From autonomous air taxis to delivery drones: urban air mobility relies heavily on accurate GPS navigation. But these signals are vulnerable to manipulation: GPS spoofing attacks can feed false data into the system, potentially leading to unsafe flight paths.

Benedikt Adolph, a PhD candidate at the Institute for Mobility and Life in Motion (IMM) under Prof. Dr.-Ing. Daniel Ossmann, is tackling this challenge head-on as part of the AUDEKI research project. On June 27, 2025, he presented his research “Topographic Data-Driven GPS Spoofing Detection for Advanced Air Mobility” at the European Control Conference (ECC25) in Thessaloniki.

His approach enhances traditional fault detection methods with topographic reference data to check incoming GPS signals for inconsistencies. If a spoofing attempt is suspected, the system can flag it quickly, adding a much-needed layer of security for future autonomous aircraft.

“As air traffic in urban environments grows, navigation must not only be precise but also resilient to manipulation,” says Adolph. “Our work shows a promising way to achieve that.”

The ECC25 gave him the opportunity to exchange ideas with experts worldwide. “It was exciting to see how others are approaching similar cybersecurity challenges in aviation. The feedback confirmed that data-driven methods like ours can make a real difference.”