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Secret UK Network Hunts GPS Jammers

Posted by samzenpus on from the hunt-you-down dept.

garymortimer writes "A secret network of 20 roadside listening stations across the UK has confirmed that criminals are attempting to jam GPS signals on a regular basis. From the article: 'Government-funded trials involving the police have revealed more than a hundred incidents of GPS jammer use in the UK. The Sentinel project, which has been running since January 2011, was designed to measure GPS jamming on UK roads. The project, run by GPS-tracking company Chronos Technology, picked up the illegal jamming incidents via four GPS sensors in trials lasting from two to six months per location.'"

5 of 228 comments (clear)

  1. Re:at the risk of sounding stupid.. by Tarmas · · Score: 5, Informative

    FTFA:

    "People illegally jam GPS for a number of reasons, Curry told the audience at the conference at the National Physical Laboratory. These include evasion of company-vehicle or covert tracking, and stealing high-value vehicles."

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    Signature has left the building.
  2. Re:Not that much of a stretch, really... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    When you consider that a criminal will also monitor police radios as well.

    UK
    Google TETRA, or Terrestrial Trunked Radio..
    Ain't that easy anymore....

  3. Re:at the risk of sounding stupid.. by C0vardeAn0nim0 · · Score: 4, Informative

    that's a whole lot of bullshit right there.

    i know wikipedia is not a reliable source for any argumentation, but here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synchroscope

    this is what's in use on power grids all over the world since the concept of interconnected generators was invented.

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    What ? Me, worry ?
  4. Re:at the risk of sounding stupid.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    I'm a Protection Engineer. We have GPS at every substation in order to timestamp, down to the millisecond, faults. Helps us determine where the fault started, who tripped first, etc. It's a protection coordination thing. It's also required for Synchrophasors, which is a way to monitor power flows, system stability, and system disturbances at a very fine level. When you have several readings coming in from geographically spread out locations, all with the same down-to-the-millisecond timestamp, you can get a good feel on how the transmission grid is performing.

  5. Re:GLONASS by MartinSchou · · Score: 4, Informative

    GLONASS is different from GPS in more than just frequency - each satellite has its own specific frequency.

    One of the advantages to this over GPS is that atmospheric disturbances are much easier to cancel out. Might make it harder to jam as well, as you'd need a broader spectrum, but I don't know.

    One disadvantage is, of course, that your receivers have to be able to pick up multiple frequencies.