Iranian technology (wrt RQ-170 capture)

blatantrereg

What are the implications of the drone capture regarding Iranian technological advancement?

They were able to jam the signal. Do the drones have any other protection against signal jamming than channel-hopping? Is there a known way of jamming signals using channel hopping without somehow knowing the pattern beforehand?

They were able to spoof a landing signal. Again - if it uses channel hopping they must have known the pattern to be able to communicate with it. The signal must have been encrypted too.

It's not unrealistic that Iran has developed more sophisticated technology than elsewhere to achieve this. What are the implications of that with regard to espionage though if it is the case?

Or perhaps they were able to do this because of the result of espionage in the first place.

It would suggest that Iran might have similar defences against cruise missiles too I would think, which is interesting. How likely would they be able to defend against ICBMs?

booom

I read an article about a college professor in Texas hacking a UAV in front of the DHS with a 1000 dollar bit of kit that hijacked the gps signal- very technical stuff as you can imagine, but apparently quite easy to accomplish if you now what you're doing. As for ICBM's; as far as I know, and am open to correction here, they follow ballistic trajectories and wouldn't be susceptible to any kind of interference- again, really technical stuff and I would imagine the people who could really set the record straight won't be found on boards spilling the beans.

blatantrereg

What I read suggested that GPS signal jamming/spoofing is relatively straightforward. They would have had to land-originated signals as well though. They have apparently been jamming radio transmissions as a matter of course since 2009 to impose censorship, so they signal jamming is something they do carry out. I imagine a brute force approach would circumvent channel hopping - just broadcast a very powerful signal on every possible frequency.

But even then, they appear to have taken control of the drone, not just jammed the signal. I suppose the logical conclusion is just that they were able to do more than they were expected to be able to do: Whether that's a result of technological advancement or espionage - or just a blunder on the part of the Americans is just speculation.

ICBMs are ballistic alright (InterContinental Ballistic Missile).

Donny5

booom wrote: »

I read an article about a college professor in Texas hacking a UAV in front of the DHS with a 1000 dollar bit of kit that hijacked the gps signal- very technical stuff as you can imagine, but apparently quite easy to accomplish if you now what you're doing. As for ICBM's; as far as I know, and am open to correction here, they follow ballistic trajectories and wouldn't be susceptible to any kind of interference- again, really technical stuff and I would imagine the people who could really set the record straight won't be found on boards spilling the beans.

GPS spoofing is technically uncomplicated but relatively difficult to achieve, and fairly easy to protect against, as long as you have other comms. ICBMs aren't actually ballistic (no power missile is) but they follow ballistic-like profiles. Some re-en try vehicles may rely on GPS for final maneuvering, but all current known NATO ICBMs use inertial guidance (which is tracking local acceleration) with celestial confirmation.

blatantrereg wrote: »

They would have had to land-originated signals as well though.

This isn't necessarily true. If the drone was reliant on GPS for its altitude, they could have spoofed it right into the ground.

blatantrereg wrote: »

I imagine a brute force approach would circumvent channel hopping - just broadcast a very powerful signal on every possible frequency.

This is simply wrong. The channels are so narrow and the spectrum so broad, that the energy required to jam all frequency hopping radios would be outside the ability of the U.S., let alone Iran. Not to mention that it would required massive facilities and antenna and knock out all RF comms in the jammed area.

blatantrereg

They rely on land-based communications because of the possible vulnerability of GPS though, as I understand it. Would they use GPS alone to determine altitude?
Is it realistic that they could have captured it intact without jamming land-based communications?

What about this scenario? -
They jam both civilian and military bands of GPS signal.
They spoof a signal for altitude on civilian GPS.
Then somehow the drone becomes aware of the low altitude [jamming ceases?] and initiates landing procedures automatically as a result.

It seems a bit haphazard. They shouldn't have been able to predict the drone would react that way in that scenario, so lowering the altitude would seem pointless, unless they were planning to crash it into the ground or something, which doesn't seem to be the case.

What do you think happened?

Donny5

They might use GPS for ASL and radar for AGL, and it's possible then that a spoofed GPS signal could fool a drone into getting low enough that it could not escape the terrain without crashing. There is no evidence that the drone was landed and didn't simply crash. Jet powered autonomous vehicles have proved to be remarkably resilient to controlled flights into terrain.

Still, that would require spoofing the military GPS signal, which is no mean feat. The ability to read M-code, let alone spoof it, is probably limited to a very few State sponsored actors, and a simple (but expensive) key change should be enough to remove that ability from even those that have it.

Having a lot of experience with GPS and its applications, I think it's far more likely that the drone either lost power and glided to the ground, or the drone's C2 protocol was compromised and they Iranians simply flew it to the ground. Spoofing military GPS isn't child's play, and if it happened, it's a serious **** storm for NATO.

Victor

Donny5 wrote: »

Spoofing military GPS isn't child's play, and if it happened, it's a serious **** storm for NATO.

While it is hard to confuse a GPS receiver into telling it is somewhere it isn't, it is very easy to confuse a GPS receiver into not knowing where it is.

GPS-only bombs were easily confused in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Hence the likes of Laser JDAM http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GBU-31#Upgrades

Donny5

Victor wrote: »

it is very easy to confuse a GPS receiver into not knowing where it is.

That's just not true, at least for the military receivers, and that's before M-Code.

Victor wrote: »

GPS-only bombs were easily confused in the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Where are you getting this tidbit of falsehood?

Victor

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,82018,00.html

https://www.google.ie/search?q=GPS+jammer&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a#hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=oj3&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB%3Aofficial&sclient=psy-ab&q=GPS+jammer+ukraine+russia+iraq&oq=GPS+jammer+ukraine+russia+iraq&gs_l=serp.3...151921.153153.2.153965.5.5.0.0.0.0.93.289.5.5.0.les%3B..0.0...1c.1.5.serp.OZJ0ssKvsA0&psj=1&bav=on.2,or.r_qf.&bvm=bv.43287494,d.ZGU&fp=b7400c6814d75151&biw=911&bih=389

Oh noes, I linked to Fox News

Donny5

A GPS jammer destroyed by a GPS-guided munition is all I get from that. I have never heard of a GPS weapon being successfully jammed in the field, and it would be big news in my work.