AIM+ Anti-Spoofing Protection

What is GPS/GNSS spoofing and how to secure my receiver?

AIM+ Anti-Spoofing technology protects devices such as drones.

Spoofing occurs when a malicious attacker transmits fake signals into a GNSS receiver to hijack its positioning. To avoid the trap of spoofing Septentrio receivers are equipped with AIM+ Anti-Spoofing technology on both software and hardware levels. Protection from spoofers is important not only for critical applications, but also for reliable operation of autonomous machines and other systems. AIM+ offers:

Anti-spoofing security at the GNSS core, ensuring resilience of your whole system
Leveraging cryptographic methods available on certain satellite signals, including OSNMA
Implementation of two decades of expertise in anti-spoofing and anti-jamming technology, that Septentrio is known for
All-in-one anti-spoofing solution, no extra hardware needed
Continuous improvement of anti-spoofing technologies and algorithms

Spoofing, not as complex at it used to be

Spoofing occurs when a GPS receiver reports wrong positioning because it has received GNSS signals with intentionally incorrect positional information sent by a 3rd party. Spoofing devices can be used to hijack autonomous vehicles or drones and send them on alternate routes. This article describes how several ships in the Red Sea had their GPS receiver reporting a position at a faraway airport. The reason why spoofing is becoming more commonplace is because spoofing devices such as Software Defined Radios or SDRs have become more affordable and readily available for purchase online. Couple that with easily accessible open-source simulator software and you have a recipe for a DIY spoofer. For more information see What is spoofing and how to ensure GPS security.

There are many ways to spoof

A spoofing attack can be carried out in different ways, depending on the attacker’s knowledge and equipment. Easily accessible hardware and open-source software make it trivial to insinuate an asynchronous or a meaconing (signal repeater) attack. Synchronous or covered spoofing attacks on the other hand are more sophisticated and are even more complex to detect and mitigate since they very closely mimic real GNSS signals.

Protecting GNSS receivers on many levels

Septentrio receivers have several approaches to combat spoofing:

Algorithms that look for signal anomalies. These sophisticated integrity algorithms are derived and fine-tuned on a vast amount of real-world data. The triple-band multi constellation technology allows for inter-constellation consistency checks and numerous signal fallbacks.
Cryptography and authentication of certain GNSS signals which have a built-in mechanism for spoofing detection and prevention. The Galileo OSNMA authentication is available on Septentrio receivers.

GNSS Jamming is often accompanied by spoofing

Jamming is a form of white-noise RF interference on the same frequency as GNSS signals causing degradation of accuracy or even loss of position. Most spoofing attacks are combined with jamming to remove fallback signals. Jammers are low-cost devices which are easy to set up to produce an RF frequency which drowns out the relatively weak GNSS signals. Septentrio’s renowned AIM+ technology works together with ASP+ to protect the receiver from jamming interference with sophisticated filtering and receiver integrity techniques.

External sensors which promise to protect against GNSS spoofing are available on the market today. However, to ensure overall security and robust operation of your system, it is most effective to have resilience against GNSS spoofing and jamming at the GNSS core. This article explains why secure GPS receivers are crucial for GNSS/INS systems.