Abstract
Communications, Navigation, Surveillance/Air Traffic Management (CNS/ATM) systems utilize digital technologies, satellite systems, and various levels of automation to facilitate seamless global air traffic management. Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B), the core component of CNS/ATM, broadcasts important monitoring information, such as the location, altitude, and direction of aircraft, to the ground. However, ADS-B data are transmitted in an unencrypted (or unprotected) communication channel between ADS-B sensors and Air Traffic Control (ATC). Consequently, these data are vulnerable to security threats, such as spoofing, eavesdropping, and data modification. In this paper, we propose a method that protects the ADS-B data transmitted between ADS-B sensors and ATC using Simple Public Key Infrastructure (SPKI) certificates and symmetric cryptography. The SPKI certificates are used to grant transmission authorization to the ADS-B sensors, while symmetric cryptography is used to encrypt/decrypt the ADS-B data transmitted between the ADS-B sensors and ATC. The proposed security framework comprises an ADS-B sensor authentication module, an encrypted data processing module, and an ADS-B sensor information management module. We believe that application of the proposed security framework to CNS/ATM will enable it to effectively obviate security threats, such as ground station flood denial, ground station target ghost injection, and ADS-B data modification.
Highlights
Communication, Navigation, Surveillance/Air Traffic Management (CNS/ATM), which is based on the concept that safe aircraft navigation is ensured by the use of satellites, sensors, and data communication technology, is the next-generation Air Traffic Control (ATC) system being promoted by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) [1]
We propose a method that protects the Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) data transmitted between ADS-B sensors and ATC using Simple Public Key Infrastructure (SPKI) certificates and symmetric cryptography
The transmission of ADS-B data between ADS-B sensor and ATC is carried out in an unencrypted communication channel; it is vulnerable to security threats such as spoofing, eavesdropping, and data modification
Summary
Communication, Navigation, Surveillance/Air Traffic Management (CNS/ATM), which is based on the concept that safe aircraft navigation is ensured by the use of satellites, sensors, and data communication technology, is the next-generation Air Traffic Control (ATC) system being promoted by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) [1]. A number of solutions to correspond to consequential security threats have been proposed [7,8,9]. Even with these proposed measures, data from ADS-B, one of the core components of CNS/ATM are still vulnerable to security threats. The remainder of this paper is organized as follows: Section 2 gives an overview of ADS-B, describes the security vulnerabilities present, and discusses the lightweight SPKI certificates utilized in the proposed security framework.
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