ADS-B, this is just automating a couple of things, firstly the classic mode-c transponder. Secondly things like weather information and other such, which is often read out on good old analogue radio such as AWOS.
Messing around with that wouldn't be any different from people just SQUARKing fake data.
I suppose there could be opportunity for security exploits on the digital device listening, but the airline industry is very legally enforced at applying updates.
With regards to ACARS I have no idea, as a PPL my rust bucket has nothing that fancy. I suppose there could be buffer overflow type things, or a flaw in the encryption.
However I still feel that this is a little bit sensationalist, as it stands you could create chaos as it just VHF radio and voices.
There's a huge difference between an old-style transponder and ADS-B in terms of spoofability. To make a transponder position show up on radar, you need to actually put a transponder there. You can spoof altitude to an extent, and you can potentially spoof being farther away by delaying your echo, but you can't spoof the radial at all. And you can't spoof being closer than you really are, which means you can't e.g. falsely trigger a TCAS system.
ADS-B is a simple broadcast of coordinates. Spoofing a position there is just a matter of broadcasting coordinates that aren't where you actually are.
True, but given the way the ATC or TCAS receivers work, they really care about the history of the echos.
They are looking for a vector. It would be theoretically possible to create a ghost, give it a speed and heading to make people avoid it. But I'm not sure what it would achieve. Maybe I'm not being creative enough.
Thing is though, why would that be any different to "FY holding London NDB UFY 60 descending 40." on the radio. If you then dropped off the radio completely a massive poostorm would happen as ATC tried to figure out who that transmission came from. Whilst ATC have to try and find the plane that thinks it's got full service in class-a space (non pilots this is the busy bits of sky where you have to get permission from guys on the ground) they would divert away from that area.
I'm not aware of a TCAS system which doesn't alert the pilot to the fact it is changing the autopilot heading. If this happened in busy controlled airspace, it would have to be with acknowledgement from ATC or the pilot would at worse do a near miss to avoid a phantom that wasn't there, he certainly wouldn't hit one that was to avoid a ghost which ground wasn't warning him of.
If you're over the north atlantic and the TCAS wants to change heading or attitude, it will alert the meatbag AFAIK.
History is a good point, but does TCAS really care? I thought it was a fairly simple device in that regard. It has only vague directional sensing.
As for twiddling the autopilot and acknowledgement with ATC, I'm not aware that either is the case. TCAS simply informs the pilot, and current systems never advise any horizontal maneuvers, only climb/descend, because their ability to detect horizontal position is fairly crap. A TCAS advisory takes precedence over ATC commands and is expected to be obeyed immediately unless there's an obvious immediate danger to doing so. You never inform ATC of the TCAS alert and ask what to do, you always obey the machine, then tell ATC what's going on when you have time. If ATC notices the impending collision and gives you instructions that contradict the TCAS's instructions, you follow TCAS and ignore ATC.
ADS-B, this is just automating a couple of things, firstly the classic mode-c transponder. Secondly things like weather information and other such, which is often read out on good old analogue radio such as AWOS.
Messing around with that wouldn't be any different from people just SQUARKing fake data.
I suppose there could be opportunity for security exploits on the digital device listening, but the airline industry is very legally enforced at applying updates.
With regards to ACARS I have no idea, as a PPL my rust bucket has nothing that fancy. I suppose there could be buffer overflow type things, or a flaw in the encryption.
However I still feel that this is a little bit sensationalist, as it stands you could create chaos as it just VHF radio and voices.