Shift5 debuts GPS integrity module to combat GPS spoofing risks

April 29, 2024

Shift5 has announced the release of the Shift5 GPS Integrity Module, the first known platform-agnostic solution applicable to military, aviation, rail, maritime, and space industries. With real-time access and analysis of onboard data, the patent-pending GPS Integrity Module assesses changes in navigational position through multi-faceted anomaly detection methods, alerting operators to GPS spoofing attacks as they happen.

The GPS Integrity Module enables operators to make smarter, faster, and safer decisions at the edge based on automated detection capabilities to mitigate risks involving the manipulation of GPS signals to help ensure the accuracy and reliability of navigation. As an example, over three months, the Shift5 GPS Integrity Module detected 24 instances of degraded GPS performance across the Shift5 customer base.

GPS spoofing poses significant threats to national defense and commercial transportation systems, from navigational errors to compromised operational safety — especially in contested or congested geographies. According to Gartner®, “Global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) is increasingly unreliable because of jamming, spoofing (fake signals), and other forms of interference that can have a dramatic effect on its availability and accuracy. Given that GNSS is used for safety-critical applications such as landing aircraft or controlling self-driving cars, certain errors could be catastrophic.”

Using data collected from onboard systems, the Shift5 GPS Integrity Module uses algorithmic position analysis to identify significant position deviations and GPS data validation to verify GPS information accuracy. Discrepancies or deviations that indicate evidence of tampering trigger an immediate notification, allowing operators to more rapidly and accurately initiate Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), such as taking steps to prevent backup navigation systems from calibrating off of a false GPS reading.

The Shift5 GPS Integrity Module has been designed for cross-platform deployment, across commercial and military planes, locomotives, vessels, and aircraft, as well as for use on other critical systems such as radar, unmanned aircraft systems (UAS), and weapon guidance systems.

“We’re in an era of electronic warfare, defined by the use of hybrid threats on the battlefield. But the use of cyber-physical weaponry isn’t restricted to one particular theater of conflict and isn’t aimed toward military targets alone. GPS Spoofing is a timely threat in both civilian and military worlds, and invites risk to national defense, a stable supply chain, and to the safety of operators and the public,” said Egon Rinderer, CTO at Shift5. “The answer to how we combat these types of GPS attacks comes down to data. Observability into onboard data quantifies the risk posed by GPS spoofing. We’re putting a measure of control back into the operator’s hands, enabling the DoD to maintain force readiness and lethality while enabling commercial operators to maintain the safety and performance of their fleets.”

The Shift5 GPS Integrity Module provides sophisticated, multi-faceted detection and alerting for GPS spoofing attempts, helping ensure the safety and reliability of navigation systems. Shift5’s platform is hardware, bus, and protocol agnostic and performs passive, full-take data capture from any onboard source — every frame, every bus, every protocol.

The GPS Integrity Module offers commercial and military operators:

Physics-Based Spoofing Detection to determine if changes in position are physically possible, providing a simple yet effective method for initial spoofing detection.
Advanced Detection Capabilities to analyze enriched data from all sources to detect subtle, sophisticated spoofing attempts, which is essential for identifying more complex spoofing strategies that might evade traditional detection spoofing techniques.
Operator Alerting provides real-time notifications to operators when the module detects GPS jamming or spoofing, enabling immediate awareness and faster response to potential threats.
Seamless (SWaP Compliant) Integration with existing platforms, as well as the ability to deploy directly to onboard hardware.

The Shift5 platform, which can be deployed using existing onboard compute resources or optional flight-proven TRL9 hardware, adapts to new and evolving spoofing techniques on an ongoing basis. Shift5 alerts can be integrated into existing Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) to help preempt contamination of other Positioning and Navigation (POSNAV) data, such as Inertial Navigation calibration against false GPS data.

Metadata about the time, location, duration, and estimated position of the attack can be passed for inclusion in threat mapping and other geospatial systems for future route avoidance. Data and insights collected and produced through the Shift5 GPS Integrity Module enrich the Shift5 Platform, benefitting the Shift5 Cybersecurity Module and Shift5 Predictive Maintenance Module.

The patent pending Shift5 GPS Integrity Module is available and can be customized to work with military and commercial transportation fleets, helping enhance situational awareness by delivering direct alerts for GPS spoofing attempts.