The Global Positioning System operated by the Ministry of Defence of the United States guides for example ships or aircrafts. Every day, it timestamps millions of financial transactions made across the world. According to experts, GPS is at risk from criminals, terrorist organizations, hostile states and even from owners of common GPS jammers that can be bought online for US$ 50.
In 2010, British scientists installed a low-level GPS jammer at test boats in the English Channel. It resulted in ships veering off course without the knowledge of the crew. Communication systems stopped working and the crew was unable to contact the Coast Guard. In addition, emergency service system guiding rescuers completely failed.
Another famous incident is the loss of U.S. unmanned spy drone over Iran. According to Todd Humphreys from the University of Texas, Iranians used a simple jamming technology to confuse RQ-170 spy drone which switched to landing mode. The aircraft probably used a civilian GPS system instead of military-grade encrypted model.
Other devices can emulate a GPS signal and divert the ship or aircraft from the course.
-tk-