Microchip's Participation in Jammertest 2024: Enhancing GNSS Resilience Against Jamming and Spoofing Threats

In an era where digital technology is rapidly advancing, the availability and integrity of GNSS (Global Navigation Systems) signals is crucial to mission success. Jamming, spoofing and meaconing attacks pose threats to both. While traditional jamming attacks destroy available GNSS signals, spoofing and meaconing attacks "fool" the system with invalid location and/or time. Advanced threats use a combination of attack types.

The Importance of Field Tests

While laboratory tests have been instrumental in assessing GNSS anti-jamming and anti-spoofing functionalities, they cannot account for Position Navigation and Time (PNT) system’s behavior under real-world GNSS attacks. Field tests are essential to complement laboratory testing, as they help identify the characteristics of live sky jamming and spoofing signals, verify the system’s capabilities and understand how advanced PNT systems can detect and respond to threats.

Jammertest 2024: A Vital Testing Event

Jammertest is an annual, invitation-only GNSS industry event hosted by Norwegian government sectors, Metrology Service, Space Agency, Defense Research Institute, National Communication Authority, Mapping Authority and Public Roads Administration. Over the course of a week, they generated dozens of advanced GNSS attacks, as vendors subject their stationary, mobile, maritime and airborne GNSS-based platforms to these attacks. They provided a unique opportunity for GNSS manufacturers and technology suppliers to evaluate their equipment under actual jamming and spoofing conditions. This event, held in northern Norway, brought together over two hundred experts to test how their systems respond to various jamming and spoofing attacks.

Microchip's Participation

Microchip, a leading provider of resilient timing and synchronization systems, was among the participants in Jammertest 2024. Our team of experts embarked on this journey to evaluate our BlueSky technology which provides GNSS system resilience against jamming and spoofing under real-world conditions.

The Test Scenarios

Microchip brought the GNSS BlueSky^® Firewall 2200, TimeProvider^® 4100 and SyncServer^® S650 all equipped with embedded BlueSky Technology. Our equipment participated in 38 stationary jamming and spoofing test blocks.

• Day 1 of testing included
  • High-power jamming with consistent power, power sweeps and power ramps
  • Continuous wave signals transmitted across L1, G1, L2 and L5
  • Pseudo-Random Noise signals transmitted across E6, E5b, L5, G2, L2, B1I, G1 and L1
  • Bandwidth and chip rate variations
• Day 2
  • Position jumps, small position jumps with and without continuous jamming
  • Simulated driving affecting Galileo only, GPS only and both
• Day 3
  • Time offset 15 and –3 minutes from real time, with and without power jumps affecting E1, L1 or neither at different power
  • Static and pseudo range error, with and without initial and continuous jamming
  • Leap second spoofing with initial and continuous jamming
• Day 4
  • Static and time manipulation to +2 years and April 2019, with power ramping, and initial and continuous jamming

Figure 1. High power jammer overlooking Jammertest HQ in Bleik, Norway

Conclusion

This event was a unique opportunity to evaluate our BlueSky technology and its ability to provide resilience and protection of our synchronization systems in a real environment. We also gained valuable insights for adding features to combat advanced and emerging attacks, an aspect we prioritize highly. We extend our gratitude to the Jammertest 2024 organizers for their support and efforts in hosting this event. Our participation in Jammertest 2024 has provided us with critical data and insights that will drive the development of more robust and secure GNSS solutions in the future.

We remain committed to enhancing BlueSky and the resilience of GNSS systems against jamming and spoofing threats. We are looking forward to participating again this year at Jammertest 2025!

Figure 2. Microchip team alongside all other participants in Jammertest HQ

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