w_3_3_d: I was playing Pokémon Go in the center of Moscow and that spoofing annoyed us a LOT. Basically anywhere near The Red Square
thekiddzac: Plot twist, it was set up so Putin could catch the Snorlax in Vnukovo Airport.
kyjoca: That explains why Russia was so against Pokemon Go.
AmetaWan: The reason is probably the ban on drone flights near the Kremlin. GPS signal imitating airport location stops the drones from getting into flight mode.
Source: Am Muscovite.
DarthLysergis: Imagine a GPS guided missile on its way to the Kremlin. For whatever reason the US decided in some backroom deal that it needed to be done. A group of men including the president sitting in a room watching TV screens. The missile is closing in on the Kremlin then suddenly when it gets nearby it makes a B line for the airport.
ScaredOfTheMan: Would this really affect Military GPS? I thought the Military version was on a different frequency and had encryption. That would be much more difficult to spoof. To make this really effective, they would have turn off anything that produces RF, because Wi-Fi networks and Cellular towers can also be used to triangulate location.
throwspeed: The real story here is that people in Russia are still playing Pokemon Go.
skippingstone: Wasn’t this a major plot point in James Bond, Tomorrow Never Dies?
It also reminds me when Russia killed some rebel commander by sending a missile by homing into his satellite phone.
topcheesehead: Not just Russia. US too. Often times at the airport my location drifts off to a spot near the airpot at least a half mile away. Same spot everytime. Many airports too.
Buck_Thorn: Is this just with US GPS, or with the Russian GLONASS system? Or both?
( https://beebom.com/what-is-glonass-and-how-it-is-different-from-gps/ )
Techttz: Maybe that was the purpose of Pokemon go.
nonsensicalsymbiosis: So what do you think are favorite real life Bond villian (Putin) is up to this time?
tankpuss: Does the white house not do this too?
InsideJob2001: Deters civilian class drone usage for surveillance and other intelligence operations surrounding Kremlin installations. Means that civilians can’t easily get themselves into trouble flying where they shouldn’t. To fly in that area you would either have to intentionally modify your commercial drone to fly there, use home build equipment or have access to military navigation hardware. A smart move in terms of legal accountability for anyone planning on attempting survey Ops on Kremlin installations
Playboi_Icardi: I swear the same thing happens to me in downtown Manhattan
keyboardromeo88: We were in Moscow recently and it was impossible to get an Uber out of the Red Square due to this.
qcubed3: I was there last year and that shit was annoying. I was wondering why my phone kept telling me I was at an airport I’ve never been to while standing in the middle of red square.
BootyWhiteMan: Why?
tcgardner: Didn’t they do GPS spoofing in a James Bond movie?
_josepi_: Why would a Russian be using GPS instead of GLONASS?
bangbangblock: This has been happening for years now, probably at least as long as GPS has been publicly accessible (ie, from the 80’s), and most likely, well before that, soon after the launch of GPS, when the Russians could analyze and figure away to spoof the signal.
crush1010: Pretty sure this is a play straight from Team Rocket’s playbook.
Jonax: I’m guessing it’s a measure to nullify any attempts to use GPS to guide a missile to Red Square?
In the same way that GPS units no longer work if they detect themselves as travelling at around the same velocity as a cruise missile.
jeffreyhamby: Wait, how would that work? The device itself would change to the new location based on the actual location as the satellites only send back a timing ping. That means you’d have to be in control of all device manufacturers that make their way to your city.
mantrap2: Spoofing GPS is quite trivial.
It’s basically a “man-in-the-middle” attack similar to how you can duplicate DVDs by ignoring the encryption in the signal/encoding itself and merely duplicate the raw DVD data (fully encrypted) onto a new disk. It still works because it’s exactly encrypted as the original.
With GPS you only need to systematically delay the signal at a higher power than likely received directly from the satellite. Because the delay (references to an encoded timing/position signal) is what is used to find the location, you can control the position “seen” by any receiver that locks onto your re-transmission.
Because you are merely replicating the original signal that looks 100% legit, then the real signal looks like a multi path signal to be ignored/rejected by design if it gets picked up at all.
By picking up multiple satellite signals and dynamically controlling the delay of each you can precisely control what each receiver “sees” as its location in x,y,z and time and ** the receiver has NO way to know it’s been spoofed.**
This can be useful given than many/most US weapons and aircraft have GPS guide options – they are programmed to move to a coordinate specified by or tracked to latitude, longitude & height and you can effectively move that target/position point to locations away from the real target.
So if the US is trying to do a surgical strike to hit a government building nestled between a hospital and school, you can EASILY cause a GPS-guided missile to hit the latter and then accuse the US of genocide and war crimes (hitting either violates numerous war crimes treaties and agreements). They will be hit and there’s little or no trace of anything gone awry.
In an extreme case you could even cause the missile to hit US troops, armor or ships nearby instead of the target. It’s also possible to drive a ship aground or run a plane into a mountain.
Also consider: all alternative navigation aids for private/commercial flights have been shut-down (e.g. LORAN-C) and GPS has been finally adopted as a valid primary IFR navigation system for aircraft.
Cam_86: Jormungand!
Kinda a spoiler, but the anime of that name(and the codename for the *”weapon”*)pretty much deals with this concept as a super weapon to eliminate modern war. Definitely worth checking out if you like action anime like black lagoon or cowboy Bebop.
PleaseWithC: What we’ve got here is a real GP-Mess!
^^Sorry.
CitationX_N7V11C: Good ol’ Russian paranoia.
DooDooBrownz: wrong. that’s location spoofing that requires a data connection, not gps spoofing.
RogerTheBadger: Everyone does that… Any decent military has the capability and uses it for defence.
Likewise, I’m sure NATO would not use standard GPS in an attack on Russia but more sophisticated hardware because they know GPS would be jammed.