Anomaly Detection in Maritime AIS Tracks: A Review of Recent Approaches

Konrad Wolsing,Linus Roepert,Klaus Wehrle,Jan Bauer

doi:10.3390/jmse10010112

Abstract

The automatic identification system (AIS) was introduced in the maritime domain to increase the safety of sea traffic. AIS messages are transmitted as broadcasts to nearby ships and contain, among others, information about the identification, position, speed, and course of the sending vessels. AIS can thus serve as a tool to avoid collisions and increase onboard situational awareness. In recent years, AIS has been utilized in more and more applications since it enables worldwide surveillance of virtually any larger vessel and has the potential to greatly support vessel traffic services and collision risk assessment. Anomalies in AIS tracks can indicate events that are relevant in terms of safety and also security. With a plethora of accessible AIS data nowadays, there is a growing need for the automatic detection of anomalous AIS data. In this paper, we survey 44 research articles on anomaly detection of maritime AIS tracks. We identify the tackled AIS anomaly types, assess their potential use cases, and closely examine the landscape of recent AIS anomaly research as well as their limitations.

Highlights

Freight transport via sea is one of the major backbones of our highly connected global economy today
We find that most proposals focus on the detection of route deviation anomalies and are limited to a confined geographical region their models were trained on
Simple collision avoidance mechanisms are already built into existing automatic identification system (AIS) equipment [2] and are likely to be not covered by our survey due to their design

Summary

Introduction

Freight transport via sea is one of the major backbones of our highly connected global economy today. Global demand for freight transportation is expected to more than double by 2050, with over 70% of goods shipped by sea [1]. Ensuring the safety and security of diverse maritime traffic is necessary for the continued functioning of the increasingly globalized market economy and the well-being of passengers and marine ecosystems. To augment safety and security at seas, the International Maritime Organization (IMO). Ships equipped with AIS transceivers broadcast their positions derived from the Global navigation satellite system (GNSS) periodically to vessels and authorities in their vicinity. While neighboring vessels may utilize positional data for collision avoidance, on-shore Vessel traffic services (VTSs) leverage AIS for traffic planning and guidance. According to the SOLAS (Safety of life at sea) agreement from

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