Thread by @steffanwatkins

📡✈️ I wrote an article about how aircraft traffic situational awareness can be improved by capturing aircraft transponder signals, using open source-based software defined radio receivers

Let's consider the Islamic Emirate of #Afghanistan's airspace

cc @TGhazniwal2 @TGhazniwal

Here's what I wrote last time about #Iraq, and how to improve aircraft traffic situational awareness over Iraq, by capturing the transponder transmissions the aircraft are broadcasting. #ModeS #ADSB #ADSBexchange

steffanwatkins.medium.com/live-in-the-mi…

The largest cities in Afghanistan are #Kabul, #Herat, #Mazar_e_Sharif, #Kandahar, and #Jalalabad. If any cities in #Afghanistan were to have telecom infrastructure and internet access, it's those five cities.

With one receiver in each of those five cities, the aircraft transmitting their exact location will be geolocated, like most commercial air traffic, and some military aircraft.

With 4+ receivers per city? We would get Mode-S #MLAT coverage too (more about that later).

Without receivers to collect the transmissions and post them to the cloud, we won't ever see anything over Afghanistan.

This is the #ADSBexchange view of Afghanistan airspace now (LIVE!):
globe.adsbexchange.com/?&lat=34.088&l…

You can see aircraft in the screenshot over #Turkmenistan, #Iran, #Pakistan, and #India in that screenshot; most are transmitting their exact location using ADS-B

There could be additional air traffic that doesn't transmit its location which we could triangulate with
#MLAT.

Let's use #Iraq, as an example

Here is the current view of aircraft transmitting their exact location using ADS-B, broadcasting their LAT/LON; those transmissions are being collected, and uploaded to the cloud by multiple open source SDR-based aircraft receivers in/around #Iraq.

Here are most of the American aircraft which are ALSO there, but not being shown over Iraq right now; there aren't enough receivers in LOS of them to pinpoint their location. We need 4 receivers in LOS to geolocate the aircraft. (Some ISR aircraft, tankers, etc)

This same deception could be going on over #Afghanistan right now, but there aren't enough receivers in Afghanistan (none, as far as I know) to give us any picture of what's really going on in, or near, Afghan airspace.

Am I suggesting the Taliban deploy #ADSBexchange open-source SDR-based radio receivers across Afghanistan, and feed the cloud, in order to build better airspace situational awareness, and provide the open source community visibility about any planes above them? Yes. 🎯