Spotlight

“State lawmakers may decide to ban drone surveillance of private property in Texas. A University of Texas professor fears that bill could hurt the research being done on those eyes in the sky. The university has an $80,000 drone that has been used by engineering professor Todd Humphreys to prove that the security of drones can be compromised.

“We showed that you can hack into a GPS system of one of these drones and like a tractor beam you can bring it down out of the air.” But, using that technology could be prevented in the future.

State Representative Lance Gooden (R, District 4) has introduced a bill called ‘The Texas Privacy Act’ that would ban drone surveillance of private property by everyone from aviation hobbyists to law enforcement.”

Continue reading the myFOXaustin article that features a video interview with Dr. Humphreys.

A drone, no bigger than a toy airplane, hovered north of the Texas Capitol, floating over the heads of lawmakers who were momentarily distracted from their morning meetings. Several of them gathered beneath it, faces tilted skyward, marveling over a pair of goggles that allowed them to watch live video of the craft’s panoramic bird’s-eye view.

But when the conversation turned to the reason for the demonstration, the tone shifted. Representative Lance Gooden, Republican of Terrell, said he was sponsoring legislation to prevent this futuristic technology — increasingly used by everyone from aviation hobbyists to law enforcement authorities — from capturing “indiscriminate surveillance.”

Continue reading the New York Times article, which features an interveiw with Dr. Humphreys.

Austin, TX—At the magazine’s annual Leadership Dinner, held during the ION-GNSS Conference, we gave the first GNSS Leadership Awards to four individuals for their respective work in the four fields of satellites, signals, services, and products. These are not lifetime or career achievement awards, but recognition of significant contribution in the last year or two. Think of them as the Oscars, the Academy Awards of GNSS, if you will, for significant recent achievement.

Several people were nominated in each category by a small group, then voted on by a larger group of about 40, including the magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the contributing editors, and a dozen industry executives.

In the Signals category: Todd Humphreys, Director, Radionavigation Laboratory, and assistant professor, University of Texas at Austin. Leader of several seminal studies on spoofing and jamming; testified this summer before Congress on the subject.

Continue reading the award notice that contains Dr. Humphreys’s acceptance speech.

“Could the next big trading glitch come from the sky? An expert in satellite technology says it’s possible, and he wants more traders and investors to be aware of the potential problem. The danger lies with the global positioning satellite system, according to Todd Humphreys, a professor of aerospace engineering and engineering mechanics at the University of Texas at Austin. High frequency traders depend on GPS technology for accurate time signals to guide their trading strategies, but the satellite system’s rooftop receivers are vulnerable to jamming, he contends. GPS signals can also become the target of hacking attacks, known as “spoofing,” that can send out false time signals and disrupt trading, he adds.”

Continue reading the Institutional Investor article.

The GAO Report to Congressional Requestors titled “Unmanned Aircraft Systems” notes that: 

“GPS spoofing has also been identified as an emerging issue. Encrypting civil GPS signals could make it more difficult to “spoof” or counterfeit a GPS signal that could interfere with the navigation of a UAS. Non-military GPS signals, unlike military GPS signals, are not encrypted and transparency and predictability make them vulnerable to being counterfeited, or spoofed. In a GPS-spoofing scenario, the GPS signal going from the ground control station to the UAS is first counterfeited and then overpowered. Once the authentic (original) GPS signal is overpowered, the UAS is under the control of the “spoofer.” This type of scenario was recently demonstrated by researchers at the University of Texas at Austin at the behest of DHS. During the demonstration at the White Sands Missile Range, researchers spoofed one element of the unencrypted GPS signal of a fairly sophisticated small UAS (mini- helicopter) and induced it to plummet toward the desert floor. The research team found that it was straightforward to mount an intermediate- level spoofing attack, such as controlling the altitude of the UAS, but difficult and expensive to mount a more sophisticated attack. The research team recommended that spoof-resistant navigation systems be required on UAS exceeding 18 pounds.”

Continue reading the GAO report (GAO-12-981).