Miloch
March 26th 19, 10:55 PM
https://www.axios.com/how-russia-tampers-with-gps-f43f91d9-fa0f-4a6d-a2a6-2857b5b4985e.html
Satellite navigation systems like the Global Positioning System (GPS) make so
many different pieces of our global infrastructure tick that most countries
treat their signals as sacrosanct, knowing that interfering with them could have
devastating effects. But a new report released Tuesday is giving us the first
broad view of a country — Russia — that's pervasively tampering with the
service.
The big picture:
Global navigation satellites — including GPS and less-used competing services
like Russia's GLONASS — are coordinated networks of atomic clocks in outer space
that can be used to triangulate precise locations or coordinate precise timing.
Without them, everything from global shipping to financial markets would suffer.
Why it matters:
It's easy to see the military, transportation and pizza delivery importance of
precise location information. The timing signals are extremely important, too.
•The stock market needs precision timing to handle transactions down to the
fractional second.
•Precise timing is a critical component in telecommunications because it allows
national and international networks to synchronize.
The intrigue:
Russia has been called out several times before for interfering with global
positioning satellite systems. It is known to have pursued the national security
and military use of interfering with GPS in a way no other country has. But
before the study by the C4ADS think tank, no one had really taken a scientific
look across all of Russia's activities to see how constant the disruptions are.
•To do that, C4ADS used University of Texas equipment placed on the
International Space Station to monitor more than 9,800 suspected instances since
2016 where fraudulent global navigation signals appear to have been broadcast in
the Russian Federation, as well as instances where similar signals were
broadcast in Russian conflict zones like Crimea and Syria.
C4ADS is not formally accusing the Russian government of being behind any of the
fraudulent, "spoofed" signals. It would be impossible to make that kind of
determination from the space station.
But, but, but:
It is clear that many of the instances largely serve Russian national interests.
•In Russia, C4ADS found that several spoofed signals came from areas where
Russian VIPs (like President Vladimir Putin) were traveling or that contained
military or domestic facilities Russia wants to protect (including a
"multimillion-dollar 'palace'" reportedly built for Putin).
•Those areas broadcast the coordinates of airports in places where there are no
airports.
•The spoofing was frequent enough that C4ADS reports the Russian internet firm
Yandex had to redesign its ride sharing app. Otherwise, it billed passengers for
sudden trips to the airport whenever their driver passed through a spoofed area.
• Airports that mysteriously seemed to appear in the Black Sea were so
disruptive that the United States issued a warning to international cargo firms.
Why airports?
Many manufacturers of drones use GPS chips to prevent their products from flying
into airport airspace. C4ADS suspects the spoofing was to prevent drone attacks
or surveillance.
Meanwhile, Russia also used spoofing in combat zones, particularly Syria, to try
to limit attacks against its installations.
•Unlike in Russia, the fake signals were intended to mimic connections to
satellites without providing discernible location information. Rather than
thinking they were at airports, navigation chips couldn't figure out where they
were.
•This is likely because drone attacks in Syria often used equipment modified to
ignore the airport blocks, making it more productive to disorient pilots rather
than trick the aircraft.
All of the spoofing Russia has been involved in appears to have been focused on
faking a location rather than disrupting timing. But the C4ADS report notes that
disrupting locations during NATO and Russian military exercises affected timing
anyway, impacting Finnish and Norwegian cell phone networks.
*
Satellite navigation systems like the Global Positioning System (GPS) make so
many different pieces of our global infrastructure tick that most countries
treat their signals as sacrosanct, knowing that interfering with them could have
devastating effects. But a new report released Tuesday is giving us the first
broad view of a country — Russia — that's pervasively tampering with the
service.
The big picture:
Global navigation satellites — including GPS and less-used competing services
like Russia's GLONASS — are coordinated networks of atomic clocks in outer space
that can be used to triangulate precise locations or coordinate precise timing.
Without them, everything from global shipping to financial markets would suffer.
Why it matters:
It's easy to see the military, transportation and pizza delivery importance of
precise location information. The timing signals are extremely important, too.
•The stock market needs precision timing to handle transactions down to the
fractional second.
•Precise timing is a critical component in telecommunications because it allows
national and international networks to synchronize.
The intrigue:
Russia has been called out several times before for interfering with global
positioning satellite systems. It is known to have pursued the national security
and military use of interfering with GPS in a way no other country has. But
before the study by the C4ADS think tank, no one had really taken a scientific
look across all of Russia's activities to see how constant the disruptions are.
•To do that, C4ADS used University of Texas equipment placed on the
International Space Station to monitor more than 9,800 suspected instances since
2016 where fraudulent global navigation signals appear to have been broadcast in
the Russian Federation, as well as instances where similar signals were
broadcast in Russian conflict zones like Crimea and Syria.
C4ADS is not formally accusing the Russian government of being behind any of the
fraudulent, "spoofed" signals. It would be impossible to make that kind of
determination from the space station.
But, but, but:
It is clear that many of the instances largely serve Russian national interests.
•In Russia, C4ADS found that several spoofed signals came from areas where
Russian VIPs (like President Vladimir Putin) were traveling or that contained
military or domestic facilities Russia wants to protect (including a
"multimillion-dollar 'palace'" reportedly built for Putin).
•Those areas broadcast the coordinates of airports in places where there are no
airports.
•The spoofing was frequent enough that C4ADS reports the Russian internet firm
Yandex had to redesign its ride sharing app. Otherwise, it billed passengers for
sudden trips to the airport whenever their driver passed through a spoofed area.
• Airports that mysteriously seemed to appear in the Black Sea were so
disruptive that the United States issued a warning to international cargo firms.
Why airports?
Many manufacturers of drones use GPS chips to prevent their products from flying
into airport airspace. C4ADS suspects the spoofing was to prevent drone attacks
or surveillance.
Meanwhile, Russia also used spoofing in combat zones, particularly Syria, to try
to limit attacks against its installations.
•Unlike in Russia, the fake signals were intended to mimic connections to
satellites without providing discernible location information. Rather than
thinking they were at airports, navigation chips couldn't figure out where they
were.
•This is likely because drone attacks in Syria often used equipment modified to
ignore the airport blocks, making it more productive to disorient pilots rather
than trick the aircraft.
All of the spoofing Russia has been involved in appears to have been focused on
faking a location rather than disrupting timing. But the C4ADS report notes that
disrupting locations during NATO and Russian military exercises affected timing
anyway, impacting Finnish and Norwegian cell phone networks.
*