Real-World Jammer Localization Using a Low-Cost Array-Based Software-Defined Radio

Typical single-antenna GNSS receivers are highly susceptible to interference, especially from jamming and spoofing attacks. The use of an antenna array at the receiver may mitigate the impact of such attacks on GNSS reception and enable attacker localization. In this paper, we investigate jammer and spoofer localization using the recently released KrakenSDR, which is a low-cost commercial Software-Defined Radio (SDR) with five phase-coherent channels. The performance was characterized for direction-of-arrival estimation and localization against commercial jammers in realistic conditions during the open GNSS test campaign ”Jammertest 2023” in Andøya, Norway. The tests included simple scenarios displacing the jammer and car-based jamming and spoofing observed by different receiver setups. Direction finding was accurate across tests for unobstructed line-of-sight, which was ensured for simpler tests. The multipath environment affected vehicle-based jammer localization but correctly identified the car’s approach and provided consistent velocity estimates. The driving-based spoofing localization estimated the spoofer position close to its true position and also provided position data from GNSS spoofing.