‘Report GPS spoofing within 10 minutes of occurrence:’ DGCA to pilots & ATC

NEW DELHI: The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has made it mandatory for pilots and air traffic controllers to report GPS spoofing within 10 minutes of encountering the same.

Issuing a new “reporting protocol” after the Delhi Airport has started witnessing this phenomenon for the first time in recent weeks, the regulator says: “Any pilot, ATC controller, or technical unit detecting abnormal GPS behaviour (like position anomalies, navigation errors, loss of GNSS signal integrity, or spoofed location data) shall initiate real time reporting (within 10 minutes of occurrence).” A GNSS signal is a radio wave transmitted by satellites that contains data about their position and the time the signal was sent. The real-time information will require details like date and time of spoofing occurrence; aircraft type & registration; operator/airline name; flight sector/route; coordinates (latitude & longitude) of occurrence or area affected; type of interference like jamming or Spoofing or signal loss or integrity error; aircraft equipments affected by the interference and any operational impact.The office of National Security Advisor Ajit Doval has launched a probe into the unprecedented GPS spoofing Delhi Airport has been facing for the past few weeks.

Because of this phenomenon, aircraft coming in to land at IGIA often get wrong location or heading and false terrain warnings about 60 nautical miles from the airport. The NSA is learnt to be coordinating with multiple aviation and defence agencies on this issue as spoofing has been common in conflict zones that start areas near the India-Pak border to patches all the way to Ukraine.

But this is the first time that Delhi Airport has faced this issue.The “automatic terminal information service” (ATIS) for Delhi Airport has been regularly issuing alerts about spoofing. Airlines have accordingly informed pilots about the possibility of facing this phenomenon in Delhi.