The Indian government has officially confirmed a series of cyberattacks involving GPS spoofing targeting major airports across the country, including Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Amritsar, and Chennai. These spoofing incidents involved false GPS signals misleading aircraft navigation systems, particularly affecting flights using GPS-based landing procedures at India’s busiest airports, such as Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi. Flights approaching runway 10 at IGIA encountered spoofed navigation signals, prompting pilots to switch to contingency procedures without disrupting overall flight operations.
The government disclosed these findings in Parliament, with Civil Aviation Minister K Rammohan Naidu highlighting that the Airports Authority of India (AAI) has engaged the Wireless Monitoring Organisation (WMO) under the Department of Telecommunications to identify the sources of GPS interference. Since November 2023, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) mandated mandatory reporting of GPS jamming and spoofing events. Multiple Standard Operating Procedures and advisory circulars have been issued to handle these threats in real time.
To mitigate risks, India retains a Minimum Operating Network of conventional ground-based navigation aids, ensuring operational resilience even as newer GPS-based procedures face threats. The Ministry also acknowledged rising global cybersecurity threats such as ransomware and malware targeting aviation infrastructure. In response, AAI is actively deploying advanced cybersecurity solutions in line with guidelines from the National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre and the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team to secure critical aeronautical IT infrastructure against evolving cyber threats.
