Tag: HawkEye 360

HawkEye 360 launches advanced GNSS interference detection capabilities
HawkEye 360 has made powerful enhancements to its GNSS Interference (GNSS-I) Detection product suite. The upgrades — designed with defense, intelligence and national security operations in mind — offer unprecedented accuracy, coverage and insight into global GPS jamming and spoofing threats.

The update includes a new wider frequency algorithm that better distinguishes individual emitters, incorporates GPS spoofing detection, and is terrain adjusted for better geolocation accuracy, delivering greater situational awareness and more precise geolocation of interference sources worldwide.

HawkEye 360’s enhanced GNSS Interference Detection product suite supports strategic decision-making by providing timely, precise insight into potential signal disruptions, enabling stakeholders to better assess risk, respond confidently, and maintain operational continuity in dynamic environments.

With this release, HawkEye 360’s GNSS-I Detection product suite now provides:
- 15 times increase in geolocation density
- Spoofing detection and differentiation
- Terrain adjusted for increased accuracy
- Consistent monitoring across wide areas of interest
HawkEye 360’s new spoofing detection capability identifies potentially malicious transmitters that imitate legitimate GPS course/acquisition (PRN) codes — a tactic increasingly used to deceive aircraft and mislead navigation systems. The capability supports threat mitigation and trend analysis by detecting and geolocating these spoofers down to a kilometer-level precision.

“In contested environments, timely RF intelligence is the key to mission success,” said Alex Fox, president, International Business Unit. “Traditional land, sea, and air systems struggle in Anti-Access/Area Denial environments, while our satellites provide global GNSS-I detection and geolocation coverage. These enhanced capabilities give defense and intelligence teams the ability to identify and neutralize threats before they disrupt operations, enabling faster decisions and sharper visibility into adversary behavior.”
July 30, 2025
HawkEye 360 adds satellites to geolocation constellation

Three HawkEye 360 radio-frequency geolocation microsatellites were launched May 25. The satellites, launched aboard SpaceX Transporter-5 mission, were built by Space Flight Laboratory (SFL) of Toronto. Three SFL-built satellites for greenhouse gas monitoring were also launched.

The HawkEye 360 constellation detects and geolocates RF signals for maritime situational awareness, emergency response, national security and spectrum analysis applications.

Once Cluster 5’s on-orbit checkout is complete, the HawkEye 360 constellation will be expanded to 15 satellites, doubling capacity and revisit rates. This significantly boosts the constellation’s ability to serve global customer demand and to monitor activity across places such as Ukraine.

“Every enhanced satellite cluster we launch helps us deliver a higher density of valuable data to our government, commercial and humanitarian customers and partners – advancing our efforts to monitor global activities for a safer and more secure world,” said HawkEye 360 John Serafini. “Launch by launch, these space-based innovations are analyzing the knowns and uncovering the unknowns of the RF spectrum across the globe.”

Cluster 5 includes enhanced antenna functions introduced with Cluster 4, which allow greater flexibility in geolocating signals across a wide range of frequencies important to customers.

Cluster 4, launched April 1, has been completing checkout and moving into final formation to begin collecting data in late June. Cluster 5 is slated to achieve initial operating capability in August.

Cluster 4 on orbit. (Image: HawkEye 360)

HawkEye 360 plans to continue to grow the constellation to achieve revisit rates of about 15 minutes to support timely defense, national security and commercial applications.

SFL has now developed 15 microsatellites for HawkEye 360 of Herndon, Virginia. SFL was selected for these missions due to the importance of formation flying by multiple satellites for successful RF geolocation.

Other missions developed by SFL in the past two years include 16 communications CubeSats and three microsatellites designed for Earth observation, maritime tracking and atmospheric monitoring.

In its 24-year history, SFL has developed cubesats, nanosatellites and microsatellites that have achieved more than 191 cumulative years of operation in orbit.

HawkEye 360 Cluster 5. (Photo: HawkEye 360)

June 4, 2022
HawkEye 360 tech reveals early GPS interference in Ukraine

Technology from HawkEye 360 Inc. has detected and geolocated extensive GPS interference over Ukraine, starting months before the Russian invasion. HawkEye 360 uses satellites to monitor radio-frequency signals that might threaten military and civil navigation applications.

The capability was tested in 2021 in a variety of exercises and is available as part of HawkEye 360’s RFGeo signal product catalog.

When HawkEye 360 analysts examined Ukraine over the past five months, they discovered continued and increased GPS interference across the region. The data showed extensive GPS interference in November 2021 along the boundary of the pro-Russian separatist-controlled regions in Luhansk and Donetsk.

Open-source information confirmed unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) operating in the area were disrupted because of lost GPS connections.

In February 2022, HawkEye 360 detected GPS interference along the border between Ukraine and Belarus, shortly before the Russian invasion started. This February activity occurred north of Chernobyl within the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, demonstrating the integration of electronic warfare tactics into Russian military operation to further degrade Ukraine’s ability for self-defense.

“GPS is a fundamental ‘global commons’ service that all modern economies depend upon. GPS signal interference has the potential to significantly disrupt air travel, logistics, finance, transportation, communication and many other basic services,” said John Serafini, CEO of HawkEye 360.

“Whether unintentional or deliberate, interference that prevents people, vehicles, ships, and planes from determining accurate locations can be devastating to government and commercial activities alike,” Serafini said. “Since HawkEye 360 can monitor hundreds of millions of square kilometers daily, we are able to notify clients when and where GPS interference occurs, so they can respond quickly to mitigate the impacts.”

Interference can be inadvertent by equipment operating too close to GPS frequency bands. However, deliberate interference has spiked across the globe due to the low cost, ease of deployment, and general availability of GPS jamming technology.

Military forces use GPS jammers to obscure and protect critical troops, facilities and equipment from attack and can be a leading indicator of future military activity. Drug cartels use GPS jammers to deter surveillance from overhead drones. Use of jammers is illegal in most developed nations.

HawkEye 360’s detection product offers a valuable capability to monitor for illicit and unintentional GPS interference that can significantly disrupt critical location services, representing the company’s global commitment to make the world a safer place, the company said.

Image: HawkEye 360

April 29, 2022
NGA awards HawkEye 360 contract for RF mapping

Up to five-year contract follows a successful pilot program that demonstrated the value of commercial RF geospatial intelligence

HawkEye 360 has been awarded a contract by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) to help the agency discover, characterize and map activities that emit energy in the radio frequency (RF) bands of the electromagnetic spectrum.

HawkEye 360 specializes in RF data and analytics from space-based satellites.

HawkEye 360 will provide NGA the means to develop global datasets, enabling users to discover and monitor a broad range of RF activity across large geographic areas.

The $10 million one-year contract includes an option for four more years. It will support users throughout the NGA enterprise, including the combatant commands and other mission partners.

HawkEye 360’s data will support a variety of analytics missions for NGA, including military activity and the trafficking of military, nefarious, non-state and transnational criminal (or illicit) activity. The company’s growing constellation of satellites will provide insight into developing events in a timely manner, and the company will work collaboratively with NGA on an ongoing basis to effectively meet the agency’s mission needs.

“We’re pleased to be moving from the pilot into an NGA long-term operational contract, which showcases the value of unclassified, shareable commercial RF insights,” said HawkEye 360 CEO John Serafini.

“This program is an excellent example of agile acquisition rapidly delivering high-impact GEOINT to the warfighter,” said Alex Fox, the company’s executive vice president for business development, sales and marketing.

NGA leveraged a National Reconnaissance Office commercial integration study contract with HawkEye 360 in September 2020 to execute a test and evaluation contract with the company.

NGA then issued a competitive RFP in March 2021 and awarded the contract in July 2021. “We are excited to continue working with NGA to address current mission requirements and expand the RF GEOINT tradecraft to address an even larger set of mission requirements, much like NGA has done with their pioneering use of commercial imagery,” Fox said.

HawkEye 360 operates a constellation of nine RF-monitoring satellites. Twenty-one additional satellites are fully funded and scheduled for launch in 2021 and 2022. Once complete, this baseline constellation of 30 satellites will provide collection revisits as frequently as every 20 minutes.

Following the establishment of the baseline constellation, HawkEye 360 plans to launch a second-generation constellation of 30 additional satellites by 2025 to satisfy projected capacity and operational requirements.

The company’s RF data and analytics produce actionable insights for national, tactical and homeland security operations, maritime domain awareness, environmental protection and a growing number of new defense and commercial applications.

October 27, 2021
Trio of HawkEye 360 formation-flying microsatellites launched for RF geolocation

The HawkEye 360 constellation detects and geolocates RF signals for maritime situational awareness, emergency response, national security and spectrum analysis applications.

Cluster 3 satellites fly in formation, joining Clusters 1 and 2. (Artist’s rendering: Hawkeye 360)

HawkEye 360 Inc. announced the successful launch of its Cluster 3 radio frequency geolocation microsatellites built by Space Flight Laboratory (SFL). Carried aboard the June 30 SpaceX Transporter 2 mission, the Cluster 3 formation-flying microsatellites quickly established communication with the company’s satellite operations center. They join in orbit the HawkEye 360 Cluster 2 and Cluster 1 Pathfinder satellites.

The HawkEye 360 Constellation detects and geolocates RF signals for maritime situational awareness, emergency response, national security and spectrum analysis applications. Cluster 3 significantly expands HawkEye 360’s capacity, and is part of its second generation of advanced RF-sensing satellites.

“With the addition of our second-gen satellites, we’ll offer more frequent, timely and actionable data and insights to our government, commercial and humanitarian partners,” said CEO John Serafini.

“The increased revisit frequency and capacity Cluster 3 brings to our constellation are essential to detecting, characterizing, and understanding the continuously changing RF activity important to our clients,” said Alex Fox, Executive Vice President for Sales and Marketing.

Seven more clusters are fully funded and scheduled for launch in 2021 and 2022 to achieve collection revisits as frequent as every 20 minutes, Fox said. “Each cluster will offer new innovations to address a rapidly growing set of requirements needed by our defense, security and commerce clients. We plan on expanding the constellation past the initial 10 clusters to achieve near-persistent monitoring of global RF activity, which will drive even more value and ensure our continued dominance in the industry.”

HawkEye 360 delivers a layer of intelligence to help understand human activity on Earth. The constellation detects, characterizes and precisely geolocates these RF signals from a broad range of emitters, including VHF marine radios, UHF push-to-talk radios, maritime and land-based radar systems, L-band satellite devices and emergency beacons.

By processing and analyzing these RF data, the company delivers actionable insights for national, tactical and homeland security operations, maritime domain awareness, environmental protection and new applications in the commercial sector, the company said.

The HawkEye 360 launch brings to 20 the total number of SFL satellites placed into orbit in less than a year. The Cluster 3 satellites were built on SFL’s 30-kg Defiant microsatellite bus.

HawkEye 360 selected SFL due to the importance of formation flying by multiple satellites for successful RF geolocation. SFL is the acknowledged leader in developing and implementing high-performance attitude control systems that make it possible for relatively low-cost nanosatellites and microsatellites to fly in stable formations while in orbit.

The previous HawkEye 360 satellite clusters built by SFL were the Pathfinder launched in 2018 and Cluster 2 in January. Each Cluster is comprised of three satellites.

Other launches of SFL-built satellites in the past year include missions developed for the Norwegian Space Agency (NOSA) in Norway, the Dubai-based Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC) in the United Arab Emirates, GHGSat Inc. of Canada, Space-SI of Slovenia, and a Canada-based telecommunications company.

July 3, 2021
An overview of the latest PNT satellite launches

Satellites NTS-1, 2 and 3. (Illustration: Lt. Jacob Lutz, AFRL Space Vehicles Directorate)

Just last month we celebrated the kickoff of the GPS III campaign, reporting on the launch of the first space vehicle of that generation in the closing days of 2018. A new era had begun, heralded by a rocket’s blazing path, bearing aloft a new “lighthouse in the sky serving all humankind.”

Turn around and — whoa! Where did all these other new PNT satellites come from?

We attempt to chronicle them all in this issue, though I’m not sure we haven’t still missed some.

For years we’ve been talking about the Iridium constellation, a low-Earth orbit telecommunication network that can also deliver timing services to improve accuracy, and signal acquisition in urban environments. Were it not for the fact that 10 more of its satellites just launched in January, bringing the total of its second-generation NEXT constellation to 75, this would practically qualify as old news.

But let’s move on to the real new news. NTS-3 is the new kid on the block most closely related to the GPS family. In fact, integrally a part of it. This third Navigation Technology Satellite will go even beyond GPS III — whose capabilities, mark you, are not yet online — to investigate new experimental antennas, flexible and secure signals, increased automation and use of commercial ground assets.

Learn about 72 nanosatellites of the Spire constellation piggybacking on Galileo signals to offer GNSS radio occultation products for the weather community. This may not be exactly direct-to-user PNT, but it’s a derivative.

Finally, absorb the latest on Hawkeye 360 formation-flying Pathfinders, designed to detect and geolocate radio frequency (RF) signals, and use the data in search-and-rescue as well as commercial maritime operations.

Don’t stop there! Read about Planet, the breadloaf satellites, current population 300 with more coming, beaming down 1.2 million high-resolution Earthly images per day, useful for agriculture, defense, mapping and GIS, and a few other industries.

If a group of satellites is a constellation, what do you call a group of constellations? If we are to follow astronomy’s lead, I’ve just learned that the proper technical term is an asterism. However, I think galaxy will be easier to handle.

February 19, 2019
Microsatellite constellation geolocates RF signals

Space Flight Laboratory (SFL) has launched three formation-flying HawkEye 360 Pathfinder 15-kilogram, 20 x 27 x 44-centimeter microsatellites designed to detect and geolocate radio frequency (RF) signals.

Hawkeye 360 Pathfinder satellite trio flies in formation, seeking RF signals from Earth. (Image: UTIAS Space Flight Laboratory)

The target signals emanate from VHF radios, maritime radar systems, automatic identification system (AIS) beacons, very small aperture terminal (VSAT) communication systems and emergency beacons. HawkEye 360 applies advanced RF analytics to the data to assess suspicious vessel activity, survey communication frequency interference and direct search-and-rescue.

Precise formation flying is critical, as the relative position of each satellite must be known to accurately geolocate transmission sources. The satellites carry space-qualified GPS receivers and high-performance attitude control systems to keep them stable in orbit.

Flying in formation, two or all three satellites may receive the same transmission when it originates from their common footprint. The signal’s different times of arrival at each satellite and their different apparent center frequencies (Doppler) will enable onboard comparison of time-of-arrival and frequency-of-arrival measurements to then calculate the transmitter’s position.

The onboard GPS receivers provide precise estimates for the position and velocity of the receivers, information required for multilateration. The satellites further synchronize their clocks using GPS receivers, which also stabilize the phase-locked loops governing the tuning frequency in the RF tuners.

The satellites were built by Deep Space Industries of San Jose, California, and University of Toronto, Institute for Aerospace Studies/Space Flight Laboratory (UTIAS/SFL). They were launched in December 2018 into low-Earth orbit.

February 8, 2019