Flightradar24's new GPS jamming map

I've been working on mapping GPS jamming using ADS-B data for a couple years, and I'll try to address questions and points brought up here based on what I know.

Relevant previous posts on HN:

2022: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32245346

2023: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37868106

(From my comment on that 2023 post: "Why haven't FlightRadar24, FlightAware, or any of the other flight trackers done this?")

"A single observer can't really say for certain that jamming is happening; you need a distributed sample from multiple different sensors over a period of time to have reasonably high confidence."

There are heuristics you can use that allow you to make a pretty good guess about whether jamming is happening based on signals from just one or two aircraft, and have worked well on GPSJAM for the past couple years.

With regard to localization of GPS jammers, yes you can do direction finding of the emitted signal directly, but that's easy mode. For a fun challenge, do it based just on observations of the ADS-B data from affected (and unaffected aircraft). Here's one approach from researchers at the GPS laboratory at Stanford, "GNSS Interference Source Localization Using ADS-B data": https://web.stanford.edu/group/scpnt/gpslab/pubs/papers/Liu_...

I have some other ideas about how to do that localization.

https://twitter.com/lemonodor/status/1764054377982308484

"Do aircraft systems really only use GPS and not the full constellation of navigational satellite systems?"

ADS-B doesn't tell you what navigation system is, but my understanding is that most aircraft are still using GPS. Maybe someone who works on aircraft avionics will chime in. A few years ago I did see data that distinguished between different GNSS, and GPS was experiencing more jamming than the others. I assume as multi-network systems become more and more common jammers will just target all of them, if they're not already.

"There looks like a big hole of no data over Ukraine, where I'd most expect GPS jamming, but I suppose there are no civilian flights either. Maybe they could setup an GPS observation station on the ground at a surveyed point to get data there."

That's right, no (or few) flights over Ukraine with ADS-B transponders means no data. I actually first started mapping GPS jamming on Feb. 14, 2022 (https://gpsjam.org/?lat=45.00000&lon=35.00000&z=3.0&date=202...), because I thought it might give me an early warning of the expected Russian invasion of Ukraine. It didn't work out that way--there was no indication of interference right up until Feb 24., and then all civil aviation stopped and there was no more data for that region (https://gpsjam.org/?lat=49.18928&lon=33.51687&z=3.9&date=202...).

As some of you have noticed, GPS jamming is highly correlated with conflict zones. Some conflicts are higher intensity than others--for example, I think the airspace around Cyprus has been jammed for years (since 2018 maybe?), and I get the feeling it's more harrassment than anything else (maybe someone more geopolitically savvy than me knows more).

"I see 2 red cells on the US/Mexico border right about Texas/Coahuila region". Someone always says it's cartels, and the evidence is that it's much more likely to be U.S. military testing and training. First, the interference is always in the Laughlin and Randolph military operating areas (MOAs) (https://imgur.com/vieGhgN). Second, the interference usually runs during the week and takes weekends off--which I doubt cartels do, but that's the typical pattern seen for military exercises.

"am I missing any other GPS jamming mapping or data collection projects?"

From 2/24/2022 until 3/19/2024, gpsjam.org was the only site with regularly updated GPS jamming maps. On Twitter, @auonsson (https://twitter.com/auonsson) and @rundradion (https://twitter.com/rundradion) have been posting geospatial and other analysis of similar data for the past several months at least, and @x00live (https://twitter.com/x00live) has looked at ADS-B and GPS interference for a while too. (I'm not even going to try to catalog academic or government efforts, though I will mention HawkEye 360's satellite based GPS interference mapping: https://spacenews.com/hawkeye-360-gps-ukr/)

"If line of sight to the jamming antenna is required to be jammed, why do aircraft not have a downwards shield so that they only receive GPS signal from the sky (satellites) and not from jammers (coming from the bottom hemisphere)? Or is the jamming signal so many orders of magnitudes stronger than the satellites that there's always going to be some gain no matter how good the shield is?"

Yes, GPS signals are so weak (below the noise floor!) that it's just super easy to overpower them with terrestrial (or airborne) jammers. But there are special antennas and other techniques for building jam-resistant systems, e.g. "controlled reception pattern antennas" (CRPA): https://www.gpsworld.com/anti-jam-technology-demystifying-th... But I think the main reason most civilian aircraft systems aren't jam resistant is because they didn't need to be--For the past several decades GPS jamming has been a much smaller issue than it is now, and I don't think there was sufficient reason to spend time and money on what would have been an over-engineered, mostly unnecessary system. But the situation is changing, and I expect anti-jamming to become a more significant concern by equipment manufacturers and aviation authorities.

[Edited to add:]

"I'm in the middle of one of the red blobs on the map and just used my phone with google maps to drive around. It worked fine."

From the GPSJAM FAQ: ""I live in one of the red zones and my GPS was fine?"" (https://gpsjam.org/faq/#i-live-in-one-of-the-red-zones). Yeah, the answer is, as you mentioned, aircraft fly at higher altitudes, so they get much longer line of sight to the jammer.

On the general idea of using ADS-B to map GPS interference, when I thought of this idea I was pretty excited. I realized that if you had access to worldwide ADS-B data, which ADS-B Exchange graciously gave me as part of my Advisory Circular project (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24188661), you could also make a worldwide map of GPS jamming, and I hadn't seen anyone do that before (later I found some researchers who realized you could get GPS jamming information from ADS-B, but they only looked at a couple aircraft).

I just think it's pretty neat that even though there were multiple companies devoted to processing, analyzing, and selling ADS-B data, and ADS-B data is not all that complicated, none of those companies had realized this new way of using it. Sometimes there's gold left even in data that you think must have been completely mined out.

Even specifically looking at ADS-B data as it relates to GPS interference, there's still lots to be done! FR24 is mapping jamming, but I don't think anyone else has made worldwide maps of spoofing (yet!): https://twitter.com/lemonodor/status/1770515361739493488

[Edited to add more:]

With respect to safety issues, yes, aircraft have redundant navigation systems. But GPS is one of the important layers that add safety to aviation, and it is not at all normal for entire countries or even larger regions to lsoe GPS while still maintaining passenger flights. This Eurocontrol presentation, "GNSS Interference and Civil Aviation", has lots of details: https://rntfnd.org/wp-content/uploads/Aviation-GNSS-interfer...

From the presentation:

  Aviation Safety is built on two main principles:
    • Trust your instruments
    • Follow standard operating procedure
  GNSS RFI causes pilots to have to question both principles!

There have been close calls due to lack of GPS. It increases workload for both pilots and controllers, which is a safety issue by itself. Despite a lot of airlines and government aviation agencies saying everything is fine, they're not really prepared for a world with frequent GPS denial, and everything is not fine. Industry and government are organizing emergency meetings about how to handle this in a less ad hoc way than they have been so far (commercial aviation is kind of the opposite of ad hoc).

Modern phones use all the available navigation constellations, and have done so for years.

But aviation is much more conservative due to its safety-critical nature. Galileo was only just recently (2023) certified for use in aircraft systems by ICAO:

https://www.esa.int/Applications/Navigation/Galileo/Galileo_...

The article was interesting alone, simply for the Google Dork technique explanation. Have not heard the "unusual, yet specifically frequent" search technique described that way previously. Very similar to what's necessary for searching StackExchange and similar, such as "site:https://aviation.stackexchange.com/ tracking private planes"

The Bombardier Global Express 6000 GLT6 result is interesting, as it's a plane with a known large number of military conversions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardier_Global_Express#Mili...

Known Conversions: GlobalEye, Project Dolphin, Raytheon Sentinel, Saab Swordfish, PAL Aerospace P-6, E-11A, HALOE, PEGASUS, Hava SOJ, CAEW, HADES.

Actually has a tie-in with the article, since the Hava SOJ is an air stand-off jammer configuration for the Turkish region.

Otherwise, if I still worked for the government contracting, I'd probably offer you a job, although you're apparently British, so there might have been citizenship issues.

The idea that russians are doing these things 'by accident' ain't even funny, just dangerously naive and nobody from intelligence community thinks so. They know damn well what they do and its well planned and even heroic in some childish fashion in their f*cked up mindset.

They are at war with west (more Europe than US though) for solid 2 decades straight, just that they started to use military only in last decade, but were subverting public opinions in usual command & conquer strategy for much longer (riling western and former soviet populations against EU and Nato, supporting ultra-right groups, spreading false rumors ie on covid in us vs them psi-ops).

Whatever politicians on their side say is meaningless or diversion and definitely just wasted time, just look at actions alone.

good point, thanks!