Think GPS offers high security? Think again.

Conference · Thu Jan 01 04:00:00 EST 2004

OSTI ID:977505

Johnston, R G ^[1]; Warner, J S ^[2]

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1. Roger G.
2. Jon S.

The Global Positioning System (GPS) is being increasingly used for a variety of important applications. These include public safety services (police, fire, rescue, and ambulance), marine and aircraft navigation, vehicle theft monitoring, cargo tracking, and critical time synchronization for utility, telecommunications, banking, and computer industries. Civilian GPS signals-the only ones available to business and to most of the federal government-are high-tech, but not high-security. They were never meant for critical or security applications. Unlike the military GPS signals, civilian GPS satellite signals are unencrypted and unauthenticated. This makes it easy for even relatively unsophisticated adversaries to jam or counterfeit them. Counterfeiting ('spoofing') of civilian GPS signals is particularly troublesome because it is totally surreptitious, and (as we have demonstrated) surprisingly simple. The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) has warned of vulnerabilities and looming problems associated with over-reliance and over-confidence in civilian GPS. Few GPS users appear to be paying attention.

• Research Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory
• Sponsoring Organization: DOE
• OSTI ID: 977505
• Report Number(s): LA-UR-04-1692
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY
99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS
GLOBAL POSITIONING SYSTEM
SABOTAGE
SECURITY
VULNERABILITY