineering of the RQ-170.[32]

The semi-official Tasnim news agency of Iran reported in September 2016 that
a UAV named Sa'egheh, similar in appearance to the RQ-170 Sentinel, had been
built. It was said to be able to carry four precision-guided bombs; the
range was not stated.[33]

The Israeli military shot down a Sa'egheh drone during the February 2018
IsraelSyria incident. Israeli media reported that the UAV's design was
indeed largely based on the RQ-170, IAF Brigadier General Tomer Bar said
that the drone was quite advanced and emulated western technology.[34]

Decoded footage obtained from captured US drone
On 7 February 2013, Iran released video footage allegedly from the RQ-170
stealth plane. They claim the footage shows the drone coming in for a
landing at the Kandahar base. Commander of the Aerospace Division of the
Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Brigadier General Amir-Ali Hajizadeh
said in February that all the data on the downed drone was "fully
decoded."[35]

See also
Iran portalUnited States portalPolitics portalAviation portal
Islamic Republic of Iran Air Defense Force
Yasir (UAV) An Iranian UAV based on an American type that was captured in
a similar incident
Saegheh (UAV), the design of which is alleged to be inspired by RQ-170
Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752
Iran Air Flight 655
2019 Iranian shoot-down of American drone
References
Peterson, Scott; Faramarzi, Payam (2011). "Exclusive: Iran hijacked US
drone, says Iranian engineer". csmonitor.com. Retrieved 15 December 2011.
Mungin, Lateef (22 October 2013). "Iran claims released footage is from
downed U.S. drone". CNN.
"Obama says U.S. has asked Iran to return drone aircraft". CNN. CNN Wire
Staff. 22 October 2013.
Maroney, Sean. "Iranian Video Displays Alleged US Drone". Voice of America.
Retrieved 13 December 2011.
"Iran Says No To Returning U.S. Drone, But Hints At Deal". Rferl.org.
Retrieved 13 December 2011.
"Iran shows film of captured US drone". BBC News. 8 December 2011.
Retrieved 12 December 2011.
U.S. officials, analysts differ on whether drone in Iran TV video is real.
CNN.com. (8 December 2011) Retrieved 12 December 2011.
Shane, Scott; Sanger, David E (7 December 2011). "Drone Crash in Iran
Reveals Secret U.S. Surveillance Effort". The New York Times. Retrieved 13
December 2011.
Dave Majumdar (9 December 2011). "Iran's captured RQ-170: How bad is the
damage?". Air Force Times.
Majumdar, Dave (12 May 2014). "Iranian Copy of U.S. Unmanned Stealth
Aircraft is a Fake". USNI News.
"US official: Iran assembled drone like puzzle". Ynetnews.com. 20 June
1995. Retrieved 24 August 2014.
Jaffe, Greg; Erdbrink, Thomas (5 December 2011). "Iran says it downed U.S.
stealth drone; Pentagon acknowledges aircraft downing". The Washington Post.
Retrieved 5 December 2011.
"About the FlightGlobal Group - Blogs Announcement - flightglobal.com".
Scott Peterson; Payam Faramarzi (15 December 2011). "Exclusive: Iran
hijacked US drone, says Iranian engineer". Christian Science Monitor.
David A. Deptula, Lt. General, USAF (Retired) (23 January 2013). "Nova -
Rise of the Drones". Event occurs at "0:37". Retrieved 24 January 2013.
Meade, Sean. "Ares". Aviation Week. Retrieved 24 August 2014.
"Iran Says It Will Display More Us & Israeli Drones". aviationintel. 16
December 2011. Retrieved 1 May 2012.
Rick Gladstone (8 December 2011). "Iran Shows Video It Says Is of U.S.
Drone". the New York Times.
"U.S. officials, analysts differ on whether drone in Iran TV video is
real". CNN. 8 December 2011.
U.S. official: Iran does have our drone. CBS News (8 December 2011).
Retrieved 12 December 2011.
"After drone was lost, CIA tried a head fake". The Washington Post. 6
December 2011. Retrieved 8 December 2011.
"General: Iran won't return U.S. drone it claims to have". CNN. 11 December
2011. Retrieved 28 November 2013.
"Obama appeals to Iran to give back downed US drone". The New York Times. 9
December 2011. Retrieved 11 December 2011.
"General: Iran won't return U.S. drone it claims to have". CNN. 11 December
2011. Archived from the original on 12 December 2011. Retrieved 13 December
2011.
"Iran says captured US drone is their 'property' now". The Daily Telegraph.
13 December 2011. Retrieved 13 December 2011.
"Obama says the U.S. has asked Iran to return drone aircraft". CNN. 13
December 2011. Retrieved 13 December 2011.
Shirzad Bozorgmehr. "Iranian company wants to send toy drone to Obama -
CNN.com". CNN. Retrieved 15 September 2016.
"Iran says it has gleaned data from U.S. spy drone". San Francisco
Chronicle. 22 April 2012. Retrieved 23 April 2012.
"Russia, China seek info on US drone held by Iran". Fox News. 19 April
2012. Retrieved 23 April 2012.
"Officials challenge Iran claims on US drone despite concerns about value
to Russia, China". Fox News. 23 April 2012.
"Iranian Copy of U.S. Unmanned Stealth Aircraft is a Fake". USNI News. 12
May 2014. Retrieved 15 September 2016.
"Iran carries successful test flight of reverse-engineered RQ-170". 10
November 2014. Archived from the original on 10 November 2014. Retrieved 10
November 2014.
"Iran builds attack drone similar to captured US model, local media say".
The Guardian. 2 October 2016. Retrieved 2 October 2016.
Gross, Judah Ari (10 February 2018). "Iranian UAV that entered Israeli
airspace seems to be American stealth knock-off". The Times of Israel.
Retrieved 12 February 2018.
"Iran shows 'hacked US spy drone' video footage". BBC News. 7
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2018/march/14/keeping-nextgen-on-the-air
KEEPING NEXTGEN ON THE AIR
AS GPS NAVIGATION GROWS, SO DOES GPS INTERFERENCE
March 14, 2018
By AOPA ePublishing staff
An AOPA-co-chaired task group that studied how to keep civil aircraft
flights on course when military training and testing interfere with GPS
services used for navigation has issued a wide-ranging set of
recommendations to the FAA.

Satellite-based navigation is becoming the norm.
Satellite-based navigation is becoming the norm. iStock photo.
GPS interference has many causes, but the task group focused on GPS
interference resulting from Department of Defense activity.

GPS is rapidly becoming the dominant air-navigation technology under the
FAAs NextGen modernization program, and the pace of the advance is sure to
accelerate as more aircraft take on Automatic Dependent
Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) Out systems before a mandated compliance date
of Jan. 1, 2020.

By their nature, signals from GPS are fragile due to their very low power,
so as the FAA modernizes the National Airspace System, it is essential to
ensure that alternate navigation aids and capabilities are available if GPS
becomes unavailable.
National Security Presidential Directive 39 directs the Department of
Transportation to, develop, acquire, operate, and maintain backup
positioning, navigation, and timing capabilities that can support critical
transportation, homeland security, and other critical civil and commercial
infrastructure applications within the United States, in the event of a
disruption of the Global Positioning System The same U.S. policy directs
the Department of Defense to train, equip, test, and exercise U.S. military
forces and national security capabilities in operationally realistic
conditions that include denial of the Global Positioning System.

When military exercises intentionally degrade GPS signalsnecessary to
simulate operationally realistic conditions in trainingthe impact on
civilian aircraft has been mixed. Sometimes the impact of a GPS signal
outage on an aircraft is nothing at all. Much depends, say experts, on the
aircrafts altitude, the terrain, and the navigation equipment on board.
However, sometimes the impact is more significant.

One incident from April 2016 has come to exemplify what can happen: It
documented an Embraer Phenom 300 entering a Dutch roll and emergency descent
after its yaw damper disengaged when the aircrafts dual attitude and
heading reference systems responded differently to the GPS signal outage.

Numerous aircraft have reported the loss of navigation signals in affected
airspace; some have been observed to disappear from their ADS-B-plotted
tracks in dead spots, to reappear in zones of better signal reception.

And because it is very difficult to predict how loss of GPS signals may
affect an aircrafts navigation and flight control systems, this is the
dilemma: Is it better for an aircraft to reroute to avoid the frequently
expansive swaths of airspace depicted graphically on GPS-testing notices to
airmen? Can better methods be found to quantify the risks?

Degraded navigation, the loss of ADS-B, and the failure of GPS-dependent
control systems arent the only impacts on civil aviation from what the FAA
calls intentional interference events. Theres also economic risk for
businesses like aerial surveying companies that fly GPS-based grids, and who
may be unable to operate during an interference event.

The uncertainties also highlight the need for the FAA to keep NextGens
VOR-based backup system in good working order, urged the panel that studied
the problem.

Quantifying the problem
Its report, Operational Impacts of Intentional GPS Interference, is a
must-read for aircraft operators who want to understand the knowns, the
unknowns, and the future planning designed to make interference eventswhich
tripled in number from 2012 to 2017non-issues for civilian aircraft, said
Rune Duke, AOPA senior director of airspace, air traffic, and security.

Duke co-chaired the Radio Technical Commission for Aviations GPS
Interference Task Group with Capt. Wes Googe, technical pilot and manager of
airspace optimization for American Airlines. Robert Sweet, a senior manager
in the Air Traffic Organization, served as the coordinator for input by the
FAAs technical operations and technical experts.

The task group came into being in May 2017 after the FAA requested that
RTCA, which studies technical questions for government agencies, recommend
ways to accommodate aviations increased reliance on GPS simultaneously
with the Department of Defenses increased need to hold exercises that
include GPS interference for national security and defense training.

The FAA requested that the task group focus on quantifying the impact of
interference events on the National Airspace System and recommend follow-up
actions ranging from better depictions of the events, based on their likely
interference profile, to analyzing how pilots are alerted to the activity,
to creating new training materials for pilots and air traffic controllers.

In its letter to RTCA, the FAA cited an AOPA survey that found that more
than a third of general aviation pilots had experienced a GPS outage, and
more than 60 percent were concerned about the impact of intentional GPS
interference.

The task group started meeting in August and delivered the recommendation
report to RTCAs tactical operations committee at its March 1 meeting, Duke
said. The committee approved the report and submitted it to the FAA for
their action. The next steps are for the FAA to review the recommendations
and report back on their concurrence and, if applicable, an implementation
plan.

Sweet added that the FAA is working to carefully balance the reliance of
air traffic on GPS with our militarys need to conduct GPS testing and
training activities. This task groups recommendations will help bring key
challenges and potential solutions into better focus.

In 25 recommendations, the report pinpoints improvement opportunities, and
it calls out the FAA where it believes the agency has failed to make
existing processes work.

According to one recommendation for better online information distribution,
The preflight resources available online for pilots are fragmented and
obscure. The FAA has failed to maintain several of these websites, yet they
were still publicly available until recently.

In some instances, it said, information is complete but hard to find.

The Flight Advisory notices are an important resource for pilots but they
are housed on an obscure website and can provide misleading information,
notes the next recommendation. The FAA should continue publishing and
emailing the Flight Advisory notices as they do provide valuable information
to users; however, where they are hosted today has limited visibility for a
pilot preparing for a flight. It is important the FAA relocate and integrate
these notices with the NOTAM on NOTAM Search, which is the default location
for NOTAM related information.

Anomaly reporting
The recommendations also flagged conflicting FAA guidance to pilots on
reporting GPS anomalies. Paragraph E in each Flight Advisory states pilots
are encouraged to report anomalies only when ATC assistance is required.
This guidance is repeated in Aeronautical Information Manual (AIM) paragraph
1-1-13, but this guidance is counter to FAR 91.187. Pilots operating under
IFR are required at all times to report as soon as practical to ATC any
malfunctions of navigational, approach, or communication equipment occurring
in flight. It is important paragraph E in the Flight Advisory and AIM
paragraph 1-1-13 are modified to be consistent with the regulatory
obligation of all pilots.

The report recommended new language stating, Pilots experiencing an anomaly
should advise appropriate ATC facility and report online using FAA GPS
Anomaly Reporting Form.

Duke strongly advocates for pilots to use the online GPS anomaly reporting
form, noting that reports conveyed by radio to ATC may not go much further
than the controlling facility. By contrast, anomalies reported online become
the subject of investigations, sometimes including the investigator calling
back the pilot who reports an event to request more information.

ADS-B permits some anomalies to be well documentedwhich could help improve
future GPS-testing notams. With ADS-B flight track data, we can see the
impact of the interference with images of aircraft flying into interference
areas and disappearing. Leveraging the ADS-B data can help us come up with
better models of where the interference is and how to inform pilots, he
said.

In some cases where problem areas were identified in the report, Duke said,
the FAA and Department of Defense are already on the case, such as examining
possible ways to reduce the graphical impact areas described in GPS testing
notams from radii of hundreds of miles, especially in airspace where the
only expected impact on GPS reception is near the notam areas center.

Also, the FAA is developing new pilot guidance, including new language to be
included in the Aeronautical Information Manual. The FAA is also considering
a new Advisory Circular that will detail the long list of mitigations the
FAA has in place for these events, Duke added.

With safety of civilian flights in mind, a key operational precaution
already in place between the Department of Defense and the FAA requires a
military interference event being stopped if the weather is less than a
5,000-foot ceiling and/or five miles visibility at a GPS-only airport when
an aircraft needs access to that airport.

This is an important mitigation that will become more robust and enforced
based on this groups work, he said.

Panel co-chair Googe noted that the airline industry considers the
Department of Defenses efforts with GPS interference critical to the
security of the country yet also a complicating factor in the conduction of
GPS dependent NextGen programs in the NAS going forward. The RTCA-sponsored
intentional GPS interference work group provided the aviation community and
FAA a forum to fully understanding the impact of these events, effectiveness
of the associated NOTAM service, and the education process for all concerned
to operate safely during these events.

Moving forward, It is imperative that the Alternative Position Navigation
Timing document (APNT) describe a collaborative roadmap that defines the
level of Required Navigation Performance (RNP) and associated equipage
expected in order to meet the current and future needs of all operators in
the National Airspace System during any GPS interference event, he said,
referring to the FAA project that investigates alternatives for
high-precision backup for GPS other than the legacy navigation systems
currently designated to provide coverage in an outage.

The report also notes that, although the task group focused on intentional
and planned GPS interference events, other factors including solar weather,
illegal personal GPS jammers, unlicensed GPS repeaters or spoofing must be
addressed by the FAA as well.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

https://www.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/report-on-pnt-backup-complementary-capabilities-to-gps_508.pdf
Report on Positioning, Navigation,
and Timing (PNT) Backup and
Complementary Capabilities to the
Global Positioning System (GPS)
National Defense Authorization Act Fiscal Year
2017 Report to Congress: PNT Requirements,
and Analysis of Alternatives
April 8, 2020
i Message from the Director, Cybersecurity and
Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA)
April 8, 2020
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), specifically
the National Risk Management Center (NRMC) within the
Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), in
coordination with the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT),
prepared the following report: Positioning, Navigation, and
Timing (PNT) Backup and Complementary Capabilities to the
Global Positioning System (GPS).
This document was compiled pursuant to the joint departmental
report requirement in the Fiscal Year (FY) 2017 National
Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) (PUBLIC LAW 114328,
Sec.1618). Included in this report is an overview and a summary
of conclusions.
This report is submitted on behalf of DHS and represents civil PNT
concerns. The U.S.
Department of Defense (DOD) already submitted its report for DOD-related
efforts.
DHS is the national coordinator for the operational security of the
Nations critical
infrastructure, and DOT has some sector-specific responsibility for the
Transportation
Sectors (Maritime, Aviation, Railways, and Roadways). DOT and DHS PNT
representatives have been involved in the progress of the studies conducted,
and all three
departments (DHS, DOD, and DOT) have reviewed the information in the studies
and
this final report.
Pursuant to congressional requirements, CISA NRMC prepared this report on
behalf of
the Federal government. This report used details from the requirement
studies conducted
in 2017 and 2018 by non-governmental organizations on behalf of DHS.
The legislative requirements (see Section I) for Section 1618 of the
FY17 NDAA (P.L.
114-328; December 23, 2016) to provide PNT capability information to backup
and
complement GPS are included in this report. This report also includes the
DHS
conclusions from the requirements studies and the Analysis of Alternative
(AoA) (nonacquisition) research conducted in 2017 and 2018. All these
studies are available to
Congress upon request.
The National Timing Resilience and Security Act of 2018 (PL 115-282) made
the
Secretary of Transportation responsible for establishing requirements for
the procurement
of a land-based, resilient, and reliable alternative timing system as a
complement to and
backup for the timing component of GPS, and a report to Congress setting
forth a plan for
such a system as well as an assessment of the advantages of such a system.
This report
does not intend to address this requirement, which was finalized after DHS
analysis was
underway; however, the timing requirements for Federal and Critical
Infrastructure users
ii
contained in this report are applicable to any subsequent DOT effort.
The Committee leadership and/or their designated representative receiving
this report are as
follows:
Chairman Adam Smith
House Armed Services Committee
Ranking Member Mac Thornberry
House Armed Services Committee
Chairman James Inhofe
Senate Armed Services Committee
Ranking Member Jack Reed
Senate Armed Services Committee
Chairwoman Eddie Bernice Johnson
House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
Ranking Member Frank Lucas
House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
Chairman Roger Wicker
Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee
Ranking Member Maria Cantwell
Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee
Chairman Ron Johnson
Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
Ranking Member Gary Peters
Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
Chairman Bennie Thompson
House Committee on Homeland Security
Ranking Member Mike Rogers
House Committee on Homeland Security
Chairman Peter A. DeFazio
House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
Ranking Member Sam Graves
House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
iii
If you have any questions, please contact CISA Legislative Affairs at (703)
235-2080.
Sincerely,
Christopher C. Krebs
iv
Executive Summary
Overview
The Global Positioning System (GPS) has become the definitive position,
navigation, and timing
(PNT) source in the United States due to its capabilities, availability, and
lack of end user fees.
These factors have led to widespread adoption of, and potential overreliance
on, GPS. While
other PNT systems are available, GPS low end user cost and ubiquity have
limited the adoption
of other PNT systems for widespread use.
Adoption and use of PNT systems, other than GPS, are generally driven by
operational needs
such as accuracy, security, or availability that GPS cannot provide. These
operational needs can
justify the cost of other PNT services for specific critical infrastructure
application. However,
these additional costs also present market challenges for broader adoption
of non-GNSS systems.
Industries that see the value in non-GNSS services adopt them, but without
regulatory
requirements or positive benefit-cost equations, adoption of non-GNSS
services is unlikely. This
report will provide details of the requirements for PNT and the analysis of
alternatives that may
drive the governments decision to move forward with investments in backup
and/or
complementary capabilities to GPS for Critical Infrastructure and critical
commercial
applications.
Purpose
Section 1618 of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2017 National Defense Authorization
Act (NDAA) (P.L.
114-328; December 23, 2016) requires the U.S. Department of Homeland
Security (DHS) to
address the needs for a GPS backup by identifying and assessing viable
alternate technologies
and systems. The Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center (HSOAC)
conducted an indepth assessment of PNT systems currently used in the United
States for DHS and DOT. This
report is a summary and analysis of that assessment and provides
recommendations for the
Federal Governments next steps in efforts to increase the resilience of US
Critical Infrastructure
to disruption of GPS services.
Key Findings and Considerations
As detailed in section V of this report, DHS recommends that responsibility
for mitigating
temporary- GPS outages be the responsibility of the individual user and not
the responsibility of
the Federal Government. Research by HSOAC shows that users can mitigate
short-term GPS
disruptions (e.g., inability to read a GPS signal) with various strategies,
ranging from using local
backup capabilities to delaying operations until GPS is restored. The HSOAC
report, Analyzing a
More Resilient National Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT)
Capability,
1 provides an
analysis of some mitigations used by specific industries to respond to a
temporary disruption or
1 The 2017 National Defense Authorization Act mandated a study to assess
and identify the technology-neutral
requirements to backup and complement the positioning, navigation, and
timing [PNT] capabilities of the Global
Positioning System [GPS] for national security and critical infrastructure.
DHS had HSOAC conduct this study.
v loss.
Recognizing the ability to mitigate the negative impacts of temporary
disruptions, the remainder
of this report will primarily address mitigation against long-term or
permanent disruption or loss
of GPS PNT capabilities. While the probability of long-term GPS disruption
is low, it is feasible,
and prudent risk management demands taking steps to minimize the negative
impacts of such an
event.
In reviewing and analyzing HSOACs report, DHS went beyond simply
identifying system
specifications and systems that could provide PNT if GPS were unavailable.
The department
sought to understand how the introduction of non-GNSS PNT systems would
affect the security
and resilience of critical infrastructures that are dependent on GPS for
PNT. A special area of
emphasis was to evaluate the reasons a user would choose to adopt non-GNSS
services when
GPS was available. Without end user adoption, the provisioning of services
does not change the
risk associated with loss of GPS. We frame this report through that risk
analysis perspective.
Through the course of its analysis, DHS identified key findings and
considerations. These
findings are critical in contextualizing the departments assessment and
recommendations in the
critical infrastructure community and risk landscape. Below are key
findings:
1. GPS is not the only source of PNT data. Other sources are currently
available for
purchase, and include alternate space-based systems and constellations,
terrestrial
beaconing systems, time-over-fiber, cellular and wireless signals, and local
terrestrial
systems.
2. Whatever the source of the PNT, it is incumbent on users to apply the
principles found in
Executive Order 13905, Strengthening National Resilience Through Responsible
Use of
Positioning, Navigation, and Timing Services. By applying these principles
uses can
reduce the risk associated with the disruption or manipulation of PNT
services.
3. Unless non-GPS PNT sources are free/low-cost or provide a unique benefit
deemed
valuable by the user and not found in GPS and other currently available
sources, there is
no reason to assume users will adopt new non-GPS PNT sources more widely
than they
have today. However, user behavior could be modified through subsidies or
regulatory
requirements.
4. The critical infrastructure sectors heavily reliant on PNT (meaning
disruption would
cause significant costs, delays, or degradation of functions and service)
include
communications, information technology, transportation, emergency services,
energy,
surveying and mapping, and financial services.
5. The critical infrastructure sectors highlighted in this report are
heavily reliant on PNT
services, but their requirements differ significantly. Some sectors require
very precise
timing, while in others position and navigation precision is more important.
6. Critical infrastructure systems that would cease to operate due to GPS
disruptions will do
so because of design choices associated with a lack of information, cost,
efficiency, and
other considerationsnot because of a lack of available options. In other
words, business
decisions, the lack of a Federal mandate, and potentially an
underappreciation of the risk
associated with GPS dependence are factors in the lack of resilience to GPS
disruption.
vi
7. New non-GPS PNT systems that are designed without considering existing
PNT
systemsincluding their capabilities, limitations, and why they were adopted
in some
industries and not othersmay simply compete with existing systems rather
than fill
perceived backup gaps.
8. The position and navigation functions in critical infrastructure are so
diverse that no
single PNT system, including GPS, can fulfill all user requirements and
applications.
Because of this, DHS could not identify generic specifications for a
national backup.
Position and navigation backups must be application-specific and must be
developed in
coordination with industry owners and operators.
9. While position and navigation requirements are complex, timing
requirements are simple,
with a minimal acceptable precision of anywhere between 65-240 nanoseconds.
This
level of precision supports all critical infrastructure requirements and is
expected to meet
future requirements, including 5G.
Recommendations
Based on these key findings and considerations, our analysis of the current
PNT ecosystem, and
the goal of mitigating risk wherever possible, DHS offers the following
recommendations to
address the nations PNT requirements and backup or complementary capability
gaps:
1. Temporary GPS disruptions: End users should be responsible for mitigating
temporary
GPS disruptions. For example, the Federal Aviation Administration maintains
sufficient
PNT capabilities to assure the continued safe operation of the national
airspace, albeit at a
reduced capacity, during GPS disruptions. The Federal Government can
facilitate this
mitigation for various critical infrastructure sectors, but should not be
solely responsible
for it.
2. PNT Diversity and Segmentation: The Federal Government should encourage
adoption
of multiple PNT sources, thus expanding the availability of PNT services
based on
market drivers. Encouraging critical infrastructure owners and operators to
adopt multiple
PNT systems will diffuse the risk currently concentrated in wide-area PNT
services such
as GPS. Federal actions should focus on facilitating the availability and
adoption of PNT
sources in the open market.
3. System Design: PNT provisioning systems, assets, and services must be
designed with
inherent security and resilience features. Critical Infrastructure systems
that use PNT
services must be designed to operate through interference and to identify
and respond to
anomalous PNT inputs. These attributes are applicable to the PNT receivers
and the
systems that use them.
4. Pursue Innovation that Emphasizes Transition and Adoption: Incorporating
PNT
signal diversity into the PNT ecosystem should be pursued with an emphasis
on research
and development that prioritizes successful transition and adoption into
existing GPS
receivers, taking into account factors such as business case considerations,
financial
costs, technical integration, and logistical deployment.
Further explanations of these findings and recommendations are included in
the body of this
report.
vii
Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Backup and
Complementary Capabilities to the Global Positioning
System (GPS)
Table of Contents
I. Legislative Language
..............................................................................................................
1 II. Background and Key
Assessments......................................................................................
2 Background...............................................................................................................................................
2 Previous
Assessments...............................................................................................................................
2 Conclusions from Previous
Assessments..................................................................................................
3 III. Positioning Navigation and Timing
Landscape................................................................ 3
Overview...................................................................................................................................................
4 Existing and Emerging PNT
Capabilities.................................................................................................
4 IV. Analysis of Alternatives
.......................................................................................................
5 Timing
Backup..........................................................................................................................................
6 Positioning and Navigation
Backup..........................................................................................................
8 Understanding the Augmentation Market Space
.....................................................................................
10
V. Backup Considerations
........................................................................................................
10
Temporary
Disruptions...........................................................................................................................
10
Long-Term Disruptions
...........................................................................................................................
11
Conclusion
...............................................................................................................................................
12
VI. Departmental Plan for Meeting the Requirements
......................................................... 13
Department of Homeland Security
..........................................................................................................
13
A. List of Abbreviations/Acronyms
.........................................................................................
14
B. Bibliography
.........................................................................................................................
15
C. User Needs Framework
.....................................................................................................
16
1 I. Legislative Language
NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT (NDAA) 17,
PUBLIC LAW 114328
Sec. 1618. backup and complementary positioning, navigation, and
timing capabilities of global positioning system.
(a) STUDY.
(1) IN GENERAL.The covered Secretaries shall jointly conduct a study to
assess and
identify the technology-neutral requirements to backup and complement the
positioning,
navigation, and timing capabilities of the Global Positioning System for
national security and
critical infrastructure.
(2) REPORT.Not later than one year after the date of the enactment of this
Act, the
covered Secretaries shall submit to the appropriate congressional committees
a report on the study
under paragraph (1). Such report shall include
(A) with respect to the Department of each covered Secretary, the
identification of
the respective requirements to backup and complement the positioning,
navigation, and
timing capabilities of the Global Positioning System for national security
and critical
infrastructure;
(B) an analysis of alternatives to meet such requirements, including, at a
minimum
(i) an analysis of appropriate technology options;
(ii) an analysis of the viability of a public-private partnership to
establish a
complementary positioning, navigation, and timing system; and
(iii) an analysis of the viability of service level agreements to operate a
complementary positioning, navigation, and timing system; and
(C) a plan to meet such requirements that includes
(i) for each such Department, the estimated costs, schedule, and system
level technical considerations, including end user equipment and integration
considerations; and
(ii) identification of the appropriate resourcing for each such Department
in
accordance with the respective requirements of the Department, including
domestic or international requirements.
(b) SINGLE DESIGNATED OFFICIAL.Each covered Secretary shall designate a
single senior
official of the Department of the Secretary to act as the primary
representative ofsuch Department for
purposes of conducting the study under subsection (a)(1).
(c) DEFINITIONS.In this section:
(1) The term appropriate congressional committees means
(A) the congressional defense committees;
(B) the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, the Committee on
Transportation and Infrastructure, and the Committee on Homeland Security of
the House
of Representatives; and
(C) the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation and the Committee
on
Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs of the Senate.
(2) The term covered Secretaries means the Secretary of Defense, the
Secretary of
Transportation, and the Secretary of Homeland Security.
2 II. Background and Key Assessments
Background
Since GPS became available for civilian use, numerous studies have assessed
the economic
impact of GPS, vulnerabilities of GPS end user equipment, consequences of
GPS disruptions,
and what systems could backup and complement GPS. Detailed in the Previous
Assessments
Section is a non-exhaustive selection of previous works relevant to this
effort selected to
highlight the long-term concerns regarding the growing dependence on GPS.
This report is a
summary and analysis of the HSOACs 2018 report, Analyzing a More Resilient
National
Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Capability. HSOACs report
contains data and
literary analyses of a large library of reference material to support their
own conclusions
regarding GPS dependency and PNT backups/alternate systems. DHS used HSOACs
report to
inform and guide the findings and recommendations presented in this report.
Previous Assessments
1997
The Presidential Commission on Critical Infrastructure issued a report
titled Critical
Foundations: Protecting Americas Infrastructures. The report stated that
[p]ossible exclusive
reliance on GPS and its augmentations, combined with other complex
interdependencies, raises
the potential for single point failure and cascading effects.2 While
this was primarily
referring to the use of GPS in the national airspace, it has become
increasingly more applicable
to other critical functions required to operate U.S. critical
infrastructure.
The findings of this report influenced the development of National Security
Presidential
Directive (NSPD)-39 that directed the Secretary of Transportation to:
develop, acquire, operate, and maintain backup position, navigation, and
timing
capabilities that can support critical transportation, homeland security,
and other
critical civil and commercial infrastructure applications within the United
States,
in the event of a disruption of the Global Positioning System or other
space-based
positioning, navigation, and timing services, consistent with Homeland
Security
Presidential Directive-7, Critical Infrastructure Identification,
Prioritization, and
Protection, dated December 17, 2003.3

2011
DHS published a National Risk Estimate related to GPS stating:
After a nine-month review, U.S. Government and private sector experts
concluded that portions of the Nations critical infrastructure are
increasingly
reliant on GPS and GPS-based services. In the short term, the risk to the
nation is
2 Presidents Commission on Critical Infrastructure Protection, Critical
Foundations: Protecting Americas
Infrastructures (Washington, D.C.: United States Government, 1997), A-19. 3
United States Government, Fact Sheet: National Security Presidential
Directive 39: U.S. Space-Based Position,
Navigation, and Timing Policy (Washington, D.C.: United States Government,
2004).
3 assessed to be manageable. However, if not addressed, this threat poses
increasing
risk to U.S. national, homeland, and economic security over the long term.4

2017
The semi-governmental advisory body Innovate UK issued a report on the
economic impact to
the United Kingdom associated with a five-day disruption to global
navigation satellite systems
(GNSS). The report estimates a daily economic impact $1.25B to the UK
economy.5

2019
The U.S. Department of Commerce and DHS, through RTI International,
estimated that the
economic impacts to the U.S. economy caused by a 30-day loss of GPS would be
$1 billion per
day and could be 50 percent higher if the disruptions occurred at the least
opportune time.6

Conclusions from Previous Assessments
All research as of the release of this report shows that dependence on GPS
and other GNSS
continues to grow. There have been no meaningful efforts to address the
unabated adoption and
use of GPS, and increasingly foreign GNSS, in U.S. critical infrastructure.
Though the 2017 and 2019 reports used different methodologies and assessed
two economies
with significantly different GDPs, they concluded that GPS disruptions would
have negative
impacts that would likely exceed $1 billion a day to their respective
economies. As currently
designed, the infrastructure in the UK and U.S. would suffer significant
degradation and
economic impacts should GPS or GNSS services be disrupted. Those negative
economic impacts
would be spread across a wide variety of critical infrastructures and a wide
variety of
applications of GPS or GNSS.
Both reports also confirmed the wide variety of uses and the unique ways GPS
and other PNT
sources are integrated in the operation of critical infrastructure that are
broader than initially
expected. For example, a greater economic loss is caused by disruption of
cargo throughput at
maritime ports that use automated container handling equipment, which
require GPS to function,
than from navigation issues created by the loss of GPS. Improving navigation
to the port
provides fewer benefits than improving the container handling equipments
ability to operate in
the absence of GPS. These types of insights help determine where sources of
risk lie and where
to focus mitigation efforts and stimulate the availability of non-GNSS PNT
services.
III. Positioning Navigation and Timing Landscape
4 United States Department of Homeland Security, National Risk Estimate:
Risks to U.S. Critical Infrastructure from
Global Positioning Disruptions (Washington, D.C.: United States Department
of Homeland Security, 2010), 3. 5 Greg Sadlier et al., The economic impact
on the UK of a disruption to GNSS (London, UK: London Economics,
2017), iii.
6 Alan OConnor et al., Economic Benefits of the Global Positioning System
(GPS) (Research Triangle, NC: RTI
International, 2019), ES-4.
4 Overview
Based on the research cited in the previous section and HSOACs report, it
is apparent that the
long-term, global disruption of GPS capabilities would have wide-ranging
negative impacts on
the global economy and the daily lives of people around the world.
GPS and foreign GNSS are the primary PNT services that industries use to
enhance operations.
However, despite the billions of dollars invested by the United States in
GPS, it does not meet all
the U.S. PNT needs. Where GPS cannot fulfill end user requirements and where
there are
sufficient drivers (i.e., economic, safety of life, security), industries
and the public sector have
developed and employed additional capabilities to fill PNT gaps. This report
summarizes these
use cases and additional PNT technologies that are already available to
address gaps in PNT
services. The report highlights where additional technologies may be
available.
Existing and Emerging PNT Capabilities
The following is a list of emerging and existing PNT capabilities, excluding
GPS. This is not an
all-inclusive list, rather it is intended to show the diversity in the PNT
ecosystem.
Foreign GNSS (Galileo [EU], GLONASS [Russia], and Beidou [China]):
Increasingly, receiver manufacturers are including multiple GNSS
constellations in their
equipment. Manufacturers claim that using multiple constellations together
provides
better accuracy and improves operations in environments with limited sky
visibility as the
receiver is likely to have more satellites in view. There is also a belief
that multiconstellation receivers provide resilience against failure of a
single GNSS constellation.
While this may be true in some respects, all GNSS are subject to the similar
phenomenology that can disrupt their reception, including intentional
jamming, spoofing,
and natural disturbances such as ionospheric disturbance caused by space
weather. The
signal from a foreign GNSS could be intentionally or unintentionally
compromised
causing system degradation or shutdown. This feature introduces exposure to
threats,
particularly in the area of critical infrastructure.
Satellite-Based Augmentations and Ground Reference Stations: These systems
are
designed to work with GPS and other GNSS to increase position and navigation
accuracy. Some systems can provide real-time accuracy 100 times better than
GPS alone,
with some capable of delivering different levels of accuracy depending on
the
subscription. Industry recognizes the value of these increased capabilities,
justifying the
increased costs associated with more expensive receivers and subscriptions
to gain access
to better accuracy. Examples of public and private augmentations include:
o Ground-Based Augmentation System and Wide-Area Augmentation System
o StarFire (Manufacturer - John Deere)
o OmniSTAR (Manufacturer - Trimble/Fugro)
o CenterPoint RTX (Manufacturer - Trimble)
o U.S. Continuously Operating Reference Stations
5 o TerraStar
Existing PNT Services: Private companies are constantly seeking ways to
deliver PNT
services to meet customer needs. These services may provide complementary
PNT
functions to GPS by expanding PNT capabilities including cross checks to
validate
dataor extending PNT services to GPS denied or degraded environments. For
example,
GPS/GNSS does not work indoors effectively, while other systems do.
Therefore, some
non-GNSS services are more suitable for location-based services in built-up
areas. Of
note, many of the below services would be available for a fee in contrast to
GPS service,
which is free to end users. The additional cost is a barrier to adopting one
of the below
services as a backup to GPS, and disincentives system diversity. Listed
below are some
of the private sector efforts to provide PNT services:
o Low Earth Orbit Satellites offering positioning and timing services: This
service is currently available to U.S. critical infrastructure operators for
a fee.
These service providers claim that this system can deliver precision time
that
meets all identified timing requirements in critical infrastructure. This
system also
offers a positioning and navigation service, however current accuracy levels
are
less than GPS.
o Metropolitan Beaconing Systems (MBS): FirstNet is exploring the
possibility of
deploying a MBS to meet the Enhanced 911 requirement for 3D location of
emergency calls in the largest metropolitan service areas. If fielded, and
the
system performs according to specifications, all critical infrastructure
timing
requirements in the serviced area could be met. The system may also be
capable
of meeting indoor and outdoor position and navigation requirements. This
service
would be fee based.
o Time Over Fiber: Precision Time Protocol (IEEE 1588) has advanced in
accuracy. New protocols have demonstrated sub-nanosecond time transfer over
short distances (10s of kilometers), with sub-microsecond over greater
distances.
As this technology progresses, it will enable companies to offer
time-as-a-service
for a fee over fiber networks.
o High Precision Positioning: Numerous sites around the country have
deployed
highly precise positioning systems that do not rely on positioning data from
GPS.
These systems cover limited areas but can provide positioning data
significantly
better than GPS. DOD, DOT, and private entities purchase these systems to
meet
specific operational requirements.
IV. Analysis of Alternatives
HSOAC Research indicates that critical infrastructure systems that would
cease to operate
without GPS do so because of design choices, cost factors, increasing
efficiency, or other
considerationsnot because of a lack of available additional means to
navigate, determine
location, or synchronize. If future critical infrastructure systems are
engineered and operated
based on the same design choices, providing additional PNT sources will not
change the risk
associated with the unavailability of GPS. Unless the additional PNT
services provide unique
benefits deemed valuable by the user community, or regulators mandate that
users secure
6 resilience to long-term GPS failure, there is no reason to assume businesses
will act differently
than they do today.
In acknowledging the availability of existing and emerging PNT services,
based on research
conducted by HSOAC, DHS sought to determine how deployment of additional,
federally
supported PNT system(s) or requirements would change the risk associated
with the loss of GPS
for critical infrastructure. The precision of those alternative
capabilities, and the analysis
HSOAC used to arrive at them, are listed in subsequent sections. Following
the technical
specifications, this report discusses adoption-related requirements.
Timing Backup
Requirements
GPS timing is exceptionally accurate, delivering time within billionths of a
second to users
around the world. According to GPS.govs website, GPS Accuracy Q&A page,
[t]he U.S.
Government distributes Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) as maintained by the
U.S. Naval
Observatory (USNO) via the GPS signal in space with a time transfer accuracy
relative to UTC
(USNO) of =40 nanoseconds (billionths of a second), 95% of the time.
Applications receive the
time directly from GPSno other inputs are required.
Based on multiple studies, the most stringent timing requirements for
critical infrastructure are
listed in Table 1.
Table 1
Function Requirement
Electricity 1.0µs Phasor Measurement Unit*
Wired and Wireless Communications 1.5µs for 4G LTE Network Backbone
50200 Parts Per Billion Frequency Stability
Emergency Services (FirstNet) 1.5µs for 4G LTE Network Backbone
50200 Parts Per Billion Frequency Stability
Financial Services 50µs**
*Currently not used for operations
**Regulatory requirement
µs = microsecond(s) (millionth of a second)
The precision time delivered by GPS exceeds the need of all critical
infrastructure for the
foreseeable future. Cellular networks require timing accuracy of 1.5µs for
4G. As the nation
transitions to 5G, those requirements may become more precise (~240
nanoseconds) but are not
expected to exceed GPSs capabilities. Since the telecommunication timing
requirement is
nationwide and is also the most precise requirement used by critical
infrastructure it can serve as
a baseline requirement for timing services accuracy.
This means that any system serving as a timing backup or alternate must
provide a minimum of
1.5µs accuracy and 50200 parts per billion frequency stability to maintain
support to the
communications sector.
7 While the Electricity Sector appears to have a more stringent requirement,
utilities can continue
to operate without that level of precision due to their strategic
implementation of timing
requirements. While the electric industry has sought to benefit from the
availability and precision
of GPS, they have not created a dependence on GPS. Should GPS signals become
unavailable,
the electric grid will continue to operate. This is an effective model for
the use of GPS in critical
applications. The system takes advantage of increased precision to increase
efficiencies while
still being able to operate in the absence of GPS, albeit at reduced
efficiency.
Alternative Systems
Table 2 depicts proposed timing solutions submitted by industry to DHS
during a Request for
Information (RFI) in December 2018. According to industry, there are several
systems that can
meet or exceed all timing requirements for U.S. critical infrastructure
(those indicated in green).
Each proposal has unique characteristics that could impact industry use. For
example, some
systems are available nationwide while others are local or regional (see
Table 3).
Table 2*
Proposed Solutions Precision Timing Requirements
5G 4G-LTE
Network
Phasor
Measurement
Unit
Financial
Services
µs = microseconds ~240
Nanosec. 1.5 µs 1 µs 50 µs
eLORAN Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision
Locata Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision
Network Time Protocol Not close to req. precision Not close to req.
precision Not close to req. precision Not close to req. precision
NextNav Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision
Precision Time Protocol Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision
Meets Precision
Satellite Time and Location (STL) Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets
Precision Meets Precision
NIST WWVB Radio Not close to req. precision Not close to req. precision Not
close to req. precision Precision within factor of 5
Meets Precision Precision within factor of 5 Not close to req. precision
*System performance parameters are as reported by the submitter and have not
been validated by the
government. Actual system performance must be assessed as part of any
acquisition effort.
Table 3
Proposed Solutions Availability Coverage
eLORAN Not operational in U.S. TBD
Locata Commercial use Local
Network Time Protocol Commercial use Local National
NextNav Commercial use Regional
Precision Time Protocol Commercial use Local - National
Satellite Time and Location Commercial use National
NIST WWVB Radio Commercial use National
8 One area of concern is dependence on GPS to synchronize to UTC. Any system
designed to
backup or complement GPS must not have a GPS connection in its timing supply
chain.
Positioning and Navigation Backup
Requirements
While determining timing requirements was relatively straight forward,
position and navigation
is complex with no single application, like telecommunications for timing,
that can be used as a
baseline for position and navigation backup capabilities. To identify the
end-user requirements,
HSOAC conducted market analysis and developed functional use cases to
understand the level of
precision required for specific applications and how those applications
obtain position and
navigation data.7

Table 4 contains the leading position and navigation applications and key
capabilities enabled by
GPS-based services identified in the Food and Agriculture Sector.
Table 4
Applications GPS Mapping GPS Piloting Variable Rate Tech
Key Functions
Can treat each part
of the field
differently
Can pinpoint
problems in specific
patches of land
through soil and
other analysis
Enables targeting of
pests identified by
aerial images
Uses GPS to more
accurately steer
equipment
Enables farm work to
extend after daylight
Can ensure
equipment does not
disturb crops
Used to ensure all land
has planted seeds or
are not replanted
Can better target
fertilizer use and apply
appropriate amount
Can better use
pesticides to target
pests when attacking
specific areas of field
Initial Metrics Sub 1 meter (1m) Sub 1m Sub 1m
Fee-Based
Services
Yes, software and
hardware for GPS
mapping is an external
service
Yes, software for auto
steering requires monthly
or yearly subscription
service; fees are $900
3,000 a month
Yes, requires yield
measurements and other
software to target
pesticide, fertilizer, and
other material application
This example shows that farmers can pay for sub-meter accuracy to enhance
mapping, vehicle
piloting, and variable-rate application of chemicals. To obtain these levels
of precision and the
enhanced efficiencies, the farmer must purchase user equipment and pay a
subscription. If either
GPS or the augmentation is unavailable, the ability to conduct the task is
impaired. However,
there are several considerations that determine whether a farm adopts
precision farming.
HSOACs research determined that other sectors and applications are also
willing to pay for
increased precision, such as surveying, construction, shipping
(containerized), and location7 The user-needs analysis (PNT data) is
attached as Appendix C of this report.
9 based services. Not surprising, these were some of the same industries RTI
International assessed
to have the highest economic impacts from a GPS outage.
Provisioning Position and Navigation Services
Table 5 depicts real-time position and navigation solutions submitted by
industry during the RFI
process compared to examples of application-specific precision requirements.
Additional
comparisons are contained in HSOACs report submitted to DHS.
Table 5*
Real-Time Precision Requirement Examples with Bounded Precision
Solutions
Precision
Agriculture/
Construction
Port
Operations
(Automated
containers)
Consumer
LBS
Over the
Road
Navigation
Open
Water
Navigation
Open
Water
Navigation
<10cm =10cm< 1m 1< 5m = 510m 1020m >20m
GPS (Aug) Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision
Meets Precision Meets Precision
GPS (UnAug) Not close to req. precision Not close to req. precision Not
close to req. precision Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision
eLORAN Not close to req. precision Not close to req. precision Not close to
req. precision Not close to req. precision Not close to req. precision Meets
Precision
STL Not close to req. precision Not close to req. precision Not close to
req. precision Not close to req. precision Not close to req. precision Meets
Precision
NextNav Not close to req. precision Not close to req. precision Meets
Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision
Locata Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets Precision Meets
Precision Meets Precision
Meets Precision Precision within factor of 5 Not close to req. precision
*System performance parameters are as reported by the submitter and have not
been validated by the
government. Actual system performance must be assessed as part of any
acquisition effort.
As mentioned earlier, GPS alone cannot meet many of the precision position
and navigation
requirements without augmentation. Generally, any precision requirement
below 5m will require
some form of augmentation (this may change soon with dual frequency, carrier
phase-based
GNSS chips). As Table 5 depicts, only two systems can meet this requirement,
but only in the
areas they are deployed. Even if the backup requirements are expanded to the
5m that GPS can
provide, it will not expand the available backup options or significantly
reduce risk. While some
position and navigation systems can outperform GPS, they are localized
applications and face
challenges scaling to a national or regional level (see Table 3).
Industries adopt high-precision position and navigation services only when
there is a business
case to do so. However, even within industries heavily dependent on
precision position and
navigation, not all users will adopt precision applications due to the
increased cost. For example,
a farm would need to be sufficiently large to offset the cost of equipment
and fees associated
with precision farming. A 2014 U.S. Department of Agriculture report
estimated that 70 percent
of U.S. farms were under 197 acres.8 HSOAC assessed that a farm would need
to have a
minimum acreage between 200 and 2,100 acres to justify the expense
associated with precision
8 United States Department of Agriculture, National Agricultural Statistics
Service, Farms and Farmland, Census of
Agriculture Highlights (Washington, D.C.: United States Department of
Agriculture, 2014).
10
farming.9
Consequently, it is not cost effective for 70 percent of U.S. farms to
adopt precision
farming. This highlights the price sensitivity associated with the adoption
of additional position
and navigation systems.
Understanding the Augmentation Market Space
By whatever means funded, all augmentation systems require interested
investors or sponsors. In
the public sector, per NSPD-39, agencies requiring augmentations to GPS are
required to fund
the augmentation in their budgets. In the private sector, companies have
developed, and continue
to develop, capabilities to deliver high-accuracy position and navigation
services through GPS
augmentation or other means. These services are sold to industries who are
willing to pay for this
level of accuracy. If the U.S. Government were to provide a free backup and
complementary
system, similar to the free utility of GPS, the government would have to
consider the
repercussions of such a system in the marketplace. A free government system
would negatively
impact commercially available PNT systems by directly competing with them.
V. Backup Considerations
Up to this point, this report has detailed PNT accuracy and precision
requirements and the
systems that can deliver PNT to meet those requirements, relying primarily
on HSOACs
research. To assist with an analysis of alternatives on viable backup
system(s), HSOAC
delineated the risks that critical infrastructure users are attempting to
mitigate and analyzed how
a backup impacts said risks. DHS frames this risk in three general
scenarios. This unclassified
report will not discuss potential causes, only the effects on GPS and GNSS
availability.
Scenario 1: Signals in the GPS band are unavailable or unreliable due to
spectrum
interference (jamming or spoofing) within the United States. This
interference is limited
in geographic area and duration.
Scenario 2: GPS and GNSS systems are unavailable nationwide due to events
such as a
geomagnetic disturbance. GPS and GNSS are expected to return to normal
operations
within days.
Scenario 3: GPS signals are no longer available, and restoration of
services cannot be
determined.
Temporary Disruptions
Though the U.S. Government provides GPS for free, this does not remove the
obligation of the
end user to plan for its short-term disruption. Since no utility is
perfectly reliable, users plan
appropriately, implementing backups and contingency plans to assure
continuity of business. In
the case of electricity during major disasters such as hurricanes, critical
functions continue
despite power outages because users made appropriate contingency plans and
are able to use
alternate power sources until mainline power is restored. In the first two
scenarios critical
9 Richard Mason et al., Analyzing a More Resilient National Positioning,
Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Capability
(Washington, D.C.: Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center, 2019).
11
infrastructure users can use this traditional utility disruption mitigation
approachresorting to
local power backups.
Planning for temporary disruptions can vary depending on the nature of the
function. At one end
of the spectrum, there are safety-of-life applications that require
significant investment to enable
graceful degradation and maintenance of an acceptable level of performance.
Returning to the
electricity example, hospitals invest significant resources ensuring backup
power sources are
available and maintained. On the other end of the spectrum, there are
applications that will
simply be deferred until signals are available, similar to retailers being
unable to serve patrons
until power is restored.
Long-Term Disruptions
The unique nature of GNSS systems requires the United States Government to
consider a
scenario where GPS and other GNSS are no longer available. Addressing this
issue requires an
entirely different approach to backup capabilities. Returning to the
electricity model, end users
assume that electricity will eventually be restored and delivered in the
same format as before the
disruption (direct current). Users do not plan for a backup delivery system
which would
necessitate not only the construction of a new distribution model, but the
replacement or
modification of all end user equipment. In contrast, should GNSS become
unavailable and
critical infrastructure be required to move to an alternate PNT source, it
would not only likely
require a new delivery system, but also widespread adoption of the alternate
systems end user
equipment, such as the procurement of upgraded receivers and antennae that
would receive a
signal other than GNSS.
If the Federal Government plans to require backup capabilities for a sudden,
long-term disruption
to GPS, the concept for a backup must change. If the Nation is to react to
such an event, then
there must not only be a distribution system in place, but also the end user
equipment. If either
the delivery method or the ability to receive the PNT data is unavailable,
the system will not
work. Moving users to this model will be challenging. There are three ways
to influence user
willingness to adopt alternate systems:
1. Availability of a PNT service that is at least as economically or
operationally beneficial
as GPS.
2. Require (through regulation or government policy) adoption of alternate
PNT sources.
3. Availability of a non-GPS PNT service that is compatible with GPS
equipment, and
would be therefore transparent to most GPS users.
Option (1) represents the current operating environment where GPS is
ineffective, and industry
adopts alternate systems to provide PNT sources. In applications where
safety-of-life requires
PNT assurance, industry uses alternate and backup systems to maintain that
assurance. In
addition, one backup service is unlikely to meet all PNT requirements.
Because of these
dynamics, providing a government alternate to existing PNT systems is
unlikely to significantly
change the nations risk profile unless it is heavily subsidized (and
therefore anti-competitive) or
there are other incentives to adopt.
12
Option (2) could provide incentives necessary to reduce the nations risk
profile. Currently there
is no authoritative or regulatory requirement for adopting any backup or
complementary system
to GPS. However, the U.S. Government could regulate public/private entities
that own and
operate critical infrastructure assets that rely on PNT to adopt alternate
sources for
backup/complementary purposes. Doing so would not necessarily require
fielding additional
complementary PNT capabilities but it would set an outcome-oriented
framework to require
certain critical infrastructure to invest in resilience.
Option (3) is a different approach where government and industry would
collaborate to enable
behavioral and design changes to enhance resilience. For example, as foreign
GNSS systems,
such as Galileo, come online, industry is integrating the new systems on the
same chipset and
using the same antenna as GPS. By emulating form factor and not
significantly changing the
size, weight, and power requirements, Galileo will provide some degree of
backup capability
depending on the cause for disruption.
If, for example, a commercially available PNT system were integrated with
existing GNSS
chipsets and hardware, the U.S. Government could incentivize inclusion of
these capabilities
onto GNSS chipsets sold in the U.S. During normal operations, these
capabilities would only be
available to subscribers. Should a largescale GPS disruption occur, the
government would then at
least have the capability to deliver service to all users in an emergency
regardless of subscription
based on need. If the government pursues this option, the requirements would
expand to:
GPS and backup receivers co-exist within the current GNSS form factors.
GPS and backup receivers are integrated on a PNT chipset.
Antennas and other hardware support both GNSS and backup signals.
The system can provide PNT data to all users regardless of subscription
status during a
long-term disruption to GPS.
If any of the systems that can meet critical infrastructures timing
requirements can be effectively
integrated with GPS equipment, there could be significant risk reduction
benefits for timing
applications. Since none of the systems meet all position and navigation
requirements, the impact
to position and navigation resilience will be less substantial. To ensure
widespread adoption,
newly adopted systems must have capabilities matching GPS and would be more
readily adopted
if they provide capabilities not native to GPS.
Conclusion
The departments analysis leads it to conclude there are steps the U.S.
Government can take in
the near term, in concert with industry, to enhance PNT resilience that
would be more effective
than endorsing and investing in a single backup system. Government and
industry can achieve
effective risk mitigation by influencing owner and operator planning and
investment, broadening
education efforts about the criticality of PNT services, enabling innovation
in the market space,
working to promote technical interoperability and adopting the principles
contained in Executive
Order 13905, Strengthening National Resilience Through Responsible Use of
Positioning,
Navigation, and Timing Services.
13
Furthermore, overreliance on a government endorsed or provided system can
cause negative
impacts. For example, telecommunications providers deploy high-quality
oscillators (clocks) that
enable systems to operate without an external timing source for days, weeks,
and potentially
months before services are significantly degraded. If operators deploy a
primary timing system
(GPS), an alternate timing system (foreign GNSS), and an un-jammable third
system endorsed
by the government and paid for by the operator, will they continue to
install high end oscillators?
The U.S. Government must assess how businesses will react to changes in the
PNT ecosystem to
guard against undesirable, unintended consequences.
As the research detailed in this report demonstrates, there is no single
intervention that the U.S.
Government can make to ensure risk elimination of a GPS disruption. However,
there are smart,
market-oriented solutions that will contribute to enhanced resilience that
the U.S. Government
should continue to promote, enable and stimulate.
VI. Departmental Plan for Meeting the Requirements
Department of Homeland Security
Since the enactment of the FY17 NDAA, DHS has aggressively pursued efforts
to define the
PNT operating environment for U.S. critical infrastructure. Most of the work
in this report is
based on DHS efforts. Based on our findings throughout these studies, CISA
has provided valueadded information at various interagency and private
sector outreach conferences (when
available). CISA has posted Information Papers and Best Practice information
on the website
gps.gov. As DHS transitions from the requirements definition phase, the
department looks to
governing documents to define roles and responsibilities.
DHS will continue its efforts to fulfill requirements established in PPD-21,
Critical Infrastructure
Security and Resilience, as they relate to PNT. DHS will continue to work
with the interagency
and the private sector to identify vulnerabilities associated with use of
PNT services and work to
minimize the associated risk to infrastructure. Because DHS has been
actively engaged in the
identification and mitigation of risk associated with PNT, DHS does not
foresee any significant
changes to our resourcing requirements in this mission space. The department
will maintain
current PNT resourcing levels to support security and resilience efforts.
DHS will continue coordination with DOT to support DOT as they execute their
responsibilities
under the National Timing Resilience and Security Act of 2018.
14
A. List of Abbreviations/Acronyms
AoA Assessment of Alternatives
CISA Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency
DHS U.S. Department of Homeland Security
DOD U.S. Department of Defense
DOT U.S. Department of Transportation
FY Fiscal Year
GLONASS Globalnaya navigatsionnaya sputnikovaya Sistema
GNSS Global Navigation Satellite System
GPS Global Positioning System
HSOAC Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center
LORAN Long-Range Navigation
LTE Long-Term Evolution
MBS Metropolitan Beacon System
NDAA National Defense Authorization Act
NIST National Institute of Standards and Technology
NRMC National Risk Management Center
NSPD National Security Presidential Directive
PL Public Law
PNT Position, Navigation, and Timing
RF Radio Frequency
RFI Request for Information
STL Satellite Time and Location
USNO U.S. Naval Observatory
UTC Coordinated Universal Time
15
B. Bibliography
Mason, Richard, James Bonomo, Timothy Conley, Ryan Consaul, David Frelinger,
David
Galvan, Dahlia Goldfeld, et al. Analyzing a More Resilient National
Positioning,
Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Capability (Washington, D.C.: Homeland Security
Operational Analysis Center, 2019).
OConnor, Alan, Michael Gallaher, Kyle Clark-Sutton, Daniel Lapidus, Zack
Oliver, Troy Scott,
Dallas Wood, Manuel Gonzalez, Elizabeth Brown, Joshua Fletcher. Economic
Benefits
of the Global Positioning System (GPS) (Research Triangle Park, NC: RTI
International,
2019), ES-4. https://www.rti.org/sites/default/files/gps_finalreport.pdf.
Presidents Commission on Critical Infrastructure Protection. Critical
Foundations: Protecting
America's Infrastructures (Washington, D.C.: United States Government,
1997), A-19.
https://www.hsdl.org/?abstract&did=986.
Sadlier, Greg, Rasmus Flytkjaer, Farooq Sabri, Daniel Herr. The economic
impact on the UK of
a disruption to GNSS (London, UK: London Economics, 2017), iii.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-economic-impact-on-the-uk-of-adisruption-to-gnss.
United States Department of Agriculture, National Agricultural Statistics
Service. Farms and
Farmland, Census of Agriculture Highlights (Washington, D.C.: United States
Department of Agriculture, 2014).
https://www.agcensus.usda.gov/Publications/2012/Online_Resources/Highlights/Farms_a
nd_
United States Department of Homeland Security. National Risk Estimate: Risks
to U.S. Critical
Infrastructure from Global Positioning Disruptions (Washington, D.C.: United
States
Department of Homeland Security, 2010), 3.
United States Government. National Security Presidential Directive 39: U.S.
Space-Based
Position, Navigation, and Timing Policy (Washington, D.C.: United States
Government,
2004).
Additional reference not used in the report:
Socio-Economic Benefits Study: Scoping the value of CORS and Grave D (Irving
Levenson
Revised 2009)
https://www.ngs.noaa.gov/PUBS_LIB/Socio-EconomicBenefitsofCORSandGRAV-D.pdf
16
C. User Needs Framework
Reported User Needs for Timing Accuracy
Critical Sector Application Accuracy Range
Communications /
Mobile Applications10 Billing, alarms 1 to 500 µs
Internet Protocol delay monitoring µ 5 to 100 µs
Call handoff/continuation11 10 to 30 µs
Node-to-node communication 7 to 9 µs
Network routers and switches, network backhaul12 4 to 5 µs
Time stamping/event management 2 to 5 µs
Long-term evolution (LTE) Time -Division Duplexing (TDD)
(large cell) WiMax-TDD (some configurations) 1.5 to 5 µs
ULTRA-TDD 1 to 1.5 µs
LTE-TDD (small-cell) 1 to 1.5 µs
Handoffs in WiMax-TDD (some configurations) 1 µs
Wired
Communications13 Conversational video (livestreaming) 1 µs
Conversational voice 150 µs
Mission-critical data 100 µs
Mission-critical delay sensitivity signaling 75 µs
Vehicle-to-Everything messages 50 µs
Network routers and switches14 50 µs
Grandmaster clock15 1.5 µs to 50 µs
Electricity Physical/video security 1 s
Network security 1 µs
Sequence of event recorder 1 µs
Protective relays-coordinated controls 1 µs
Phasor Measurement Unit (PMU) offline 1 µs
Emergency Services Public safety answering point Sub 1 s
Simulcast Land Mobile Radio (LMR) Systems 2 µs
First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet) 1.5 µs
Financial Services Manual security trading 1 s
Automated security trading 50 µs
Computer system clocks and time stamping 100 µs to 50 µs
Non-high-frequency trading (ESMA MiFID-2) 1 µs
High-frequency trading (ESMA MiFID-2) 50 µs
Source: Cavitt, et al. (2018)
10 Applies to 20, 30, LTE-FDD, and LTE-A, except where otherwise noted. 11
Applies to 20, 30, LTE-FDD, and LTE-A, except where otherwise noted. 12
Violation of timing requirement expected to have relatively minor impact. 13
Applies to Synchronous Optical Networking (SONEn, Time-Division Multiplexing
(TDM), Ethernet, and ultrahigh-speed Ethernet. 14 Violation of timing
requirement expected to have relatively minor impact. 15 Violation of timing
requirement expected to have relatively minor impact.
17
Reported User Needs for Positioning Accuracy
Critical Sector Application Position Accuracy Range
Chemicals Tracking chemicals through supply chain 1-5 m
Inspection and monitoring of equipment, pipes,
and assets Sub 1 m
Chemical Cleanup Sub 1 m
Commercial Facilities Construction Sub 1 m
Location-based marketing and sales Sub 5 m
Communications Geographical service extension Sub 5 m
Wireless signal strength measurement Sub 5 m
Service and fleet management Sub 5 m
Public safety alert management Sub 10 m
Dams Monitoring deformations in dams and
infrastructure (structural integrity) 1 cm horizontal 2 cm vertical
Monitoring deformations in landforms and
waterways Sub 0.5m
Construction of dams Sub 10 cm
Emergency Services Strategic deployment of resources (large
incidents) Sub 1 m
Dispatch and routing (routine incidents) Sub 1 m
Public safety alert management Sub 10 m
Energy Seismic exploration (land and marine)
1 m for seismic exploration
10 cm for hydrographic mapping
1 m for docking
Dynamic positioning drilling 10 cm for dredging and
construction
Construction 1 m for cable and pipe laying
Financial Services Tracking assets such as cash 15 m
Risk assessment
1 m for drone to evaluate specific
properties
5 to track consumer auto
behavior
Loan loss mitigation/ measurement
1 m for drone to evaluate specific
properties
5 to track automotive collateral
Food and Agriculture Mapping farms Sub 1 m
Piloting farm equipment Sub 1 m
Variable rate technology Sub 1 m
Food sourcing Sub sm
Food control Sub sm
Government Facilities Workforce/asset tracking Sub 1 m
Base planning/coordination Sub sm
Student tracking systems Sub sm
Defendant/parolee tracker Sub 1 m
Healthcare and Public
Health Health data mapping Sub 1 m
Location-based services to direct patients to
health services Sub 5 m
Telemedicine and response Sub sm
Nuclear Reactors,
Materials, and Waste
Tracking materials and waste through supply
chain 1-5 m
Inspection and monitoring of facilities 1 cm
Monitoring crustal deformations at nuclear waste Sub 1 m
18
Critical Sector Application Position Accuracy Range
disposal site
Water and Wastewater Equipment mapping, monitoring, and tracking Sub 1 m
Survey and mapping of landforms and waterways 1 cm
Fleet management Sub 5 m
Source: Thompson, et al. (2018).
Reported User Needs for Navigation Accuracy in Transportation
Critical Sector Application Position Accuracy Range
Aviation Oceanic phase of flight 7.4km
En route flight 3.7km
Terminal flight 750m
Non-Precision Approach (NPA) 220m
Approach Procedure with Vertical Guidance (APV)
16 m horizontal
20 m vertical (APV-I)
8m vertical (APV-II)
Maritime Cat-I landing 16 m horizontal 4-6m
vertical
Cat-II landing 7.5 m horizontal 1 m
vertical
Cat-III landing 3 m horizontal 1 m
vertical
Road Vehicle to
Infrastructure Ocean navigation 10m
(V21) Applications Pot approach and restricted waters 10m
Road Vehicle to
Vehicle (V2V) Inland waterways 2-10m
Applications Port 1m
Road 5m
Lane 1.1m
Where-in-lane 0.7m
Road 5m
Lane 1.5m
Where-in-lane 1.0m
Source: Tralli, et al. (2018b).

Subject	Replies	Author
GPS Jamming Tests Frustrate Pilots, Controllers By: Larry Dighera on Tue, 12 Oct 2021	0	Larry Dighera

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