Was our stealth drone shot down or hacked?

Can ATS pros help with this question of mine. I remember reading about our spy drones having a virus in its computers. Also the rumor of the drone being hacked and flown into Iran and maybe not shot down. I think this is very interesting and just wondering if anyone has some more insights to this?

Yes it has been found that the drones are hackable
And if I remember correctly there was a safety feature in the drones software that in the event of a hacking event only minimal control but zero weapon control among a few other things - may be why theres little damage but no mention of a shoot down and the fact that this drone in particular is meant for high alt recon - out of reach of standard small arms at least
With the chinese being as close as they are with Iran - probably helped with the tech

Do you have any source on this? It might just have been a plain old malfunction. I have no idea how reliable autopilot is, autopilot has been around for a while, but we have actual pilots on board, I have honestly no idea how often they have to interfere with the automaton that is the modern airliner.

Alas - no
So I think I should apologise for sounding so definitive in my post,
I've had a quick poke online in my usual places and can't find a reference
But I think it was a published interview with some one big in uav r&d in something like Janes
I will however look into this and repost tomorrow
But essentially it's a device that runs on a data stream - any data stream can be intercepted - eg your mobile
All you the need ...... Lol all he says...... Is the codes to be able to access the content of the encoded stream and it's frequency
Think of it as hacking a big expensive laptop
This is known as its crypto

Whoa dude "interfere with automation on airliners"
Where were you going with that one ?

These drones may not be running on encrypted date links or the encryption may be minimal.
the more encrypted a date string in the longer it takes to crypt-decrypt this slows the control response.
That is a bad idea for aircraft.

Its not hard to override the signal if you have a more powerful transmitter.
these drones are being run from a base near Kabul Afghanistan.a 100 or more miles away
and flying just inside the Afghanistan border.

If the Iranians set up a transmitter just inside there border only a couple miles away from the drone with 10 times higher power and a directional antenna
They could completely over ride the signal from the US transmitter and ether fly the drone across to there side of the border OR jam the signal(this would not require knowing the encryption)as the drone was headed in the direction of Iran but yet had not crossed the border.

I believe that Iran had technical help from China or Russia. And i believe we will see the evidence in a couple years as they copy the equipment from the drone.

What Iran does not have is the data collected by the drone as there is a fail safe that wipes the data storage if they lose the drone.

Originally posted by jw2305
Can ATS pros help with this question of mine. I remember reading about our spy drones having a virus in its computers. Also the rumor of the drone being hacked and flown into Iran and maybe not shot down. I think this is very interesting and just wondering if anyone has some more insights to this?

I am far from an ATS pro, but here was my thread on this awhile back.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by jw2305


Also did the drone crash or land????????


articles.businessinsider.com...



articles.businessinsider.com..." target="_blank" class="postlink">articles.businessinsider.com... 5/news/30476929_1_jamming-tehran-iran-six-weeks

Speculation is running rampant after Iran claimed to have shot down a US RQ-170 surveillance drone Sunday, and while Tehran has yet to show proof, it appears their announcement coincides with the delivery of this piece of equipment.

Stephen Trimble from Flight Global reports Russia delivered the Avtobaza ground-based electronic intelligence and jamming system to Iran six-weeks ago.

While most weapons deliveries to Iran are blocked, a jamming system like the Avtobaza is allowed because it's a passively defensive machine "designed to jam side-looking and fire control radars on aircraft and manipulate the guidance and control systems of incoming enemy missiles."

Possibly what NATO regulators didn't plan on was the jammer's potential as a communications link allowing UAVs to be controlled remotely.

Whether that's how it was used Sunday is another matter.


Read more: articles.businessinsider.com...

Yes drones are hackable.

All weapons are controlled through special protocols that can be accessed only by one network. If any other network tries to connect to the command and control firing module , the Drone instantly locks up all weaponary but still permits limited speed and control of the aircraft.

This a feature if a smart drone fails , it can still accessed remotely through local networks. (distance)

Though smart drones also can be remotely detonated (Self destructed) in an event of disaster which IS NOT hackable. So not sure why they simply did not blow the drone up.

I personally think this Drone was a Trojan Horse.

Ok back as promised
Right couldn't find the publication that I referred too yesterday however I found another which may help answer your question with regards to auto pilot
On the drones - should the data link be severed or a loss of control the drone will continue on its planned route - which is programmed in - to the point that the drone will autonomously fly back to base - this is the same principle as an aircrafts auto pilot - - the link however can be re acquired and manual control retaken
This would be for such as jamming as someone has already said - ( use of high power transmitters to block out the controlling signal essentially )
The connection to command is lost and the drone does it's programmed route
Now for hacking - as many have confirmed yes they can be hacked - and I'll go into a little more detail from yesterday
In order to access the data stream you firstly need the tx/rx frequencies ( transmitting and reciving ) as these can be 2 different frequencies 1 for rx 1 for tx - however - modern military frequencies are encoded a good example of this is the havequick system
Example - say military frequencies star at 1.1 fm and goes to 99.9 fm ( this is just for example ) in 0.1 increments ie 1.1fm 1.2fm 1.3 fm ........and so on
Havequick does this - rather than transmitting on 1 frequency - it'll transmit on 5 different frequencies a second - so in a 5 second transmission it's sent the message over 25 frequencies 1 at a time for 0.2 seconds- auto switch to the next frequency
Both the tx and rx need to be programmed to use the same frequencies every 0.2 seconds - this is where gps timing comes in
So you have th tx and rx ( base and drone ) both systems tell EXACTLY the same time via gps both set with the frequencies in use - so unless you know all the frequencies - how often its switching between frequencies 5/10/20 a second and the sequence the frequencies are used in you can't hack the data stream - so say you could get the frequency with a frequency scanner - by the time you see the freq on your display in the 0.5 seconds it's taken to find the freq and display it to you - it's already changed frequency 3 times
This in know as frequency hopping or frequency agile
So as some one stated - yes too much digital encryption would use up too much of the data stream and time in decoding encoding data would cause delays and lag
The main security from signal interception is gps timed mutual frequency hopping

Any one feeling a bit twitchy after that ?
Everything stated here is classified unrestricted and frequencies timings and details have been 'laymans' examples and not the true frequencys or hop rate

A simple spark gap jammer could have interupted communications to this drone. No hacking necessary. Of course this jamming jams every radio signal on every frequency. One would have to fly close to the drone to use it.