Agile, Adaptive and Intelligent GNSS Spoofers: Blue Team Characterization and Laboratory Testing

Objective

Take on the role of the blue team: anticipate the next generation of agile, adaptive and intelligent GNSS spoofers, characterize how they could behave against aviation receivers, and turn that knowledge into controlled laboratory tests that measure whether detection, mitigation and recovery defences hold up against an adversary that adapts.

Technical scope

• Review published research, field reports and test campaigns (such as JammerTest) to build a taxonomy of agile, adaptive and intelligent spoofing behaviours, beyond the static signal classes 1A–4D.
• Characterize the key attributes of an adaptive threat: how quickly it reacts, how it changes power, timing, code–carrier and navigation-data parameters, and how it tries to stay below detector thresholds.
• Model adaptive threat behaviour in simulation, including closed-loop and AI-assisted strategies, to identify the receiver monitors and expert-system logic that are most exposed.
• Design safe, conducted or simulated laboratory test cases, with no radiated signals, that reproduce these behaviours in a repeatable way and include ground-truth labels.
• Evaluate the GSDM detectors, expert system, mitigation and recovery functions against these test cases, and recommend hardening measures and new monitors.
• Propose additional test levels and scenarios for the resilience grading framework and Appendix W.

Expected deliverables

• Taxonomy and characterization of agile, adaptive and intelligent spoofer behaviours
• Adaptive-threat simulation models
• Laboratory test procedures and labelled scenario library for adaptive threats
• Blue team assessment report with hardening recommendations
• Proposed test levels for the grading framework and Appendix W

About the GSDM project

Aircraft depend on GPS and Galileo every second they fly, and GNSS jamming and spoofing have become a real, daily threat to aviation around the world. GSDM is a multi-year research program led by ÉTS in partnership with the avionics manufacturer CMC Electronics, and funded through an NSERC and CRIAQ collaborative R&D grant. Its goal is to detect, mitigate and recover from GNSS jamming and spoofing in aviation receivers, and to help write the standards that will certify that equipment. As a GSDM student, you will work on problems that matter to real aircraft, alongside the industry engineers who build certified avionics. Your work will be tested on simulators, software-defined radios and real receiver data, and it can feed directly into international standards such as RTCA Appendix W. The program spans signal processing, detection theory, estimation, integrity monitoring, inertial navigation and systems engineering. Whether you like mathematics, algorithms or hands-on laboratory work, there is a project that will challenge you and prepare you for a career in aerospace, navigation or defence. We are looking for curious, rigorous and motivated students who want their research to make flying safer.