Technology Convergence for the Integrity of Position and Time Data
As automated data generation and processing become a cornerstone in strategic decision-making across all industries, it is paramount to guarantee data provenance and integrity. In this post we discuss how the combined used of the latest navigation technologies and blockchain may represents a promising avenue to explore.
Over the last two decades, the world has undergone a long wave of digitalization that contributed to promoting a gradual migration from paper-based to computer-enabled management practices. This evolution combined with the constant search for efficiency led to a wide-ranging use of automation, often leveraging AI-based systems. As a result, the role of human intervention has been greatly reduced to the benefit of data and algorithms that, in turn, have acquired a higher level of centrality in the management of all types of processes.
As the abundant flows of data generated are moved across organizational boundaries and data hubs to be finally ingested into analytics platforms, it is important to mitigate risks of accidental data corruption, processing errors, vulnerabilities such as security violation, data tampering or malicious interference in the databases [1]. Effective and secure data management practices thus emerge as a key priority for both the public and private sectors.
The following post intends to discuss how the combined adoption of the latest satellite navigation and blockchain technologies may represent a promising path to explore for improving the integrity and reliability of information flows with specific reference to geo-time tagged data, which has become increasingly pervasive and available in consumer-grade portable devices.
Two examples from different industries are leveraged to make the case: the first refers to the tracking of food and non-alcoholic beverages along the supply chain while the second is taken from one of the most popular applications in maritime, that is fishery.
In 2017, households in the European Union spent 12.2% of their total expenditure on ‘food and non-alcoholic beverages’. This is the third most important category of household expenditure after ‘housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels’, which accounted for 24.2% of household expenditure, and ‘transport’, which accounted for 13.0% [2]. Considering the economic value of the food and beverage industry, it is not a surprise that this sector represents a great source of revenue generation for all the actors operating across the value chain and, at the same time, an opportunity for illicit activities.
According to the European Union, food fraud is about “any suspected intentional action by businesses or individuals for the purpose of deceiving purchasers and gaining undue advantage therefrom, in violation of the rules referred to in Article 1(2) of Regulation (EU) 2017/625 (the agri-food chain legislation)”. There are different ways in which food fraud can be conducted. For instance, an ingredient can be substituted with one of lower value, the food label can be distorted to provide false information or the product can be counterfeited. What is common to the different types of fraud is that these acts do not happen by chance and that they bring economic advantage to the perpetrator and lead to deception of consumers.
Another industry experiencing increasing rates of data falsification is fishery. Illegal fishing is conducted by vessels belonging to a fishery organization adopting one of the following behaviors: violating the organization’s rules, operating in another country’s waters without permission, or sailing on the high seas without showing a flag or other markings [3]. Illegal catches are not reported to the relevant authorities and thus are not accounted for in the management of fishing quotas (or total allowable catches — TACs). From a technological point of view, fishing vessels are monitored through Vessel Monitoring Systems (VMS) that rely on Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) trackers, which record and report vessels’ positions to a central authority. In fishery, the transmission of false GNSS positioning signals by the vessel captain to fool his own positioning receiver (also known as self-spoofing) has been frequently reported and documented. This behavior results in the voluntary transmission of false geo-time tagged data to central authorities, thus allowing fishing in prohibited waters.
In the cases briefly described above, but also in many other services widely adopted by citizens, digital processes based on geo-time tagged data require trustworthy values, because data may refer to items with significant economic value.
Within this context, the main satellite navigation systems, namely GPS and Galileo, are proposing evolutions of their civil signals to embed features of authentication. Galileo started testing the Open Service Navigation Message Authentication (OSNMA) [4] in the signal-in-space, allowing the first-ever OSNMA-protected position fix to be successfully computed. Testing just entered the so-called “public observation” phase, which represents the first-ever transmission of authentication features in open positioning signals of a global navigation system. Indeed, the Galileo OSNMA is an authentication mechanism that allows receivers to verify the authenticity of the information, making sure that the data they receive is indeed from the Galileo constellation and has not been modified in any way.
At the same time, GPS is planning the introduction of a more robust authentication, designated as Chips-Message Robust Authentication (Chimera), which has been formalized in a public interface specification document [5] and is suitable for the GPS L1C signal. Chimera has been studied in recent scientific articles, but it is thought that the characteristics of such signal can make the falsification of GPS data particularly challenging to achieve.
The introduction of authentication from satellites introduces complexity to the space segment, but it brings benefits to the user segment, especially for consumer-grade devices, where for various reasons the use of alternative anti-spoofing methods or backup technologies may lead to increased costs or turn out to be impractical. Without a doubt, innovative tracking systems able to process authenticated satellite signals pose a barrier to falsification attempts of positioning, navigation and timing data, at least for what concerns the most simple and common attacks. Therefore, satellite signal authentication allows for trusted time and space data, which, in turn, can be used to tag other types of information to be exchanged in a secure manner through the blockchain.
The combined use of blockchain and navigation technology would allow moving beyond instant certified positioning by creating certified historical data sets.
This may be attained in different ways, in the short term, by periodically publishing a hash of the centralized database on a public blockchain to generate proof of immutability. In the long term, as blockchain infrastructures mature in terms of scalability and cost-efficiency, by directly publishing the information on a public ledger in order to render the data streams immutable and accessible to everyone.
The presence of certified and transparent historical data sets could be leveraged for a plurality of purposes ranging from more reliable AI training processes, faster insurance claims handling and reduction of legal disputes.
The benefits that can be obtained from the joint use of GNSS signals with cryptographic features and new technologies such as the blockchain are countless. Among all, is the improved robustness to data counterfeiting, whatever type it is, which makes systems resilient and transparent.
It is worth observing that, no matter which system is considered, the benefits increase if complementary protections are used during the process of data generation, processing, transmission and storing. An example is the one reported in this post, namely the joint use of new satellite navigation signals robust to intentional interfering attacks and the blockchain for tracking valued geo-tagged data.
Returning to the case study of illegal fishing, the authors of [3] proposed an economic model to evaluate the costs and benefits of the risks inherent in illegal, unreported and unregulated activities. An interesting question explored concerns the penalties that should have been imposed to make the costs of risk at least equal to the beneficial aspects for a monitoring, control and surveillance system when the probability of detection was 0.2. Calculations show that on average, for the cases examined, the current penalty levels would have to be increased by 24 times to ensure that illegal fishing is uneconomical. The equivalent numbers when the probability of detection is 0.05 and 0.1 are 173 and 74, respectively. Clearly, the probability of detection is a key parameter in the model and is a lever to reduce fraud.
We firmly believe that new technologies such as those presented in the post make monitoring and control systems more robust to data-falsification and in turn contribute to increasing the probability of detection, with clear societal advantages.
The first OSNMA-enabled GNSS receivers are about to hit the market, and the first data sheets and public reports actually show increased robustness against intentional interference attacks and falsification of position, velocity and time data. However, the way to full-scale deployment of new systems and applications firmly based on OSNMA, possibly combined with blockchains, is not free from hurdles. First, it is necessary to raise users’ awareness about intentional interference and cyber attacks aimed at falsifying geo-time tagged data, an aspect often not widely understood by users and operators. Furthermore, it is important to clearly explain the benefits that can be obtained through new technological advances in the face of product upgrading costs that must remain within certain limits.
Finally, some applications relying on satellite data are highly regulated, such as fishery. For this reason, it is important to involve standardization bodies and have new and updated standards fostering the use of new signals and technologies.
References:
[1] ESA, “EO Data Provenance with KSI Blockchain”, February 2020
[2] J.F. Morin, M. Lees, “Food Integrity handbook, a guide to food authenticity and analytical solution”, ISBN 978–2–9566–303–1–9
[3] U.R. Sumaila, J. Alder, H. Keith, “Global scope and economics of illegal fishing”, Marine Policy, Volume 30, Issue 6, 2006, Pages 696–703
[4] M. Nicola, B. Motella, M. Pini and E. Falletti, “Galileo OSNMA Public Observation Phase: Signal Testing and Validation,” in IEEE Access, vol. 10, pp. 27960–27969, 2022, doi: 10.1109/ACCESS.2022.3157337.
[5] Air Force Research Laboratory Space Vehicles Directorate Advanced GPS Technology, Interface Specification, Chips Message Robust Authentication (Chimera) Enhancement for the L1C Signal: Space Segment/User Segment Interface, IS-AGT-100, 17 April 2019
Please cite as:
M.Pini, E. Ferro (2021) Satellite Navigation and Blockchain Promise to Protect our Health and That of the Oceans Through Improved Data Integrity, Overtheblock Innovation Observatory, retrievable at link
OverTheBlock is a LINKS Foundation’s initiative carried out by a team of innovation researchers under the directorship of Enrico Ferro. The aim is to promote a broader awareness of the opportunities offered by the advent of exponential technologies in reshaping the way we conduct business and govern society.
We are chain agnostic, value-oriented, and open to discussion.
