The new surveillance system developed as part of a project supported by ESA acts like a bodyguard for satellite navigation in strategic or safety-critical locations. An extensible system called GIDAS can immediately identify, identify and locate nearby navigation interruptions.
It is estimated that there are currently the same number of navigation receivers on Earth as humans. Positions, navigation and time signals from space-based constellations such as Galileo and GPS form an invisible and indispensable infrastructure, laying the foundation for many modern aspects of modern life (communication, energy and transportation).
Satellite navigation is helping to control more and more planes, ships, trains and self-driving cars. At the same time, GPS-based time stamps can stamp real financial transactions worth billions of euros and coordinate the synchronized operation of the power grid. Satellite navigation is always active and available anywhere on the earth. Therefore, it is easy to take usability for granted. These signals from space are equally important, and they are also susceptible to ground interference.
Andreas Lesch of OHB Digital Solutions, Austria, said: “It’s just a matter of output power.” “The navigation signal on the ground corresponds to the light of the 60-watt lamp on the satellite. For Galileo, its distance in space is about 23,222 kilometers. These weaker signals may be accidentally or deliberately destroyed by stronger local radio signals and even misleading false navigation signals (so-called deception).”
“We have developed a new GNSS interference detection and analysis system, GIDAS, to protect critical infrastructure from damage or deception by continuously monitoring important signal frequency bands. In this way, GIDAS can trigger alarms in real time, determine the nature of the failure, and then determine the cause of the failure. The location of those dangerous portable devices so that the authorities can take immediate remedial measures.”
Although at least three stations are required to locate the interference source connected to the entire monitoring center, GIDAS can provide GPS Jammers detection and orientation through a single reporting station. Monitoring centers can also be connected to each other, which makes the GIDAS system easy to expand, from ensuring a single port, airport or key location of the system to the entire city or region.
Although at least three stations are required to locate interference sources connected to the entire monitoring center, GIDAS can provide interference detection and orientation through a single reporting station. (Photo: ESA)
Andreas added: “People are just catching up with the severity of this problem.” “In parts of Europe, the highest density surveys show about three to four jammers per hour.
These small devices are technically illegal, but can be easily purchased online for a few hundred euros or less, and are usually sold as data protection devices. The sales range of the jammer is only a few meters, but the actual range may reach tens of meters or more, which may cause unnecessary widespread interference. For example, the famous American truck driver takes the jammer while sailing at the Newark Airport as long as he passes by. Will shut down the system.
“The deception is even more serious and has a strong criminal element. The forged satellite navigation signals replace the real signals and mislead the receivers used to park drones or transfer ships in the past.
“We have been working in this field for eight to nine years. Even as GNSS becomes more and more important, interference has increased dramatically. With our passion for GNSS and signal processing, we have chosen some practical measures to counteract this development. And enable our customers to quickly identify, classify and locate faults.”
GIDAS was developed by OHB Digital Solutions and Joanneum University and is part of the Navigation Innovation and Support (NAVISP) program developed by ESA in cooperation with European Industry and Science (NAVISP) to develop innovative navigation technologies.
Engineer Thomas Burger (Thomas Burger) said: “The company launched the project through the second element of NAVISP, which focuses on enhancing Europe’s competitiveness in the navigation field and is co-funded.” “The plan is Starting an economically attractive business, I am happy to say that we did it.”
“Given the budget, the scope of the project is wide, including the development of a multi-constellation GNSS receiver with all processing stages, an advanced digital front end for detecting interference and spoofing, and processing based on fully customized blocks. The processor moves to a parallel processor It is a programmable gate array.
“And that is only part of the entire GIDAS system, including the actual interference detection equipment, the interference location subsystem, and all the communications, databases, and graphical user interface elements needed to create a distributed system for human use. All can continue to work autonomously, only After that, when the event is approved, ask people for their participation.”
After completing the two-year NAVISP project, GIDAS has now been introduced for multiple clients in the European public and private sectors.