Union Civil Aviation Minister Kinjarapu Rammohan Naidu on Monday confirmed that several flights approaching New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) recently reported incidents of GPS spoofing while approaching runway 10 of the airport.
“Kolkata, Amritsar, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru and Chennai airports have all experienced incidents of GNSS interference,” Naidu said.
The revelation came in response to an asterisked question raised by Rajya Sabha member S Niranjan Reddy in the winter session of Parliament, which began on Monday.
Reddy asked the Civil Aviation Minister in the Rajya Sabha to answer “whether the government is aware of the recent incidents of GPS spoofing reported at the Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA), Delhi and the steps taken by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and the Airports Authority of India (AAI) to investigate and mitigate such incidents in future”.
What is GPS spoofing?
According to cybersecurity software company McAfee, GPS spoofing is the practice of manipulating or tricking a GPS receiver into sending out false GPS signals. By manipulating the signals, the receiver can be misled and show incorrect coordinates — in some cases placing the device in a completely different location than where it actually is.
“This form of cyberattack undermines the reliability of GPS data, which is vital for a variety of applications, from navigation to time synchronization and more,” the cybersecurity software firm said.
More than 800 flights affected
Last month, airlines flying over Delhi reportedly experienced serious incidents of GPS spoofing – resulting in false transmission of navigation data, including inaccurate aircraft positions and misleading terrain warnings. More than 800 flights have been delayed due to a technical glitch at the Delhi airport that affected air traffic control (ATC) systems, news station PTI reported earlier.
To mitigate the risks of GPS spoofing, DGCA has taken several steps. These include:
AAI asked the Wireless Monitoring Organization (WMO) for help to identify the source of the interference. Following the high-level meeting, the WMO was directed to mobilize additional resources to trace the origin of the counterfeiting using preliminary location data provided by DGCA and AAI, ANI reported.
