Published by Frontier SI PNT Labs, April 2026 with contributions by Aireon.
The reliance of modern aviation on GNSS has never been greater, while the threat landscape is shifting rapidly.
Over the past several years, GNSS spoofing has moved from a niche concern to a widespread operational issue, affecting thousands of flights on a daily basis. Unlike jamming, spoofing does not simply deny GNSS, it generates convincing, but false positioning information that can propagate through multiple onboard systems.
This work explores how space-based Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) data can be used to detect and characterise spoofing at scale. More specifically, we evaluate Aireon’s capability to compute an independent aircraft position using time-based measurements from Iridium satellites, which can be leveraged to detect GNSS spoofing by identifying deviations between the reported ADS-B position and a GNSS-independent reference track.
The key insight is simple. Even when onboard integrity indicators appear nominal, spoofing leaves behavioural signatures in the data. These include track discontinuities, duplicate addresses, loss of position messages, and physically impossible flight dynamics.
Using Aireon’s global space-based ADS-B dataset, we demonstrate how these signatures can be identified across multiple aircraft and regions, enabling detection of GNSS interference independent of the aircraft’s onboard navigation solution.
The paper also includes real-world case studies, including:
· Runway misalignment during approach in Lima
· A spoofed trajectory appearing inside Australian airspace
· A localised interference event near Townsville
These examples reinforce a critical point. GNSS spoofing is not confined to conflict regions. It is global, unpredictable, and increasingly sophisticated.
For aviation, this raises an important question. How do we monitor and maintain trust in navigation systems when the underlying signals can no longer be assumed reliable?
This work is a step towards answering that question.
