Evaluating GNSS receiver resilience : a study on simulation environment repeatability

Blatnik, Aljaž (author), Batagelj, Boštjan (author)

Abstract Global navigation satellite systems (GNSSs), with their ubiquitous coverage, have become a cornerstone of modern position, navigation, and timing (PNT) services. While their spread spectrum communication offers inherent, albeit partial, resilience against interference, GNSSs remain a prime target for malicious actors seeking to disrupt or degrade precise location and time synchronization. Jamming mitigation has been an active research area for over three decades. Despite diverse research efforts, a key weakness in the literature is the absence of rigorous, methodologically sound testing of proposed mitigation techniques in a controlled laboratory environment. This work addresses this deficiency by exploring the challenges of evaluating GNSS receiver performance and response under interference and by proposing a more robust methodological framework for result interpretation. We present a custom simulation environment that enables repeated, controlled measurements of GNSS receiver behavior under various jamming attacks, revealing discrepancies between expected performance and real-world observations. Using three low-cost receivers as a case study, we demonstrate the inherent uncertainty in the results, the unpredictable behavior of the receivers’ embedded software, and appropriate statistical analysis practices. A key contribution of this work is a publicly available dataset of extensive GNSS receiver response measurements acquired under controlled interference conditions using an advanced signal generation and a comprehensive satellite constellation simulator.

• Language: English
• Keywords: GNSS, navigation, jamming, interference, GNSS simulator
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FE - Faculty of Electrical Engineering
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Publication date: 01.01.2025
• Year: 2025
• Number of pages: 20 str.
• Numbering: Vol. 14, iss. 9, art. 1797
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-168876
• UDC: 621.39
• ISSN on article: 2079-9292
• DOI: 10.3390/electronics14091797
• COBISS.SI-ID: 234782979
• Publication date in RUL: 05.05.2025

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Electronics
• Shortened title: Electronics
• Publisher: MDPI
• ISSN: 2079-9292
• COBISS.SI-ID: 523068953

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: GNSS, navigacija, visokofrekvenčne motnje, interferenca, GNSS simulator

Projects

• Funder: ARIS - Slovenian Research and Innovation Agency
• Project number: V2-2342
• Name: Care4SIGNAL - Ocena tveganja motenj signalov GNSS v slovenskem državnem omrežju stalnih postaj SIGNAL

• Funder: ARIS - Slovenian Research and Innovation Agency
• Project number: L7-60164
• Name: Trajnostni in digitalni okvir za varnost in zaščito v pristaniščih