Thousands of planes may have been experiencing problems with jammed GPS signals, according to a report from British tabloid The Sun, which suggests Russia could be the cause.
Planes reported about 46,000 instances of problems with their satellite navigation over the Baltics between August 2023 and the end of March 2024, The Sun reported, using flight log data from GPSJAM.org. Many of them were likely jamming and spoofing attacks, The Sun reported.
Jamming is intentional radio interference with global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) that prevents aircraft from accessing satellite signals and renders the GNSS system “ineffective or degraded,” according to the United Nations Aviation Safety Agency. European Union.
Spoofing, on the other hand, occurs when fake satellite signals are sent to “trick” GNSS receivers into calculating incorrect position, navigation and timing data, the EASA says. The Sun reported that in some cases the planes swerved around objects that weren’t actually there.
The Sun and The Guardian reported that Russia is suspected of involvement in GPS jamming attacks.
According to The Sun, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Turkey and Cyprus are all at high risk of attacks.
Between August 2023 and the end of March 2024, more than 2,300 Ryanair flights and more than 1,350 flights of Hungarian airline Wizz Air reported satellite navigation problems in the Baltic region, according to The Sun. The frequency of cases of navigation problems increased from less than 50 per week last year to more than 350 per week last month, The Sun reported.
In March, a Royal Air Force plane on which British Defense Secretary Grant Shapps was flying between Poland and the United Kingdom “temporarily experienced GPS jamming” while flying near Kaliningrad, an enclave Russian in the Baltics, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s spokesman said. said.
There has been a “sharp increase” in attacks on GNSS, Luc Tytgat, interim executive director of the EASA, said in January. The EASA noted that rising incidents of jamming and spoofing had “increasingly threatened the integrity” of positioning, navigation and timing services in Eastern and Middle Europe. East.
In a November security briefing, the EASA noted that the increase in jamming and spoofing began in February 2022, the month Russia invaded Ukraine.
“This problem particularly affects the geographical areas surrounding conflict zones,” but is also found in parts of the Mediterranean, the Black Sea, the Baltic Sea and the Arctic zone, the EASA said. He noted that in the Baltic Sea region this affected flight information regions surrounding Kaliningrad.
But the CAA told The Independent that jamming and spoofing near conflict zones were often by-products of military activities and not deliberate actions.
“GPS jamming does not directly impact an aircraft’s navigation and although it is a known issue, it does not mean an aircraft was deliberately jammed,” Glenn said Bradley, head of flight operations at the UK Civil Aviation Authority, told The Sun.
A Ryanair spokesperson told The Sun that if tracking systems, such as GPS, did not work, crew would switch to alternative systems.
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