Report: University Of Texas Researchers Remotely Hijack Drone
In February, Congress ordered the Federal Aviation Administration to come up with new rules for integrating drones into U.S. airspace by 2015.
According to a Fox News article, the plan could eventually see police drones watching over U.S. cities, UAVs monitoring transmission lines for power companies or cargo-plane sized drones guided by GPS as they deliver packages across the country.
Recently, Prof. Todd Humphreys and his team at a University of Texas at Austin laboratory conducted an experiment to see if they could hijack a drone.
The team used a $1,000 spoofer device to replicate commands a satellite gives a drone for flying, giving the drone false navigation information that appears real, according to John Roberts’ report.
Anyone with the spoofer could hack into a drone and completely control all of its movements and Humphreys told Roberts using a spoofer is similar to hijacking a plane.
Humphreys estimated there could be 30,000 drones in airspace within 5 or 10 years and each one of these could be a potential missile used against us.
The UT-Austin team showed federal officials their findings during a test at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, with FAA and Department of Homeland Security officials in attendance, Roberts reported.
Many drones will use civilian GPS, which unlike military GPS, is not encrypted.
Humphreys told Fox News he is concerned terrorists could crash drones in to other planes or buildings.