Rogozin-style shutdown: what will happen if GPS is “chopped off”

“It cannot have any effect on such weapons as drones with explosives”

After a massive drone attack in Moscow, the former head of Roscosmos Dmitry Rogozin, in his Telegram channel, called for blocking GPS throughout Russia and turning off all its ground stations in the country. As an alternative, he suggested “learning materiel and maps” and using the Russian GLONASS. We asked a specialist in the field of digital technologies to comment on such an ambiguous proposal.

“Now there are four global navigation systems operating in the world: the Russian GLONASS, the American GPS, the European Galileo system and the Chinese BeiDou system,” says an expert in the field of digital technology. – All of them provide their signal for free, free of charge and without restrictions. The owner of these systems is the state. All of them, with the exception of the European Union, are managed by ministries of defense. Therefore, by disabling even one system, you will not affect anything, since there are three more. This time. And the second moment. It is impossible to turn off the system, because the signals are transmitted by satellites, there is no infrastructure on the ground for this. Satellites fly at an altitude of 19-20 thousand kilometers. You cannot turn them off, they just transmit, broadcast a signal.

Probably, the ex-head of Roscosmos Dmitry Rogozin had something else in mind. Around the world, and on the territory of Russia since the 90s, there are GPS ground stations that legally solve scientific problems. They receive signals from navigation satellites, for example, look at plate tectonics. Stations stand in a certain place, receive signals, as a result, changes can be tracked via satellite.

The expert draws attention to the fact that information from these stations can be used to more accurately tune space systems.

– That is, the countdown is underway. You can receive a signal and see what errors the signal transmitted by the satellite has. And recalculate this model. But they are really tiny! Everything will work without it. This allows you to increase the accuracy by some percentage in Russia. It cannot have any effect on weapons such as drones with explosives.

Therefore, Dmitry Rogozin’s statement can be viewed as a political decision that has a media connotation. And, perhaps, it was worth accepting this a long time ago, turning off the ground stations located on the territory of Russia, which formally solve scientific problems. They transmit information to the United States, and in raw form. This was stated in the original contracts. In the 90s, the Americans simply donated these stations to the whole world. But with the condition that they will transmit information for scientific purposes.

The specialist recalls that Dmitry Rogozin struggled with these stations when he was Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation. I suggested turning them off.

The expert recalls that Russia also installs its stations around the world. Only we do it on an interstate basis.

– And when a blockage occurs, they “turn off” all navigation. But this is done with the help of other technologies that have nothing to do with space satellites. This is the so-called spoofing, there is a deliberate jamming of the signal, almost everything is jammed, all navigation does not work. For this, special ground systems are used.

Published in the newspaper “Moskovsky Komsomolets” No. 29041 dated June 1, 2023

Newspaper headline:
Rogozin-style shutdown