Effectiveness of Detection Methods for GNSS Spoofing Signals in the Eastern Mediterranean Airspace: A Flight Study

The German Aerospace Center (DLR) conducted a flight study over the eastern Mediterranean Sea to analyze real-world GNSS spoofing signals and to evaluate the effectiveness of known methods for detecting un-targeted Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) spoofing incidents in such relevant real-world scenarios. The study aims to classify and categorize the spoofer threat, with a review of popular existing strategies. During the flight study spoofing signals from potentially multiple emitting sources could be captured and classified as Simplistic Collateral Spoofing Attack. While GNSS spoofing signals were present, various malfunctioning behaviors of Multi-Mode Receivers (MMRs) and other avionics systems could be observed and associated with the spoofing attack. The focus of this contribution is the analysis of spoofing detection methods. For this purpose, popular methods were taken from literature, categorized and evaluated for their effectiveness with regard to the observed signals. The results show that most of the evaluated techniques would be capable of detecting the attack at an early stage. This would have been a lot earlier than the instruments in the cockpit reacted on the artificial signals. This study provides valuable insights into the effectiveness of current detection approaches for GNSS spoofing in civil aviation and supports the development of more robust countermeasures to enhance aviation safety.