U.S. Military Turned GPS into a Global "Numbers Station"

Clickbait from 404 Media? Surely not!

The part they kept out of the headline:

> for use in distributing the keys for accessing the military GPS signals

It’s common knowledge that the military has access to a separate, encrypted, higher-precision GPS signal. “Numbers station” implies that they’re distributing unrelated encrypted information, but they’re not; it’s not surprising that GPS signals would be used to deliver information related to GPS, even if only military receivers have any use for it!

The story links to the current issue of the Inside GNSS magazine but the article isn't available in the digital edition, apparently. It's in the print edition, readable at https://lsc-pagepro.mydigitalpublication.com/publication/?i=...

The source data and analytical code (in Julia) is also available at https://lsc-pagepro.mydigitalpublication.com/publication/?i=...

Summary from the study author: https://www.benthamsgaze.org/2026/06/02/the-quiet-numbers-st...

PDF of article (page 62) https://cdn.coverstand.com/61061/865273/2c88ea662e2b57478723...

"Numbers station" is a weird analogy, because the idea of a numbers station was to broadcast messages to undercover operatives in a way that can be received using unmodified (and therefore non-suspicious) household radio receivers.

Here, it appears to be a rekeying system for specialized military gear.

People are complaining about a clickbaity title but it's a fascinating article I am not sure most would read otherwise

What's interesting to me is how out of date US GPS system is compared to China's BeiDou

and while most US GPS receivers will use Russia's GLONOSS, China's BeiDou is blocked

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47849174

Source: https://lsc-pagepro.mydigitalpublication.com/publication/?i=... (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48411799)

Slightly related the latest Veritasium Video: Something is jamming GPS over Europe.

https://youtu.be/tz23G_UXCGA

GPS was always a dual use system. This is very detailed and specific, but not interesting or surprising. Research has been study GPS signal data, found parts that are encrypted and he doesn’t understand. The end. Article seems only intended to generate an emotional response of “how dare they use GPS for war, man!”

Meanwhile Starlink and Starshield: Hold my beer ;-)

best zero day exploit ever