gps spoofing - researchers feed false gps signals into a ships navigation system

[deptrai]

only marginally relevant for aviation since aircraft usually don't rely solely on gps, nevertheless an interesting academic "proof of concept". the same could be done to an aircraft gps receiver, or any insecure communication (ADSB and TCAS comes to my mind)

UT Austin Researchers Spoof Superyacht at Sea - Cockrell School of Engineering (http://www.engr.utexas.edu/features/superyacht-gps-spoofing)

The team’s counterfeit signals slowly overpowered the authentic GPS signals until they ultimately obtained control of the ship’s navigation system. Unlike GPS signal blocking or jamming, spoofing triggers no alarms on the ship’s navigation equipment. To the ship’s GPS devices, the team’s false signals were indistinguishable from authentic signals, allowing the spoofing attack to happen covertly.
Once control of the ship’s navigation system was gained, the team’s strategy was to coerce the ship onto a new course using subtle maneuvers that positioned the yacht a few degrees off its original course. Once a location discrepancy was reported by the ship’s navigation system, the crew initiated a course correction. In reality, each course correction was setting the ship slightly off its course line. Inside the yacht’s command room, an electronic chart showed its progress along a fixed line, but in its wake there was a pronounced curve showing that the ship had turned.
“The ship actually turned and we could all feel it, but the chart display and the crew saw only a straight line,” Humphreys said. a bit sloppily written (eg "the crew initiated a course correction" - I assume it was an autopilot with gps input, not "crew"), but maybe a reminder that using all available means, including Mark I Eyeball whenever possible isn't such a bad idea.

[Lonewolf_50]

I discussed this problem with some Army chums about 20 years ago, and the problem of GPS cripples slowly losing the art of land navigation. I also had this discussion for some years in re aviation navigation tasks and training for same.

GPS cripples will remain with us. If this spoofing deal spreads, then maybe people will need to relearn how to read a map.

When it comes to automobile drivers and using GPS versus map ... heh, it's almost funny.

[Capn Bloggs]

only marginally relevant for aviation since aircraft usually don't rely solely on gps
Is that so?

If this spoofing deal spreads, then maybe people will need to relearn how to read a map.
Not on your RNP-AR approach, you won't be...

[john_tullamarine]

.. just when I've finally got on top of my TomTom in the car ...

[deptrai]

In the early days of gps there were quite a few ugly blunders because of map datum (coordinate system) mismatch, as well as outdated, or just inaccurate maps. The seeming pinpoint accuracy of gps seduced people to blindly believe "it tells me exactly where I am on this map". Cf false glide slopes. All of this is well known, and has been ironed out with good processes and checks. I don't think false GPS data will ever be a real problem, even less with the advent of Glonass and Galileo, but theoretically it's possible. @lonewolf, I love technology, but the "gps cripples", as you put it, who can't be bothered to look out of the window, are still a scary thought.

only marginally relevant for aviation since aircraft usually don't rely solely on gps Capn Bloggs, I don't want to be sensationalist about supposedly "evil" technology, and I've kept my faith in common sense :)

[joema]

"only marginally relevant for aviation since aircraft usually don't rely solely on gps"

Also unclear is the relevance to marine navigation of superyachts. The GPS spoofing test was done aboard the 213-foot, $80 million superyacht "White Rose of Drachs". It wasn't a little fishing boat: http://images.properties.superyachts.com/motor-yacht-6841/519-800-95--bb53/white-rose-yacht-4061.jpg

The team leader of the GPS spoofing experiment said: ""Celestial navigation through a sextant would be their only option as far as I know.."

It seems likely a 213-foot superyacht would have other navigation systems such as marine inertial nav, and possibly even a radio direction finder.

I'd be interested in whether the marine GPS they spoofed had WAAS enabled. For aviation, a key reason for WAAS is integrity monitoring (say during an instrument approach). Did they manage to spoof this also, or just turned it off to make it easier? Or do high-end marine GPS nav systems (even on superyachts) not have integrity monitoring like aviation systems?

In both aviation and ocean-going marine navigation, backup and redundancy are important issues. I find it hard to believe a 213-foot superyacht, festooned with radomes, would use GPS as the sole navigation source with no other backup available.

[Three Wire]

Google meaconing. Used extensively during the Cold War and allegedly recently as well.

[deptrai]

marine inertial nav, and possibly even a radio direction finder actual, real life usage of radio direction finders on ships is as common as bubble sextants on aircraft these days. as for inertial nav, yes, gyros etc still exist and are in use (unlike the RDF in the closet), but a lot of marine autopilots rely on gps input only. there's more advanced systems for those who need dynamic positioning of a vessel which is not under way (as you obviously can't get a heading out of a gps when you're standing still...aircraft don't have that problem) but you'd be surprised how simple many current marine autopilots are. Then again, compared to aircraft, ships have some advantages, like space. You can find entire decks dedicated to housing cadets, who will spend several months, up to a year (after 2-3 years of nautical college, and/or rising throgh the ranks) doing no real work but observing and learning the basics under the supervision of a dedicated cadet training officer. They still learn to use a sextant, to this day (and the "The Sight Reduction Tables for Air Navigation" are still in use, at least in some places, I rely on my sources as a former naval navigator). Maybe that's outdated, but...it gives people a basic understanding of navigation. I'm digressing with all this marine things, but sometimes I feel the critics of cadet schemes in aviation have got it wrong. There is nothing wrong with cadets, cadets just need good training. Just like there is nothing wrong with automation.

[Ian W]

DepTraj
only marginally relevant for aviation since aircraft usually don't rely solely on gps, nevertheless an interesting academic "proof of concept". the same could be done to an aircraft gps receiver, or any insecure communication (ADSB and TCAS comes to my mind)

The reliance on GPS comes with the ADS-B and ADS-C position reports which are almost totally reliant on GPS. So the reports being used by the ATM system and the controller will be incorrect this could lead to major problems in conflict detection and resolution.

Already trials of ground based augmentation systems at Newark have been abandoned due to truck mounted GPS jammers (not spoofers). This will be a bigger problem than people are willing to currently accept.

[Basil]

but in its wake there was a pronounced curve showing that the ship had turned
Whilst marine engineer in early sixties, recollect standing on aft end of promenade deck on 500ft banana boat chatting to off-watch 2nd Officer.
"Bl**dy hell, gyro's gone!" says he, dashing off to bridge.
It was only then that Bas noticed banana shaped wake :)

[joema]

"actual, real life usage of radio direction finders on ships is as common as bubble sextants on aircraft these days. as for inertial nav, yes, gyros etc still exist and are in use (unlike the RDF in the closet)"

By RDF, I didn't mean something like this: http://www.ohio.edu/people/postr/bapix/MR-18.JPG

Since this was a superyacht, I assume the RDF (if existent) would simply be one of many raw data sources inc'l WAAS/GLONASS-augmented GPS and INS which would be sensor-fused on a bridge display like this:

http://www.raytheon-anschuetz.com/typo3temp/pics/Megayacht_Navigation_02_64450ac8f0.jpg

Even this turnkey Garmin 8500 has both WAAS-augmented GPS and GLONASS sensor input: https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/on-the-water/gpsmap-8215-mfd/prod110007.html I assume to spoof that would require spoofing GPS, WAAS, and GLONASS simultaneously.

[Ian W]

OK465
You may think it is "baloney" perhaps you need to be better informed.


Government briefing on GPS jamming at Newark
GPS.gov: Presentation from WSTS '12 (http://www.gps.gov/multimedia/presentations/2012/03/WSTS/)

[underfire]

Newark was a peculiar incident due to the close proximity of the freeways and the truckers using jammers.
It was not the GPS signals that were jammed, it was the GBAS signal.

The GBAS GPS antennae were all located in a line, and this is fraught with error, they should have been triangulated, and as far apart as possible. A correct installation would have solved this problem.

[SeenItAll]

And the FCC has just issued a $31,875 fine to the person who was using a GPS jammer in his work truck (that was parked by KEWR) to interfere with the GPS device that his employer had installed in the truck to track its whereabouts.

See http://transition.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2013/db0802/FCC-13-106A1.pdf

[Frequent SLF]

Ian W notes that, "The reliance on GPS comes with the ADS-B and ADS-C position reports which are almost totally reliant on GPS". In fact ADS-C reports are derived from the FMS which uses INS data updated by GPS. This should flag up any significant variation between the INS and GPS positions and not send an erroneous report based on faulty GPS data. AFAIK!

[Teldorserious]

Always fun to come here and read this stuff.

Anyone in here that actually flies planes, that actually has read FAA mandated literature required for operating GPS units will know that the Military, which runs the GPS sats, purposely degrades the signal for security reasons.

Ergo, if you have an IQ above 90, 80 being retarded, with some modicum of independent thinking skills, not completely a robot, or purposelly culled to just punch buttons and take orders, would deduce that if the military can degrade the accuracy on purpose, someone else could as well.

The concept that 'no one relies soley on GPS' signals is another PRUNE chestnut, where as overwater flights, GPS stand alone approaches where non GPS nav signals are not possible, ect, are just that, solely relying on GPS signals. And yes, if you actually had an instrument rating, you would know this.

So yes, someone spoofing GPS signals is a problem, though probably not as much of a problem as continuing to putting idiots in the cockpit.

Carry on.

[mm43]

Anyone in here that actually flies planes, that actually has read FAA mandated literature required for operating GPS units will know that the Military, which runs the GPS sats, purposely degrades the signal for security reasons. The GPS Selective Availability degradation was stopped by executive order (Bill Clinton in 1996) and implemented on May 2, 2000.

[Brian Abraham]

Anyone in here that actually flies planesWell you don't.

[llondel]

I discussed this problem with some Army chums about 20 years ago, and the problem of GPS cripples slowly losing the art of land navigation. I also had this discussion for some years in re aviation navigation tasks and training for same.

I spent several months in the Bay Area in California a few years ago. To start with I had a car with GPS and it was only after I stopped using it that I really started to learn my way around. It is too easy to just put faith in the little box, although I always checked the route it gave me before setting out to ensure that we agreed on the final destination. I prefer to use the map in my head, occasionally backed up by the map on paper.

[Ian W]

FrequentSLF
Ian W notes that, "The reliance on GPS comes with the ADS-B and ADS-C position reports which are almost totally reliant on GPS". In fact ADS-C reports are derived from the FMS which uses INS data updated by GPS. This should flag up any significant variation between the INS and GPS positions and not send an erroneous report based on faulty GPS data. AFAIK!

If you look at the research the jamming and spoofing results in a distortion of the GPS signal that leads to a slow deviation from the 'real' position. The result would be the INS being 'corrected' by the GPS signal to the incorrect position. All the spoofing works by steadily changing the signals to steer the GPS user to the desired position. Unfortunately, GPS is effectively a 'single point of failure' in the current concepts unless air carriers want to spend to military levels of security and backup systems.

[Ditched]

Most cargo ships i worked on had very basic autopilots. Usually only capable of holding a heading fed from the gyro-compass with a back up to switch over to the magnetic compass should the gyro fail (happend to me once in the Singapore Strait, ... ). Some autopilots were capable of holding a GPS course which was seldom used, only very few ships at the time had ECDIS (Electronic Charts) and were capable of following a Track, like we do in aircraft. Within lets say 24nm from the coast GPS is not normaly used for primary navigation but the radar is. Plotting radar bearings on a paper charts always got us through even the most challenging waters. Also compass bearings is a great way to get a good position, simple and reliable. Out on the ocean we generally put the ship on a heading and plotted a GPS position every 4 hours. Als long as your within about 10 to 20 nm from you intended track, it will do. Besides on the ocean you dont run the risk of GPS spoofing cause you need to be fairly close to the ship. I used to keep my skills in celestial navigation up, though mostly for the fun of it. A practiced navigator can get a position by using a sextant within 2nm of the GPS position so its more than accurate enough to get across an ocean.
Sometimes US Navy convoys would jam the GPS signals, which is a non event really, some areas is the Mediterranean have bad GPS coverage, we always got through, amzazing... Bottomline its a nice experiment, but of very little value for real life provided we still have professionals on the bridge who know how to navigate.

[underfire]

I dont believe that is correct either.

ADS-B data comes from the IRU. Remember that GPS tells the aircraft where it was, not where it is. The latency in the GPS system is run through a Kalman filter and coupled with other data from the aircraft, such as airspeed.

The GPS signal itself, it 300 bits transmitted over 6 seconds. So, each satellite broadcast takes 6 seconds for the entire string. (think of how far the aircraft has traveled in 6 seconds)

The filters have the ability to weed out erroneous GPS signals or ones that dont match between broadcast as the aircraft is moving, based on the estimation of where it is.

The aircraft navigation systems need a certain number of sats depending on what you are doing. The minimum of 4 sats will give you horiz and vert location with no error checking. Most aircraft systems will require at least 5 sats for navigation with redundancy. If this minimum is temporarily not met, the IRU has some ability to span a gap, but them will go into a degraded mode with drift.

Surface ships are slow moving and don't require vertical, so fewer sats are necessary. The IRU is set up with a much larger outage time and IRU drift rates were never set up for precise navigation. Therefore, for a surface ship, it is far easier to broadcast 2 sat signals with a pseudorange correction because the ship is moving so slow, and doesnt likely have a very tight filter for the error corrections.

Trying to spoof an aircraft, you would have to follow it in the air, and replace the precise signal and pseudo range error that each individual sat has. If you are not able to do that, the aircraft will disregard the signal.

Back to aircraft and ADS-B. With the Kalman filter balancing the aircraft location, rapid changes in direction and speed will affect the position accuracy. Remember back when each sat signal takes 6 seconds, and you need at least 4, so, the latency of the estimation can be upwards of 30 seconds to get all of the sat signals, balance them and estimate with aircraft speed where the aircraft is. A rapid decrease in speed or a tight radius turn while descending on final can really throw things for a loop.

BTW, some ADS-B systems have their own independent GPS antennas and are not even coupled with the aircraft FMS