Blog Editor’s Note: We have to say that our friends at GPS World “got us” with the title of the article. “Finally,” we thought, “some government or commercial entity is taking a serious approach to this problem and is systematically trying to find and stop jammers!”
Alas, no. The article is about an ION paper showing it is possible to outfit gantries with the right equipment and identify the guilty party. We are sure this is a step in the right direction. But these kinds of proposals and papers have been around a while (see for example the Chronos JammerCam that was briefed at the PNT Advisory Board in 2017 – full disclosure, Chronos is a corporate supporter of our charity).
So undoubtedly worth the coverage. It’s just that the title got our hopes up that things were moving beyond research papers and into action.
Highway gantries identify jammers
Recent years have seen an increase in drivers turning to cheap GNSS jamming devices in order to move around undetected or to thwart built-in anti-theft systems or road tolling systems. These jammers not only knock out their own GNSS receiver, they also block GNSS signal reception in a radius of several hundred of meters.There is a growing demand for automatic detection of these illegal jammers to help catching the offending driver.
Septentrio GNSS antenna placement on highway gantry. (Photo: Septentrio)
An ION GNSS+ 2018 presentation by Wim de Wilde and Jean-Marie Sleewaegen presentation showed how a multi-antenna GNSS receiver with built-in RF spectrum monitor and adequate processing tool can efficiently detect and classify jamming events and identify the offending car or truck. They conducted a five-day test with two Septentrio AsteRx-U dual-antenna receivers installed on an overhead structure above a busy highway.
