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What’s New: A report of North Korea jamming GPS signals across the border. This is the first report we have seen of them doing this since 2016.
Why It’s Important: North Korea uses GPS jamming to antagonize its adversaries, much as Russia is doing in the Baltic. This most recent three day incident coincided with joint South Korean/ U.S. military exercises. And, as the article points out, the jamming precedes an election in South Korea, much as the jamming in 2016 did.
What Else to Know:
- North Korea has a history of broadcasting GPS jamming signals across the boarder to the south (see chart).
- In the early 2010’s South Korea embarked upon a Resilient PNT program that included:
- Upgrading their Loran system to eLoran and making it independent of the neighboring Chinese and Russian systems (complete)
- Establishing their own Space-Based Augmentation System (SBAS, complete), and
- Developing R-Mode for maritime navigation (status unknown).
- These disruptions were not shown on GPSJam.org, likely because ADS-B equipped commercial aircraft do not fly in the impacted area.
Thanks to alert member Ryan Terp for pointing out this news item to us!
N. Korea attempted to disrupt GPS signals on S. Korean border islands
March 8, 2024 – 20:02 By Ji Da-gyum
North Korea attempted to disrupt the reception of Global Positioning System signals on the front-line islands of South Korea in the West Sea for three consecutive days from Tuesday, coinciding with annual combined military drills between Seoul and Washington, the South Korean military confirmed on Friday.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff detected signals sent from North Korea, which were assessed as attempts to interfere with the reception of GPS signals on the Five West Sea Islands multiple times from Tuesday noon to Thursday.
