Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport, one of the busiest in the world, faced an unprecedented situation this week with suspected cases of GPS spoofing — a cyber-attack where fake satellite signals mislead aircraft about their real-time position. Such incidents, typically associated with war zones or military borders, disrupted operations across North India, leading to hundreds of flight delays and diversions.
Over the past few days, pilots reported sudden discrepancies in navigation readings within a 60-nautical-mile radius of Delhi. The Navigation Integrity Category value, which measures GPS accuracy, dropped from its normal level of 8 to 0, rendering positioning data unreliable. On Friday alone, nearly 400 flights were delayed, officially attributed to a technical glitch in the Air Traffic Control (ATC) system. However, aviation experts say the spoofing incidents worsened congestion, forcing at least seven flights to be diverted to nearby airports, including Jaipur and Lucknow.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has initiated a probe into the suspected spoofing. Officials suspect that false satellite signals may have been transmitted from outside the airport’s vicinity using sophisticated frequency-mimicking equipment. The issue has been aggravated by the temporary shutdown of the Instrument Landing System (ILS) on the main runway, which is being upgraded to Category III standards to facilitate landings during dense fog. In its absence, pilots have relied on satellite-based navigation, increasing vulnerability to spoofing attacks.
GPS spoofing differs from jamming, which blocks signals entirely. Instead, spoofing sends counterfeit satellite signals that deceive receivers into displaying false locations. For instance, an aircraft flying over Delhi could appear to be over Chandigarh or Agra on its instruments, creating a serious risk of navigational error. Such attacks can cause aircraft to deviate from their intended paths, particularly dangerous during approach or descent.
Globally, GPS interference has become a growing threat. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) reported over 430,000 cases of GPS jamming and spoofing worldwide in 2024, a 62 percent increase from the previous year. India has also faced an uptick, particularly near its borders. Between November 2023 and February 2025, 465 spoofing incidents were recorded in regions like Amritsar and Jammu, areas close to the India–Pakistan border, where electronic warfare systems are often active.
Internationally, GPS spoofing has already led to serious consequences. In December 2024, an Azerbaijan Airlines jet crashed in Kazakhstan amid reported signal interference linked to Russian military systems. In March 2025, an Indian Air Force aircraft delivering earthquake relief to Myanmar also encountered spoofed GPS signals suspected to have originated from Chinese systems near the border.
Indian aviation authorities are now treating the issue as a national security concern. The DGCA, Airports Authority of India (AAI), and Indian Air Force (IAF) are collaborating to implement countermeasures, including encrypted navigation channels, improved radar coordination, and backup systems like the Inertial Navigation System (INS) and Ground-Based Augmentation System (GBAS).
As Delhi prepares for the winter fog season, restoring dependable navigation at IGI Airport is critical. The recent spoofing episodes underscore how electronic interference, once confined to battlefields, can now disrupt civilian skies and endanger one of the world’s most vital air corridors.
