Leveraging GPNTS for NAVWAR Situational Awareness

The Global Positioning System (GPS) is an integral part of American life. Our dependence on GPS has been called AmericaÆs ōlargest unaddressed critical infrastructure problemö by its lead architect. It has also been called a ōsingle point of failureö by Department of Defense (DoD) officials. Across the DoD, efforts are underway to develop robust alternatives to GPS for positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT). Since 2020, Caliola has been working with PMW/A-170 to develop one such alternative for the Navy. Our Satellite Communications [SATCOM] Antenna Pointing for Positioning (SCAPP) solution uses lines of bearing from satellites to derive a positioning estimate when GPS is denied. That estimate is then fused with other sensor data ¢ e.g., inertial navigation systems (INS) ¢ in the AN/SSN-9(V) GPS-based PNT Service (GPNTS). The AN/SSN-9(V) is the NavyÆs open architecture PNT system for surface vessels. The principal purpose of SCAPP and other Alternate PNT Sources (APS) for GPNTS is to provide position and velocity tracks when GPS is denied. That said, by comparing the tracks implied by APS data to those provided by the on-board GPS equipment, APS data can also be used for a secondary navigation warfare (NAVWAR) purpose. If several APS sensors produce tracks that are mutually consistent yet disagree with those produced by the GPS equipment, then it is likely that GPS is jammed or spoofed. In the proposed SBIR effort, Caliola will leverage its experience interfacing with GPNTS to develop a software based NAVWAR situational awareness (SA) tool that identifies GPS threats in near real-time. Our proposed architecture applies proven tools and techniques from artificial intelligence ¢ to include Mahalanobis distance based clustering algorithms ¢ to sift GPNTS input and output messages.