The Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission has tested the performance of selected technologies that provide an alternative to GNSS systems for Precise Positioning, Navigation and Timing (PNT). Following the new NIS2 and CER Directives of the European Parliament and the Council, these alternative systems can play a crucial role in enhancing the resilience of critical infrastructure systems and critical services.
With the rapid development of the space industry and GNSS, the dependence of modern society and new technologies on the services offered by the space domain is increasing. The benefits of GNSS are unquestionable, but the threats associated with its use must also be taken into account, especially when the systems are used by critical infrastructure and critical services such as transport, telecommunications, energy or even the financial sector. Preventing serious impacts caused by GNSS interference, such as jamming or spoofing, is addressed by the new NIS2 and CER Directives, which require Member States to take measures to increase the resilience of critical infrastructure to physical and cyber attacks.
The published report describes the performance tests of a selection of seven alternative GNSS-independent PNT devices, which were carried out at the JRC premises for eight months (2021/2022) to demonstrate the accurate and reliable provision of PNT information according to set requirements. The results showed that all tested systems meet the requirements, both indoors and outdoors. Thus, it was confirmed that these technologies can serve in critical infrastructure systems as a backup source or as a supplementary one to increase robustness and resilience to GNSS interference or even for active refinement of GNSS information.
The GCE team has been working on the resilience of GNSS systems for a long time, so the results of the JRC report are of great interest to us, especially in the context of the newly issued directives of the European Parliament and the Council, which the Member States, including the Czech Republic, will gradually implement into national regulations. Thanks to its broad knowledge in this area, GCE provides not only its founding and associate members but also state authorities and national authorities with its expertise, experience and services.