{"id":1809541,"date":"2022-10-26T19:18:16","date_gmt":"2022-10-26T23:18:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/?p=1809541"},"modified":"2022-10-26T19:18:16","modified_gmt":"2022-10-26T23:18:16","slug":"starlink-as-gps-alternative","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2022\/10\/starlink-as-gps-alternative\/","title":{"rendered":"Starlink as GPS Alternative"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The point of SpaceX&rsquo;s Starlink constellation, consisting of some 3,000 low-orbiting satellites (so far), is to provide broadband internet access. But it could also be used as an alternative to GPS that might be less susceptible to jamming or spoofing. The U.S. Army and a team at the University of Texas at Austin <a href=\"https:\/\/www.technologyreview.com\/2020\/09\/28\/1008972\/us-army-spacex-musk-starlink-satellites-gps-unjammable-navigation\/\">were interested in the idea<\/a>, but SpaceX told them to go pound sand in 2020. Now said UT team has gone and reverse-engineered the Starlink signal to pinpoint a location to within 30 metres. Not as good as GPS, obviously, but the researchers say that a software update&mdash;and SpaceX&rsquo;s cooperation&mdash;could get that accuracy down to within a metre. Their (non-peer-reviewed) paper is <a href=\"https:\/\/arxiv.org\/abs\/2210.11578\">here<\/a>. Coverage: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theregister.com\/2022\/10\/24\/starlink_signal_decoded_for_use\/\"><em>El Reg<\/em><\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2022\/10\/24\/starlink-signals-could-work-as-gps-alternative-whether-spacex-likes-it-or-not\/\"><em>TechCrunch<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The point of SpaceX&rsquo;s Starlink constellation, consisting of some 3,000 low-orbiting satellites (so far), is to provide broadband internet access. But it could also be used as an alternative to GPS that might be less&hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2022\/10\/starlink-as-gps-alternative\/\">More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"link","meta":{"autoblue_enabled":true,"autoblue_custom_message":"","autoblue_shares":[],"autoblue_post_url":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[254],"tags":[1593],"class_list":["post-1809541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-link","hentry","category-gps","tag-starlink","post_format-post-format-link"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1810022,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2022\/11\/supergps-promises-ten-centimetre-accuracy\/","url_meta":{"origin":1809541,"position":0},"title":"SuperGPS Promises Ten-Centimetre Accuracy","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"24 November 2022","format":"link","excerpt":"It seems to be steam engine time for GPS alternatives. We\u2019ve already seen two proposals that suggest using constellations of low-flying satellites to provide greater accuracy and more resilience against signal blocking than GPS and other orbital navigation systems can provide. Now a research team in the Netherlands is developing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;GPS&quot;","block_context":{"text":"GPS","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/gps\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1809677,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2022\/11\/esa-considering-low-orbit-satellites-to-improve-galileo-system\/","url_meta":{"origin":1809541,"position":1},"title":"ESA Considering Low-Orbit Satellites to Improve Galileo System","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"3 November 2022","format":"link","excerpt":"The idea of using low-earth-orbit satellites to provide greater GPS\/GNSS accuracy isn\u2019t limited to commandeering the Starlink constellation. The European Space Agency is exploring the idea of using low-flying satellites to increase Galileo\u2019s accuracy and robustness: make it possible to use indoors, make it more resistant to jamming and interference,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;GPS&quot;","block_context":{"text":"GPS","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/gps\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1840665,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2025\/05\/exploring-gps-alternatives\/","url_meta":{"origin":1809541,"position":2},"title":"Exploring GPS Alternatives","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"16 May 2025","format":"link","excerpt":"In March the FCC issued a Notice of Inquiry to explore GPS alternatives, citing increasing threats to the resiliency of the existing GPS network. GPS World worries that the U.S. may limit domestic access to non-U.S. navigation systems (Beidou, Galileo, GLONASS), which many devices support, for security reasons. Breathless coverage\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;GPS&quot;","block_context":{"text":"GPS","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/gps\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1830673,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2024\/05\/russia-accused-of-jamming-civilian-flights-gps\/","url_meta":{"origin":1809541,"position":3},"title":"Russia Accused of Jamming Civilian Flights\u2019 GPS","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"6 May 2024","format":"link","excerpt":"BBC News: \u201cRussia is causing disruption to satellite navigation systems affecting thousands of civilian flights, experts say. [...] The persistent disruption led Finland\u2019s flag carrier Finnair to suspend daily flights to Estonia\u2019s second largest city, Tartu, for a month, after two of its aircraft had to return to Helsinki due\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;GPS&quot;","block_context":{"text":"GPS","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/gps\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1788572,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2020\/03\/can-gps-be-used-on-the-moon\/","url_meta":{"origin":1809541,"position":4},"title":"Can GPS Be Used on the Moon?","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"30 March 2020","format":"link","excerpt":"More on the question of whether GPS can be used for navigation on the lunar surface\u2014that is to say the existing constellations of Earth-orbiting GNSS satellites, not a new constellation of satellites around the moon. A new study suggests that the answer is yes: GPS and other navigation systems could\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Astronomy&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Astronomy","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/astronomy\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1787444,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2019\/06\/the-economic-impact-of-gps-and-gps-outages\/","url_meta":{"origin":1809541,"position":5},"title":"The Economic Impact of GPS\u2014and GPS Outages","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"20 June 2019","format":"link","excerpt":"A new study quantifies the economic benefits of GPS: in the U.S. alone, it estimates around $1.4 trillion in economic activity resulting from private-sector GPS use, about half of that coming from improvements in the telecommunications sector. (Roughly a quarter came from the telematics sector, and 15 percent from location-based\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Aviation&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Aviation","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/aviation\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.maproomblog.com\/xq\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/faa-gps-outage-300x148.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1809541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1809541"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1809541\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1809545,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1809541\/revisions\/1809545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1809541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1809541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1809541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}