GNSS/GPS Spoofing Detection using Ionospheric Signatures

GNSS/GPS having wide application in Civil and defence sectors like aviation, transport, navigation, survey, vehicular and secured communications. This GNSS/GPS will be vital for future navigation systems, especially in the intelligent transport system (driverless vehicle) and vehicular communications. Nowadays, spoofing is a significant threat that can divert the route or trajectory of mobile units (ground or airborne). To identify and minimise spoofing, many methods have been tried. Methods such as identifying anomalous carrier-to-noise ratios, the interval amongst the phase changes, the delay in between signal broadcast at various frequencies, spatial data processing, and determining the direction of arrival using an antenna array were all successfully applied. Nevertheless, still, there are challenges to be addressed in spoofing detection. In this short communication, we propose using ionospheric signature as an augmentation to the existing methods to detect spoofing more effectively. By the continuous estimation of the ionospheric parameters from the received signal since the beginning of the navigation and comparing it with the model derived values, one can effectively identify the spoofing signal. When added with the existing spoofing detection methods, this method implemented in real-time will become a powerful tool.