This is likely just the start. With growing consumer reliance on GPS, jammer proliferation will mirror what we see in military contexts. Same thing will happen to starlink and jamming in contested zones
Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
61–70 of 243 posts
Re: Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
A lot of work is being done to make GPS more jam resistant, and - just as important - more spoof resistant. The latest batch of satellites has a whole raft of countermeasures to help a receiver to identify whether the received signal is genuine or whether it was spoofed. Receivers too can do a lot to detect spoofing by just observing the signal (for instance: unrealistic power levels on reception, impossible response…
Jam resistance and spoof resistantance are very different. What work is done to make GPS more jam resistant?
https://gps.stanford.edu/research/current-and-continuing-gps...
Single element antennas, adaptive antennas, beam steering antennas. Basically attempting to pull good RF while avoiding bad RF.
(this has been applied in the Russo-Ukrainian war in modified Starlink equipment)
GPS antenna mods make Starlink terminal immune to jammers - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39616417 - March 2024 (72 comments)
https://olegkutkov.me/2023/11/07/connecting-external-gps-ant...
Re: Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
A lot of work is being done to make GPS more jam resistant, and - just as important - more spoof resistant. The latest batch of satellites has a whole raft of countermeasures to help a receiver to identify whether the received signal is genuine or whether it was spoofed. Receivers too can do a lot to detect spoofing by just observing the signal (for instance: unrealistic power levels on reception, impossible response…
Jam resistance and spoof resistantance are very different. What work is done to make GPS more jam resistant?
L5 is considered to be more jam resistant, but it is still in the process of being rolled out and most receivers do not have that capability. It will take the better part of a decade to be rolled out completely but the space side should be done by 2027 so if you need it you can get it but you'll need a completely new receiver.
https://insidegnss.com/onenav-l5-direct-technology-enables-d...
For obvious reasons hard information about all this is tricky to come by, you can read what is available from non-classified sources though and you can glean quite a bit from there.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPS_signals#L5
The third edition of 'Kaplan' is still excellent reading on the subject even though it is 10 years old now.
Re: Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
Jam resistance and spoof resistantance are very different. What work is done to make GPS more jam resistant?
L5 is considered to be more jam resistant, but it is still in the process of being rolled out and most receivers do not have that capability. It will take the better part of a decade to be rolled out completely but the space side should be done by 2027 so if you need it you can get it but you'll need a completely new receiver. https://insidegnss.com/onenav-l5-direct-technology-enables-d... For obvious reasons hard in…
> L5-band signals are 30x harder to jam and interfere with compared to L1, and they offer superior performance in difficult-to-navigate areas such as urban canyons and tree-covered regions.
Impressive performance.
Re: Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
Seems like we'd need a modern version that's less susceptible to jamming, otherwise aren't we just replacing one jammable service with another?
There are two types of GPS jamming. There's GPS jamming by the military, mostly in war zones. This seldom effects airliners because they steer clear of active war zones. Then there's GPS jamming by delivery drivers who don't want their boss watching over their shoulder all the time. When the article mentions jammers as small as a cellphone and costing less than $100, those are sold to drivers. Delivery drivers don't…
GPS jamming was being investigated by the NTSB as a possible reason for this air crash that killed 4 people near White Sands Missile Range.
The plane reported GPS signal loss 5 minutes after the jamming started by WSMR. Three other planes in the area also reported GPS loss.
https://www.stripes.com/theaters/us/2026-08-05/ntsb-medevac-...
Re: Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
#66> At the quantum-sensing firm SandboxAQ, an Alphabet spinoff…
This was an interesting article up to the point where the writer started taking SandboxAQ seriously.
For why you shouldn't take SandboxAQ seriously as a creator of actual technology or real products, start here: https://www.theinformation.com/articles/lavish-spending-weak...
Re: Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
We have starlink I am sure they can figure something out.
Starlink lacks the high precision atomic clocks on board of the satellites, that is also why Starlink needs a GPS fix to bootstrap itself.
We have starlink I am sure we can figure it out. Like... launch a better GPS system with one rocket?
Re: Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
#68Whats really sad for aviation is there was already an extensive network of ground based navaids. As GPS has proliferated, they've slowly been decommissioned as they age out to save on cost. I'm specifically referring to VORs which provide azimuth and range to station. GPS is fantastic and as a primary source everyone loves the benefits it brings. However, in a century of aviation, everyone has kinda sorted out that y…
Probably be easier and more reliable to use star navigation with modern cameras, computers and atomic clocks. Especially for commercial aircraft flying above the weather.
Re: Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
#69Whats really sad for aviation is there was already an extensive network of ground based navaids. As GPS has proliferated, they've slowly been decommissioned as they age out to save on cost. I'm specifically referring to VORs which provide azimuth and range to station. GPS is fantastic and as a primary source everyone loves the benefits it brings. However, in a century of aviation, everyone has kinda sorted out that y…
Probably be easier and more reliable to use star navigation with modern cameras, computers and atomic clocks. Especially for commercial aircraft flying above the weather.
Celestial navigation requires an accurate clock and an almanac that needs to be updated. It is completely impractical for non-military applications.
Re: Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's 2026: we have more ways to defeat jamming, or make it irrelevant, at unit costs trivial for commercial and most private applications. 1) atomic clocks can be smaller than a closed fist and allow GPS to work with 3 satalites with ocassional drops to 2. 2) the same clocks can be used to filter out radio sources from the wrong direction. 3) star navigation (commercial is often above weather, most weather is clear i…
And the military has JDAM with HOJ as a solution for jamming
I was thinking G-man and a suprise helicopter on your lawn. The government hasn't made a spectical of throwing the book at a jammer recently.