The Evolving Shape of GNSS Jamming and Spoofing

As we've been building Zephr we do lots of testing around the globe. On occasion we've been asked to test our capabilities in conflict zones like Ukraine to see if we can help thwart jamming and spoofing. Other times we are doing commercial testing adjacent to conflict zone and discover electronic warfare in our tests.

As disruption of GNSS/GPS becomes more problematic we thought sharing a few high level observations would be helpful. As more innovators target these really challenging problems real world testing is super helpful for understanding the efficacy of novel approaches.

While there are large swaths of Ukraine where GNSS/GPS is operable, often in a degraded state, at the front lines it is frequently blown out. Adversarial jamming is so powerful that the L1, L2 and L5 bands are inoperable. Spoofing attempts can be so highly powered they overwhelm GNSS solvers and end up just jamming them. Here is an example of a frequency scanner run at the front lines in Ukraine illustrating the jamming of the L1 and L5 bands specifically.

Conversely in Israel we see more sophisticated spoofing that does successfully deceive GNSS/GPS receivers to solve for the wrong location. This has been most commonly observed in Northern Israel where spoofers convince receivers they are at the Beirut airport as a drone defense mechanism. More recently we've observed spoofing in central Israel that causes receivers to locate themselves in Cairo Egypt.

The contours of electronic warfare vary distinctively across geographies. Also the tactics used in these environments evolve rapidly. Frequencies that were free of jamming one day can be quickly overwhelmed when they are used as counter measures to avoid EW attacks. Similarly the patterns of spoofing are dynamic. To this end I don't believe there is an AltPNT silver bullet that will provide a robust alternative to GNSS/GPS, nor is there a magic fix that will make GNSS/GPS robust to all future adversarial EW attacks. A cooperative layered approach that provides resilient fallbacks and graceful degradation is a trajectory that could win the day. Real world testing is such a powerful tool and we hope it is something we can facilitate more of. To that end we are always open to sharing data and facilitate testing with partners on the ground. The need is great. Ukrainians not being able to medevac injured civilians and personnel is a problem that should be solved. Individually our odds are low. Collectively there is an opportunity to make a difference.