Under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government, the Indian administration has issued an official statement confirming that several airports across the country were impacted by a sophisticated cyber-attack that involved GPS spoofing on November 7,2025. This attack affected both flight operations and airport tarmac activities, leading to cancellations and delays.
The statement, released to the news outlet Matrubhumi, was confirmed by Ram Mohan Naidu, the Union Minister for Civil Aviation. Naidu revealed that the GPS signaling systems at key Indian airports, including Runway 10 at Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI) in New Delhi, as well as runways at airports in Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, and Bangalore, were all affected by the cyber-attack. The disruptions led to significant flight delays and, in some cases, cancellations.
What is GPS Spoofing?
GPS spoofing is a type of cyber-attack where the signals from the Global Positioning System (GPS) are deliberately manipulated. In a spoofing attack, false GPS signals are transmitted, tricking an aircraft’s navigation system into believing it is in a different location, potentially throwing off its position, altitude, and direction. This can severely disrupt the aircraft’s journey, making it difficult for pilots to safely navigate to and from airports.
In this case, the attack had a major impact on flight operations, with disruptions to takeoffs, landings, and airport traffic management. The affected airports reported that several flights were forced to delay or reroute, causing operational chaos.
A Serious Security Breach
The Indian government confirmed that this GPS spoofing incident was the result of a targeted cyber-attack. Had the situation not been quickly mitigated, experts warn that it could have led to more severe disruptions—possibly even a broader collapse of airport and airspace management systems. The potential safety risks were significant, with the possibility of aviation accidents, as aircraft would have been flying with erroneous location data, complicating the pilots’ ability to land safely.
The timing of the attack, along with its sophisticated nature, suggests it was part of a well-coordinated effort. However, at this stage, it remains unclear whether the incident was the work of state-sponsored hackers, criminal organizations, or possibly a terror group seeking to disrupt aviation operations and create chaos. The government has assured that an investigation is underway, but no clear motives or perpetrators have yet been identified.
The Global Concern of Cybersecurity in Aviation
This attack highlights the growing threat of cybersecurity risks in the aviation sector, where many critical systems, including navigation aids and air traffic control, rely on GPS signals. As technology becomes increasingly integral to air travel, aviation experts have raised concerns over the vulnerability of systems to hacking and interference.
This is not the first instance of GPS spoofing affecting airports globally, but the scale of this attack in India has raised alarm bells for aviation authorities around the world. The incident serves as a stark reminder of the need for enhanced security protocols to protect critical infrastructure in the aviation industry.
The Indian government has pledged to strengthen cybersecurity measures across all airports and air traffic management systems to prevent such incidents from occurring in the future.