How GPS interference is disrupting the Middle East

Hours after the first salvos of US and Israeli “preemptive” strikes against Iran on February 28, data analytics firm Kpler observed ships in the Persian Gulf engaging in unusual maneuvers; Position data from ships in the Gulf shows that the ships are traveling on land and making sharp turns on polygonal paths.

Since the start of the war, similar disruptions to location-based services have increased across the Middle East, affecting sailors, planes and drivers alike.

These outages also revealed major weaknesses in GPS, an American-made system that has now become synonymous with satellite navigation.

Companies like Kpler have marked thousands of oil tankers in the Persian Gulf for years manipulating the onboard Automatic Identification System (AIS) signals (system used to track ships in transit) to avoid sanctions on Iranian oil exports.

This manipulation of location signals, known as spoofing, allows ships to disguise their movements and has long been used as a means of “stealth” operations, according to trade risk analyst Ana Subasic of Kpler.

But since the beginning of hostilities in the Middle East, location fraud in the Persian Gulf has increased dramatically. In the first 24 hours of the conflict, naval intelligence firm Windward Accessed over 1,100 different ships AIS interference occurs across the Gulf, followed by 55% increase after one week.

Such forms electronic enterprise They are increasingly used as defensive countermeasures in modern warfare, according to the CSIS report; similar cuts followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

But this intervention also disrupted several aspects of daily life.

The interference caused the plane to appear to be traveling erratically, wave-like patterns; Faulty GPS systems on land are also food delivery riders To appear off the coast of Dubai.

Persistent jamming and spoofing activities in the region also raise significant public safety concerns, according to Lisa Dyer, executive director of the GPS Innovation Alliance.

Although the closure of the Strait of Hormuz has significantly reduced shipping activity in the Persian Gulf, foreign-flagged ships from countries such as China and India are still granted passage.

For ships currently carrying crude oil exports from the Gulf, accurate positioning data is vital to reduce the risk of collisions or groundings as they pass through the narrow Strait, which is only 21 miles (33 km) wide at its narrowest point, Kpler’s Subasic said.

Beyond the navigation challenges faced by ships and aircraft in the area, interference with satellite navigation systems could also hinder the response of emergency services that rely on navigation aids, Dyer said in an interview with CNBC.

Other analysts, Quoted in publications such as Al Jazeerathey also attributed the apparent accuracy of Iranian attacks to China’s use of BeiDou.

Missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles often use a combination of satellite-based navigation systems for targeting and other systems such as inertial navigation capabilities that operate independently of satellite-based signals.

Like GPS, which was originally a US Department of Defense project, Beijing developed BeiDou for military use following an over-reliance on US-made GPS in the 1995 Taiwan Strait Crisis, when GPS disruptions allegedly led to the loss of ballistic missiles over the Taiwan Strait.

Now in its third iteration following its launch in 2000, BeiDou According to Luca Ferrara, managing director of SandboxAQ’s navigation product AQNav, it has been expanded into a number of commercial applications and “has the largest network” compared to other constellations such as GPS, Europe’s Galileo and Russia’s Glonass.

While Tehran has not officially commented on the use of BeiDou, Iran’s deputy minister of communications and information technology, Ehsan Chitsaz, reportedly said praised BeiDou’s accuracy and architecture After the 12-day war between Iran and Israel last June, according to China’s state media Xinhua.

Iranian and Chinese officials did not respond to CNBC’s requests for comment.

But other analysts are not surprised by these claims.

Even if true, Iran’s use of BeiDou probably matters little, according to CSIS’s Swope, as it “would not require active coordination or support from China.”

“Modern chips used for satellite navigation are capable of receiving signals from all four major global satellite navigation systems, so Iran may be using BeiDou or even GLONASS or Galileo,” Swope said.

Dyer of the GPS Innovation Alliance added that most commercial receivers “are using [multiple] navigation constellations that are “interoperable in some ways.”

Even if Iran was using BeiDou as a satellite-based navigation system, it would be vulnerable to the same jamming and spoofing risks as GPS, Dyer said.

For industry players, the war in the Middle East has exposed the vulnerabilities of satellite-based navigation systems.

“What’s really being challenged right now is the belief that satellite-based systems can serve as the sole basis for positioning, navigation and timing,” said Ferrara of SandboxAQ, which is trialling technology that relies on the earth’s magnetic field rather than satellite signals.

The emergence of satellite-based networks such as China’s BeiDou and Russia’s Glonass also “challenges traditional US strategic dominance,” Ferrara said, adding that these GPS alternatives are eroding US “influence over global navigation.”

But Washington may still have some trump cards up its sleeve.

As speculation increases As a ground invasion by U.S. forces looms, American forces may be among the least affected by the electronic interference sweeping the region.