GPS World • July 2022 • TIMING

Focus Telecom has installed its GPS Resilient Kit (GRK) cyber protection system in the national time systems of the State of Israel at the National Physics Laboratory in Jerusalem.

“A cyber protection system like the one installed in the National Laboratory, as well as many other systems we have developed to protect critical infrastructure, enable our customers to deal with the growing global threat and ensure the function of GPS-based systems, on which their business activity is based — even under jamming and spoofing attacks of various kinds,” said Shlomi Mazor, vice president of sales, Focus Telecom.

The company has developed a holistic model made up of several layers that can protect a GPS-based organization, according to the company.

Focus Telecom has been a leader in the field of synchronization and atomic clocks since 1995 and serves as Israel’s national timekeeper.

The company’s technology can detect an attack on an organization’s time sources, neutralize the threat of intrusion into the organization, provide alternative time from a secure highly accurate source, and protect internal organizational time distribution through a fiber-optic protection system through which time protocols are transmitted. It provides alerts for spoofing or jamming attacks as they happen.

Focus Telecom provides solutions in several layers, including secure NTP/PTP time servers, grandmaster atomic clocks, and radio frequency firewalls. These are protected by an active protection system that can detect and neutralize disruptions before they reach timing servers, and by additional technological solutions that provide effective protection against threats.

Focus Telecom cites recent jamming and spoofing incidents as highlighting the need for protection. For instance, pilots reported disruptions of GPS signals in June 2019, making it difficult to access Ben Gurion Airport. These disruptions resumed in January 2022 and pose a renewed challenge to pilots.

In a May 2021 incident, farmers on the northern border and in the Gaza Envelope reported disruptions affecting the GPS-based guidance system installed in tractors used for sowing and harvesting.

Focus Telecom’s systems are integrated into the Israel Defense Forces, defense industries, financial inst itutions , communications companies, and Israel’s transportation, electricity and water infrastructure.

ADVA Provides Backup Service to Combat PNT Cyberattacks

ADVA is enabling service providers to offer GPS/GNSS-backup-as-a-service (GBaaS) to answer the need for operators to safeguard services that rely on positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) information.

Along with spoofing and jamming of GNSS, in-network timing based on network time protocols (NTP) and precision time protocols (PTP) are also increasingly vulnerable to cyber threats.

As a response, ADVA is now empowering service providers to offer GBaaS and enable end users to address new guidelines and standards for redundant PNT architectures. GBaaS meets the latest recommendations for PNT homeland security, including U.S Executive Order 13905. Leveraging ADVA’s aPNT+ technology, GBaaS eliminates the risks and costs associated with GNSS dependence.

GBaas is based on ADVA’s aPNT+ platform, which leverages a suite of technologies, including multi-band GNSS receivers and management software based on artificial intelligence and machine-learning. Service providers can offer ADVA’s aPNT+ protection as a subscription-based service as part of their service-level agreements.