This year, there have been around 1,200 notifications of GPS interference in aviation across Finland, whereas the number last year was 239, according to The Finnish Transport and Communications Agency Traficom. The interference causes risks and problems to users of GNSS-provided navigation and timing.

Resilient Position, Navigation and Timing (PNT) is an important research focus area at the Finnish Geospatial Research Institute FGI of the National Land Survey of Finland NLS. A group of researchers from FGI and specialists from NLS took part in the Jammertest event, which tested the effects of interference to GNSS equipment as part of research. GNSS interference is an illegal activity, and such extensive testing can only be conducted by state-level actors. Therefore, the Jammertest event in Andøya is a good opportunity to test GNSS devices in a controlled environment.

'It’s a great opportunity to put GNSS equipment and methods to test and to share experiences with other experts in the field from all over the world', says Senior Research Scientist José Vallet from the Finnish Geospatial Research Institute FGI.

How will GNSS interference affect professional equipment?  

At the Jammertest event, equipment will be subjected to spoofing and jamming attacks. This time, the objective of FGI was to test how jamming and spoofing can impact the equipment used by professionals and what the users of services relying on these devices will experience. To this end, the participant team from the National Land Survey of Finland and the Finnish Geospatial Research Institute, prepared and used a wide variety of equipment of different quality, from consumer-grade to professional mapping/surveying, and including high grade reference stations, and even a signal recorder that is allowed to replay the recorded signals off-line in a laboratory after the tests. 

Different tests were done under static and dynamic conditions. As an example, a professional GNSS real-time kinematic (RTK) receiver typically used by surveyors was operated under the effect of five different jammers, while the data and images from the controlling table were recorded. This enables surveyors to see first-hand how the tools they use every day are affected by real jamming, and to better detect it.

Developing GNSS resilience through science

The Jammertest event provided NLS and FGI with a significant amount of data, and new useful knowledge and ideas. Based on the knowledge obtained, NLS will keep updating the precautions already adopted to minimize the effect of jamming on daily cadastral/mapping works. In the meanwhile, FGI will continue improving the resilience of GNSS against interference with new advanced methods, and ensuring the quality of service required in our modern society.

'Analysing data from Jammertest is now in progress in NLS and FGI. On the one hand, the outcomes will influence the already adopted strategies to further increase the robustness of NLS’s services in the near future, and on the other hand they will shape the future research directions and test plans of our colleagues at FGI, both in our laboratories and in forthcoming editions of the Jammertest and alike events', says Research Group Manager Martta-Kaisa Olkkonen from the Finnish Geospatial Research Institute FGI.

More information 

Martta-Kaisa Olkkonen, Research Group Manager  +358 50 443 3365, etunimi.sukunimi@maanmittauslaitos.fi