Updated June 12, 2024
Many people have irrational fears 30,000 ft up in the friendly skies. Now, here’s a new worry: jamming and spoofing.
Commercial airline pilots’ reliance on GPS navigation systems is being put to the test more than ever before. The war in Ukraine and heightened military alert in the Middle East are increasing the number of radio frequency interruptions caused by jamming and spoofing in conflict areas.
“Planes are losing satellite signals, flights have been diverted, and pilots have received false location reports or inaccurate warnings that they were flying close to terrain,” according to The New York Times on 11/21/23.
Governments in troubled regions have increased their jamming and spoofing tactics, affecting airplane routes in many air corridors. And now, low-cost spoofing equipment is available to anyone.
Smaller planes are more susceptible to spoofing. That means business and private aircraft.
AviationWeek reported in October that an Embraer nearly flew into Iranian airspace due to spoofing.
“The worst-affected regions include the skies above the Black Sea area from Turkey to Azerbaijan; the Mediterranean Sea extending from Cyprus to Libya; the Baltic Sea near Poland and Latvia; and the Arctic near Finland and Norway,” according to the NYT.
Read the NYT’s article, Electronic Warfare Confounds Civilian Pilots, Far From Any Battlefield, and AviationWeek’s The Serious Threat Of GPS Spoofing: An Analysis for more details.
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