Fuzzy-based acquisition in GPS receivers for spoofing mitigation

Spoofing attacks are one of the most dangerous threats in the application of the Global Positioning System (GPS). These attacks can influence different parts of GPS receivers such as acquisition, tracking, or navigation part. We focus on the acquisition stage. We propose a fuzzy-acquisition technique that aligns the value of the acquisition threshold by using the parameters affecting the acquisition performance in the presence of the spoofing attack. Then, the ratio between the correlation levels of different satellite signals is introduced as a new criterion for distinguishing the spoofing signal from the authentic signal. In order to verify the proposed algorithm, it is implemented in a measurement and four laboratory data sets. The results indicate that the proposed algorithm effectively mitigates spoofing attacks by an average of 96.61%. Lastly, the performance of the suggested method is compared against the wavelet-based method. The results show a 21.60% advantage of our method.

Automated summary

Spoofing attacks are a significant threat to GPS applications. In this study, a fuzzy-acquisition technique is proposed to counter spoofing attacks by adjusting the acquisition threshold based on parameters affecting acquisition performance. Additionally, a new criterion utilizing the correlation levels of different satellite signals is introduced to distinguish between spoofing and authentic signals. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm effectively mitigates spoofing attacks with an average reduction of 96.61%. Furthermore, a comparison against a wavelet-based method shows a 21.60% advantage for our approach.