Aircraft manufacturing giant Boeing (XETRA: BCO) is looking at how blockchain can help protect in-flight GPS receivers, CoinDesk reported.
In a patent application released last Thursday by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the developer of the world’s most popular airliner details an "onboard backup and anti-spoofing GPS system" that would be used if a plane's primary system becomes unreliable or nonfunctioning.
According to the application, blockchain data would be used as a backup record of information in the event that the anti-spoofing system detects potential trouble.
The filing states: "The method further determines if the GPS signals, received by the GPS receiver, are spoofed GPS signals and, then, retrieves position data from the block-chain storage module if the GPS receiver is not receiving the GPS signals or is receiving spoofed GPS signals."
The backup would store environmental information received from the GPS, allowing it to act as a failsafe to prevent pilots from getting lost by providing all of the information a GPS normally would.
Further, the design is positioned in the filing as a response to a lack of fail-over technologies that can verify data about a vehicle's location. As a result, if a GPS platform does suffer an outage or spoofing attack, "navigators, air traffic controllers, and mission planners are unable to adjust and respond with confidence."