17 ms·

ADS-B Exchange – Co-op of unfiltered flight data

438 points by AWildC182 7y ago

AWildC182 7y ago
Context: As of the beginning of 2020 all aircraft are required to have ADS-B out capability. This means that they periodically broadcast their GPS position unencrypted, along with their speed, altitude, heading and tail number. Most networks like Flight Aware allow owners to blacklist aircraft such that their tracks do not appear on the site. This is typical of corporate aviation departments and private jet owners as they don't want their movements to be available to rivals/hedge funds or the media. Additionally military aircraft are typically not reported. Edit: also, for those who are unaware, unlike license plates which are generally unsearchable, tail-numbers as reported by ADS-B are publicly searchable with registration and history information available on the FAA website: https://registry.faa.gov/aircraftinquiry/NNum_Results.aspx?NNumbertxt=N887WM https://registry.faa.gov/aircraftinquiry/NNum_Results.aspx?N...
- TigeriusKirk 7y ago
  Not quite all aircraft are required to have ADS-B in all situations, there are a number of edge cases out there. But close enough, I suppose, and most planes people would want to track are required to have it. However, there's also a new privacy initiative that allows aircraft to fly under temporary ids. The FAA will still know who they are, but for 3rd parties it will become much more difficult to determine. https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2019/december/24/ads-b-privacy-now-available https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2019/december/2...
  - AWildC182 7y ago
    Good points all around. I figured the exceptions were esoteric enough to not bother with immediately but are very valid. I'm interested in seeing where the proposal goes. I'm not sure where I stand on the issue but I'm curious of others opinions.
  - ianburrell 7y ago
    Also, the US allows using UAT on 978 MHz for ADS-B requirement for planes below 18,000 ft. Most SDRs only decode 1090 MHz signal. It is possible to decode 978 MHz but requires more work to support both.
    - superkuh 7y ago
      I know what you mean, you mean the software for SDRs is mostly geared towards tuning to 1090 MHz and decoding ADS-B pulses there. But to be clear: the SDR's tuners are rarely limited that way. Most can tune to 978 MHz even easier than 1090 MHz. Covering the entire VHF to UHF range is pretty typical.
      - crankylinuxuser 7y ago
        When I've set up P25 receivers, it's common to use 2-4 RTL-SDR's to do the bulk of listening. Each rtl-sdr gets set with a different center freq, and the control channel tells when and where to listen. You can build a P25 listener for less than $100.
        someguydave 7y ago
        which software do you use to demodulate P25? gnuradio?
        crankylinuxuser 7y ago
        I use https://github.com/robotastic/trunk-recorder https://github.com/robotastic/trunk-recorder You'll use https://www.radioreference.com https://www.radioreference.com and get the appropriate control and voice channels for your area. You'll also get the talkgroups and put them in a CSV. From there, you'll use http://garvas.org/trunk-recorder/ http://garvas.org/trunk-recorder/ to determine how many RTL-SDR dongles (or others) you'll need, along with their respective center frequencies. Note that you'll copy/paste the relevant control/voice line for your p25 from radioreferece.com From there, just define where to store the files on the drive, and off it goes. There's a python webserver ( https://github.com/ScanOC/trunk-player https://github.com/ScanOC/trunk-player ) you can install for on-prem, and/or you can also upload it to openmhz website ( https://github.com/robotastic/trunk-recorder/wiki/Uploading-to-OpenMHz https://github.com/robotastic/trunk-recorder/wiki/Uploading-... ).
  - ATsch 7y ago
    I hope not. Unlike car license plates, if you own a plane what you're doing with it is very much in the publics interest to know, especially if you don't want people to know. They can have their privacy while they aren't flying polluting multi-million dollar planes through the country and above our buildings.
    - dvtrn 7y ago
      Private Crop dusting pilots flying over cornfields in southern Nebraska aren’t flying over your buildings mate.
      - ATsch 7y ago
        Private Crop dusing pilots aren't trying to hide themselves from the airplane maps, so this is irrelevant to the point.
        dvtrn 7y ago
        I would beg to differ and could probably accurately guess that several ag pilots I know would as well.
        tjohns 7y ago
        I'd say they're more likely to be hiding themselves from the map than your average commercial flight. Pilots of small aircraft are just as sensitive about giving up their privacy as anyone else. Would you want your name, address, and position broadcast on the internet every time you get in your car?
        dvtrn 7y ago
        Not just sensitive about their privacy, but there is a particularly ornery set of opinions among rural pilots regarding the government “telling me how to tend my own farm” which I think is at the root of what we see at the surface as being “privacy concerns”. So when someone says these types of aviators aren’t trying to hide themselves I’m highly skeptical on just how well-versed the speaker is with the issues and perspectives this class people have with more and more expensive operating requirements being put on them with diminishing returns for their compliance. Then again, this perspective isn't in line with "rich moguls and their private personal jets" and represents a blue-collar voice that gets left out of discussions in this community with a frustrating frequency; so I'm really not surprised, either. Hell go talk to some ground-based truckers how they feel about having their routes tracked by logistics companies who book them for loads. There’s videos all over YouTube from long haul truckers complaining about faceless entities demanding they install tracking systems or download GPS enabled apps and the constant complaint is “don’t tell me how to drive my truck" These operators want autonomy.
- jacquesm 7y ago
  I wonder whether those hedge fund people have smartphones and if they do whether they choose Apple, Android or do not care. That would be pretty valuable information in the wrong hands, all it takes is one silly game with a permission too many and your goose is cooked.
  - preinheimer 7y ago
    On apple at least there's a lot of repeat asks these days. It doesn't just ask "can X use location data", it asks you a day later "hey X has been using location data while in the background do you still want to allow this". Then again more days later, and again. On iOS at least I think this door is closing.
  - kortilla 7y ago
    I think you’re misunderstanding. Hedge fund people want the locations of CEOs, CFOs, mergers and acquisitions lawyers, etc because they can infer a lot about potential deals (or issues). Nobody usually cares where the hedge fund analysts themselves are.
- plugger 7y ago
  Correction Context: As of the beginning of 2020 all aircraft in the United States are required to have ADS-B out capability.
  - xylophone 7y ago
    some exceptions: As such, we have concluded that the same aircraft excluded from the transponder requirement are excluded from the ADS-B Out equipage. Accordingly, an aircraft that subsequently has been installed with batteries or an electric starter would not be required to equip for ADS-B Out. The FAA may consider a technical amendment in the future to remove any confusion due to the discrepancy between the language in§ 91.215(a)(5) and§ 91.225(e). https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/agc/practice_areas/regulations/interpretations/data/interps/2017/schober%20-%20(2017)%20legal%20interpretation.pdf https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/ag... see also https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2017/january/19/ads-b-requirement-clarified-for-nonelectrical-aircraft https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2017/january/19...
  - jdubner 7y ago
    This is not true. ADS-B OUT is required to fly in certain classes of airspace, above 10,000 feet, etc. -- anywhere a transponder is currently required. That's all. That leaves a lot of airspace in the US. Someone flying his C182 in eastern Wyoming may not bother with it as he does not see any benefit. Here in western Oregon, I see the benefit (weather and traffic via ADS-B IN) and have equipped my aircraft even though I (mostly) avoid the airspace where it is required.
    - plugger 7y ago
      Thanks for the info. I had read it was becoming mandatory in the US in 2020. That was in the context of Australian regulations where aircraft still aren't forced to have ADS-B.
- nkurz 7y ago
  > Most networks like Flight Aware allow owners to blacklist aircraft such that their tracks do not appear on the site. Do you know more about how this is done? Is there a fixed price list for this service? Can one "buy" it online? Is there some sort of registry that is shared between networks? > Additionally military aircraft are typically not reported. While I'm sure the military can turn off transponders at will, I presume (?) they often fly with them on. Can these signals be tracked with "standard" gear when they are on?
  - Maxious 7y ago
    The FAA runs the blocking programs, there's no fee https://www.fly.faa.gov/ASDI/asdi.html https://www.fly.faa.gov/ASDI/asdi.html https://ladd.faa.gov/ https://ladd.faa.gov/ A copy of the ASDI block list is on https://www.muckrock.com/foi/united-states-of-america-10/faa-list-of-blocked-aircraft-barr-listasdi-block-list-34713/#file-126912 https://www.muckrock.com/foi/united-states-of-america-10/faa... The FAA also has a new program to hand out pseudonymous aircraft identifiers via commercial providers so there probably is a fee for that https://www.faa.gov/nextgen/equipadsb/privacy/ https://www.faa.gov/nextgen/equipadsb/privacy/
    - adsbx-james 7y ago
      FlightAware sells blocking services and dashboards. Don't be fooled, the privacy lobbying is only to make more money for FlightAware and FlightRada24. Feeders sending them free data for fake enterprise dashboards and fake "$89 value" accounts have made David Baker a multi-millionaire.
      - flak48 7y ago
        *Daniel Baker
  - kitteh 7y ago
    I've heard that the first few years of flightaware they made most of their money in taking requests for not publishing specific aircraft. As for military stuff - they have additional capabilities for their transponders that provide for responding to interrogators (think identify friend or foe - IFF systems). They're not supposed to disable transponders in the required airspace - they've got to comply with the FAA rules too. There are situations where ATC transfers control over to the military where they are free to do more things. Like in a hot military operating area (MOA) or when ATC transfers traffic separation to the military (MARSA).
- Mountain_Skies 7y ago
  This will be an interesting wrinkle for US college athletics. Coaches defecting to another university after secret negotiations has become very common. Watching the flights of university owned aircraft and those of prominent boosters has become a way of detecting that such negotiations might be taking place. While public universities would have a difficult time justifying paying to hide their flight data, private universities and boosters have both the means and motive to do so. A source like ADS-B Exchange neutralizes this tactic.
- sandos 7y ago
  I don't believe private owners are the most interesting black-listed things. Military aircraft anyone? Who doesn't want to see those :) I noticed a helo circling with a huuge spotlight a mile or so from my house, and the skies were empty according to flightradar24, but ads-b exchange showd me that it was a police helicopter. I can see the reason for blacklisting those, so the people being chased cant easily track the helicopter? Otoh theyre bloody obvious due to their noisiness imo so I dont think it would matter one bit for the 1% of criminals aware enough to use flightradar24 to somehow evade capture..
- zerd 7y ago
  I wonder if any of the security threats brought up in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXv1j3GbgLk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXv1j3GbgLk has been addressed. (Fun demo at 42:00)
jmccorm 7y ago
I think I'm willing to take one of my RTL-SDR dongles, hook it up to the Raspberry Pi, and start giving them a regular feed. If only just to identify a few pesky helicopters that fly over the house that aren't showing up on flightradar24 like everything else. I can appreciate this service.
- 650REDHAIR 7y ago
  Yeah I paid for FR24 and notice a lot of aircraft “flying under the radar” and aren’t marked. This is neat.
- AWildC182 7y ago
  This was actually how I stumbled upon it. There was a helicopter with a camera gimbal and what appeared to be a radar pod of some sort circling my city. I wanted to see if it was related to our local dystopian-augmented-reality-aerial-imaging-startup and lo and behold, their similarly unlisted cessna caravan covered in camera and weapon pylons was flying nearby...
  - 650REDHAIR 7y ago
    Tail number? That sounds like something interesting to watch!
    - AWildC182 7y ago
      N208CN
      - exikyut 7y ago
        I wonder if that will change. (If it can change? Probably yes...)
      - dsalzman 7y ago
        https://churchillnavigation.com/ https://churchillnavigation.com/
    - 7y ago
milofeynman 7y ago
I would like to set one of these up. Is there an extensive guide that explains where to put the sensor, how to setup the pi, etc?
- milofeynman 7y ago
  This site has a getting started section: https://www.adsbexchange.com/how-to-feed/ https://www.adsbexchange.com/how-to-feed/ but I want to know the hardware to buy, the right place to put the receiver etc. Last time I did this (broadcasting police radio to broadcastify) it was a lot of forum searching and I'm hoping to avoid that this time.
  - UnifiedTechs 7y ago
    ADS-B Exchange has a very active Discord channel where they will help you pick the right equipment and walk you though the setup process. https://discord.gg/JJ6QC4c https://discord.gg/JJ6QC4c
- yardie 7y ago
  I've been using a Pi for a while to track ADS-B and AIS. If you haven't purchased the hardware yet head over to https://www.nooelec.com/store/ https://www.nooelec.com/store/ to get the SDR dongles. And then grab the latest Dump1090 https://github.com/antirez/dump1090 https://github.com/antirez/dump1090 As for guides. It's a pretty big community so just use the keywords from above [RTL-SDR, ADSB, DUMP1090] and you should get a lot of guides on tracking aircraft.
  - milofeynman 7y ago
    Thank you!
    - _april 7y ago
      There's also this: https://github.com/wiedehopf/adsb-wiki/wiki/adsb-receiver-shopping-list https://github.com/wiedehopf/adsb-wiki/wiki/adsb-receiver-sh...
throw0101a 7y ago
If one is not using the services of air traffic control (ATC) by flying either IFR or using flight following, i.e., flying VFR, and if one's transponder supports the functionality, it is possible to fly in an anonymous fashion (while still giving position information): * https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2019/february/pilot/ads-b-incognito https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2019/february/p... What happens is that the transponder generates a random self-assigned temporary ICAO ID number. This is for UAT only. * https://www.avweb.com/aviation-news/faa-acts-to-preserve-ads-b-data-privacy/ https://www.avweb.com/aviation-news/faa-acts-to-preserve-ads... So people can tell that someone is flying in a particular position, but not who.
bronco21016 7y ago
It’s surprising to me that AOPA and NBAA have still been pushing the privacy angle on this stuff so much still. I guess that’s part of their lobbying mission though. As someone else pointed out all of these executives carry cell phones and as the recent NY Times series pointed out the things are leaking out location data everywhere. Competitors and hedge funds likely aren’t using ADS-B data to track movements when they can get significantly better data elsewhere. I wonder if high level executives have any kind of training and protocols for avoiding cell phone location tracking.
- HeWhoLurksLate 7y ago
  But more data, and more data types = more precision and accuracy.
- raquo 7y ago
  You don't need to be a high level executive to not want to broadcast your location and identity in realtime for anyone to see. This isn't about your choices with mobile devices, this is mandated by the government, and the broadcasted data is literally open to anyone.
- kitteh 7y ago
  Remember that a lot of folks use fractional air charters for their business needs which provide basically no information about whose in the planes. I know of a few large corporations that own their own jets that when they have to go for something sensitive (M&A activities) they go on fractional operators (netjets, etc.). Last year was talking to a crew who told me all the diff M&A related flights they flew.
AndrewBissell 7y ago
Eric Rosenwald used this information to track the movements of Jeffrey Epstein's plane. Among other things, he found that the plane was in Riyadh on the eve of the 2016 U.S. presidential election, at the same time Jeff Bezos was there to meet with MBS: http://www.ericrosenwaldphotography.com/jeffrey-epstein-business-jets-report http://www.ericrosenwaldphotography.com/jeffrey-epstein-busi... https://www.insider.com/epstein-riyadh-saudi-arabia-private-jet-2019-9 https://www.insider.com/epstein-riyadh-saudi-arabia-private-... The TrueAnon podcast had an interesting discussion with him where he speaks at length about ADS-B: https://www.patreon.com/posts/episode-36-in-33247305 https://www.patreon.com/posts/episode-36-in-33247305
- adsbx-james 7y ago
  ADSBx was happy to help with that and more! https://www.businessinsider.com/us-intelligence-drones-over-the-black-sea-getting-russian-response-2018-4 https://www.businessinsider.com/us-intelligence-drones-over-... https://www.businessinsider.com/us-sanctions-cause-russian-tycoon-oleg-deripaska-to-lose-private-jets-2018-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/us-sanctions-cause-russian-t... https://www.insider.com/jeffrey-epsteins-private-jet-flight-data-2019-7/commerce-on-business-insider https://www.insider.com/jeffrey-epsteins-private-jet-flight-...
saber6 7y ago
I like this. I think this data should be open-sourced, and recorded forever, without the ability to be changed. Maybe a good use for blockchain? (Please don't downvote!) FWIW: I have been streaming FR24 my ADS-B data for a few years. In return they give you a business account ($50/mo value). Back to the main point: Even the FR24 business-class account data is filtered. Given that this is an open protocol to begin with, I think the data should be recored "straight up" and made available to the public as a common service (benefit). Future thoughts: Imagine if we had tons of people incentivized to deploy these? We could make "cyber" phased arrays on a massive scale by doing time of arrival analysis and so on. It could supplement the FAA primary/secondary radar system on a huge level. Perhaps even provide dense ATC control for drone operations where deploying primary/secondary radars is not feasible. Just my $.02!
- mopsi 7y ago
  > Imagine if we had tons of people incentivized to deploy these? We could make "cyber" phased arrays on a massive scale by doing time of arrival analysis and so on. This is already going on. Some transponders don't report position (often seen on older turboprop airliners in Europe), so feeds from multiple receivers are combined to triangulate them. It's called multilateration (MLAT). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multilateration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multilateration
- nkurz 7y ago
  > I have been streaming FR24 my ADS-B data for a few years. In return they give you a business account ($50/mo value). I haven't done it myself, but if you are located somewhere that their network doesn't have good coverage, they'll even send you a free receiver and antenna to get you started: https://www.flightradar24.com/apply-for-receiver https://www.flightradar24.com/apply-for-receiver
  - UnifiedTechs 7y ago
    So will ADS-B Exchange.
- tjohns 7y ago
  For what it's worth, the FAA has been pretty explicit that they don't want drones on ADS-B. There's not enough bandwidth. They have a proposal to create a parallel tracking system just for drones. It's created quite the uproar in the drone/model-aircraft community.
NelsonMinar 7y ago
There's a similar open sharing service for tracking ships in the water: http://www.aishub.net/ http://www.aishub.net/ AIS technology works similar to ADS-B, but the details of being on the water make reception a different problem than for planes. There's three or so major ground-based AIS tracking services out there that compete, and while AISHub isn't the biggest it is the most open.
- wpietri 7y ago
  I've been participating in AISHub for a few years and really enjoy it. One of my projects is @sfships, a Twitter bot that announces major ships entering and leaving SF Bay: https://twitter.com/sfships https://twitter.com/sfships I also built a Python AIS parsing library with a bunch of command-line tools (e.g., aisgrep, ais2json): https://github.com/wpietri/simpleais https://github.com/wpietri/simpleais If anybody ends up using this, please let me know. On Twitter, I'm @williampietri. I have also been keeping a copy of all the AIS data for the last few years, and am happy to share it.
  - adsbx-james 7y ago
    Interested in adding ADS-B to some of those AIS devices? ADSBx is always looking to partner for win-win installs!
    - wpietri 7y ago
      I only have one receiver myself, on the north edge of SF, but I'm happy to set up ADS-B if you aren't covered here yet. Contact me via email or Twitter if you'd like.
  - mike_d 7y ago
    Very cool Twitter feed! Would you consider adding a second account that doesn't include cargo/tanker ships so I can follow and turn on notifications?
    - wpietri 7y ago
upofadown 7y ago
I ran across an administrative way to hide the ownership of an aircraft today. Something showed up as blocked on one of the other trackers, ADS-B Exchange gave me an N number that was for an aircraft owned by some sort of trust company. That trust company listed anonymity as one of the features of their service.
- zymhan 7y ago
  Yeah I see plenty of jets flying into Atlanta that're owned by Wells Fargo Trust
  - bronco21016 7y ago
    Fortunately, more and more of them are owned by DAL instead of a bank.
jjwiseman 7y ago
I have a receiver that I use to feed the ADS-B Exchange network. In return I get an API key that I use to power a collection of twitter bots that tweet whenever they detect, in realtime, aircraft circling over various metro areas: https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesSF https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesSF https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesDC https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesDC The bots have detected police and news helicopters and fixed wing aircraft, military aircraft (https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesSF/status/1227832420918935552 https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesSF/status/1227832420918935552), blimps (https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1213310909302493184 https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1213310909302493184), autogryos (https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1216464781869121536 https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1216464781869121536), power line inspection helicopters (https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1210280545952776193 https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1210280545952776193), and helicopters filming race cars (https://twitter.com/lemonodor/status/1228100397337702400 https://twitter.com/lemonodor/status/1228100397337702400). ADS-B Exchange is the only completely uncensored, global aircraft tracking network. And it's powered by a considerable amount of specialized open source software. Even the multilateration client (https://github.com/adsbxchange/mlat-client https://github.com/adsbxchange/mlat-client) and server (https://github.com/adsbxchange/mlat-server https://github.com/adsbxchange/mlat-server) code that can determine an aircraft's position even when it's not broadcasting its coordinates, using the time-of-arrival information from multiple receivers, is online. tar1090 (https://github.com/wiedehopf/tar1090 https://github.com/wiedehopf/tar1090) is a much more efficient replacement for the old Virtual Radar Server front-end that is currently under development, and can be tried at https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/ https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/
- jjwiseman 7y ago
  And if you want a view into some of the current status of the ADS-B Exchange multilateration (MLAT) network, check out the sync stats page: http://www.adsbx.org/sync/ http://www.adsbx.org/sync/ Select a region to see the details. For example, here are the feeder health stats for the southwestern U.S.: http://www.adsbx.org/sync/1B/ http://www.adsbx.org/sync/1B/ And here's the map of feeder locations in that region: http://www.adsbexchange.com/coverage-1B/ http://www.adsbexchange.com/coverage-1B/
sneak 7y ago
Does anyone know of a similar thing for Wi-Fi stumble output? The wigle.net database is not public.
OrgNet 7y ago
I scanned the waves around my home for aircrafts and it was fairly common to see an airplane in the sky that wasn't broadcasting any signal
jjwiseman 7y ago
And if anyone wants to help contribute data, there are a few ways to get started. 1. The minimal: Raspberry Pi and an RTL-SDR dongle. You can even use the small stock antenna that often comes with a dongle, if you put it near a window. 2. A real 1090 MHz antenna, plus filter + amp will greatly increase your performance, and cost less than $100. Weidehopf has a shopping list: https://github.com/wiedehopf/adsb-wiki/wiki/adsb-receiver-shopping-list https://github.com/wiedehopf/adsb-wiki/wiki/adsb-receiver-sh... As does flightaware: https://flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/build https://flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/build Software-wise, you have a couple nearly-turnkey solutions. The easiest thing is just to follow the guide at https://www.adsbexchange.com/how-to-feed/ https://www.adsbexchange.com/how-to-feed/ You can even use their custom Raspberry Pi image, and instantly have dashboards and maps and all the cool stuff.
- toomuchtodo 7y ago
  Any “one click buy” resources where I can simply pay for a device to be shipped and put it on my network to ship data back? I have several locations in the US I could colocate such devices.
  - UnifiedTechs 7y ago
    There are a number of places, ADS-B Exchange sells a preconfigured kit on their website. If the location is one with weak coverage they may even send one to you for free, definitely worth reaching out to them if nothing more then to ask about a bulk discount.
    - toomuchtodo 7y ago
      Thank you!
  - sorenjan 7y ago
    https://www.flightradar24.com/apply-for-receiver https://www.flightradar24.com/apply-for-receiver https://flightaware.com/adsb/request https://flightaware.com/adsb/request
not_exactly__ 7y ago
Also for those interested, check out the FAA's SWIM streaming API. it's a firehose but lots of cool stuff you can do with it. https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/swim/ https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/swim/
jjwiseman 7y ago
ADS-B Exchange also gives data to the Center for Advanced Defense Studies' (C4ADS) Project Peregrine, with the goal to "expose the airborne movements of corrupt global elites, dodgy public officials, and a vast array of illicit and criminal actors including wildlife traffickers and conflict financiers." https://easychair.org/publications/download/wbQQ https://easychair.org/publications/download/wbQQ
- adsbx-james 7y ago
  Don't forget the United Nations, OCCRP, and investigative journalists globally! https://dictatoralert.org/ https://dictatoralert.org/ https://tech.occrp.org/ https://tech.occrp.org/ https://marketplace.officialstatistics.org/partner/adsb_exchange/ https://marketplace.officialstatistics.org/partner/adsb_exch... https://gijn.org/planespotting-a-guide-to-tracking-aircraft-around-the-world/ https://gijn.org/planespotting-a-guide-to-tracking-aircraft-...
swsieber 7y ago
Oh, this will be fun. We somewhat often get Helicopters near my house. Setting up a dongle / tapping the feed will let me build a heads up tracker so I can anticipate them and prep daughter to spot them (because she loves aircraft).
SergeAx 7y ago
The license plate of an auto is clear-text and can be visible by any individual happened to be around. Is it okay to deploy a network of cameras with real-time plate detection software ($100 setup) to record and broadcast positions of all cars in the world? Is it at least legal?
- nougatbyte 7y ago
  At least Here in Germany it would be illegal. Even a dummy camera pointing at public area isn't allowed for a private person
- tree3 7y ago
  In the US, that would probably be legal as long as you have the right to set up a camera at those locations (meaning, your property plus anyone else you get permission from).
- gspr 7y ago
  A license plate is akin to a person talking on the street — audible to a few others, yes, but not meant for everyone perhaps. An ADS-B transmission is akin to someone putting the same words in a radio ad. Recording the latter seems completely different to me, privacy wise.
  - SergeAx 7y ago
    Person talking on a street wants to be heard by peers from one meter. Plane flying in the sky should be "heard" by other planes from tens of kilometers. It is a technical necessity, not a voluntary privacy surrender.
- Moru 7y ago
  The collection is already being done by a private company, just not broadcasting it freely, you have to pay for access. And they do sell it on to other actors ofcourse :-) Crowdsourcing data. https://www.drnrecovery.com/ https://www.drnrecovery.com/
janee 7y ago
For anyone interested in something similar but for sea vessels check https://www.aishub.net/rpiais https://www.aishub.net/rpiais Also...the DCSA (Digital Container Shipping Association) recently published the first API spec for shipping lines to provide tracking info to the public https://github.com/dcsaorg/DCSA-OpenAPI https://github.com/dcsaorg/DCSA-OpenAPI Glad to see industries moving towards more open standardized API.
artembugara 7y ago
Does anyone use this data to calculate the insurance price for General Aviation (small private jets)?
- adsbx-james 7y ago
  Yes and No. It has been attempted by a company in the UK, that would raise your rates of you fly in conditions that they deem risky. I think market is so niche and unprofitable that this large data analysis is seem as an unneeded expense for underwriting.
  - AWildC182 7y ago
    I definitely see things going in this direction eventually however. They've been trying to push it with cars for a while now, doing it with aircraft is trivial by comparison
  - artembugara 7y ago
    Can I get more info about this case? What exactly did they do?
adsbx-james 7y ago
https://adsbexchange.com/data/ https://adsbexchange.com/data/ Setup a reliable feeder sending data to ADSBexchange.com and get a REST API key that would cost you $100,000+ a month from FlightAware or FlightRadar24. Non-commercial enthusiast use only. And please be kind to API, no sending 10,000 requests a second. https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/ https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/ All this data at your finger tips, are you hackers or not! Let's make something useful and fun!

438 points by AWildC182 7y ago

Context: As of the beginning of 2020 all aircraft are required to have ADS-B out capability. This means that they periodically broadcast their GPS position unencrypted, along with their speed, altitude, heading and tail number. Most networks like Flight Aware allow owners to blacklist aircraft such that their tracks do not appear on the site. This is typical of corporate aviation departments and private jet owners as they don't want their movements to be available to rivals/hedge funds or the media. Additionally military aircraft are typically not reported. Edit: also, for those who are unaware, unlike license plates which are generally unsearchable, tail-numbers as reported by ADS-B are publicly searchable with registration and history information available on the FAA website: https://registry.faa.gov/aircraftinquiry/NNum_Results.aspx?NNumbertxt=N887WM https://registry.faa.gov/aircraftinquiry/NNum_Results.aspx?N...

TigeriusKirk 7y ago
Not quite all aircraft are required to have ADS-B in all situations, there are a number of edge cases out there. But close enough, I suppose, and most planes people would want to track are required to have it. However, there's also a new privacy initiative that allows aircraft to fly under temporary ids. The FAA will still know who they are, but for 3rd parties it will become much more difficult to determine. https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2019/december/24/ads-b-privacy-now-available https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2019/december/2...
- AWildC182 7y ago
  Good points all around. I figured the exceptions were esoteric enough to not bother with immediately but are very valid. I'm interested in seeing where the proposal goes. I'm not sure where I stand on the issue but I'm curious of others opinions.
- ianburrell 7y ago
  Also, the US allows using UAT on 978 MHz for ADS-B requirement for planes below 18,000 ft. Most SDRs only decode 1090 MHz signal. It is possible to decode 978 MHz but requires more work to support both.
  - superkuh 7y ago
    I know what you mean, you mean the software for SDRs is mostly geared towards tuning to 1090 MHz and decoding ADS-B pulses there. But to be clear: the SDR's tuners are rarely limited that way. Most can tune to 978 MHz even easier than 1090 MHz. Covering the entire VHF to UHF range is pretty typical.
    - crankylinuxuser 7y ago
      When I've set up P25 receivers, it's common to use 2-4 RTL-SDR's to do the bulk of listening. Each rtl-sdr gets set with a different center freq, and the control channel tells when and where to listen. You can build a P25 listener for less than $100.
      - someguydave 7y ago
        which software do you use to demodulate P25? gnuradio?
        crankylinuxuser 7y ago
        I use https://github.com/robotastic/trunk-recorder https://github.com/robotastic/trunk-recorder You'll use https://www.radioreference.com https://www.radioreference.com and get the appropriate control and voice channels for your area. You'll also get the talkgroups and put them in a CSV. From there, you'll use http://garvas.org/trunk-recorder/ http://garvas.org/trunk-recorder/ to determine how many RTL-SDR dongles (or others) you'll need, along with their respective center frequencies. Note that you'll copy/paste the relevant control/voice line for your p25 from radioreferece.com From there, just define where to store the files on the drive, and off it goes. There's a python webserver ( https://github.com/ScanOC/trunk-player https://github.com/ScanOC/trunk-player ) you can install for on-prem, and/or you can also upload it to openmhz website ( https://github.com/robotastic/trunk-recorder/wiki/Uploading-to-OpenMHz https://github.com/robotastic/trunk-recorder/wiki/Uploading-... ).
- ATsch 7y ago
  I hope not. Unlike car license plates, if you own a plane what you're doing with it is very much in the publics interest to know, especially if you don't want people to know. They can have their privacy while they aren't flying polluting multi-million dollar planes through the country and above our buildings.
  - dvtrn 7y ago
    Private Crop dusting pilots flying over cornfields in southern Nebraska aren’t flying over your buildings mate.
    - ATsch 7y ago
      Private Crop dusing pilots aren't trying to hide themselves from the airplane maps, so this is irrelevant to the point.
      - dvtrn 7y ago
        I would beg to differ and could probably accurately guess that several ag pilots I know would as well.
      - tjohns 7y ago
        I'd say they're more likely to be hiding themselves from the map than your average commercial flight. Pilots of small aircraft are just as sensitive about giving up their privacy as anyone else. Would you want your name, address, and position broadcast on the internet every time you get in your car?
        dvtrn 7y ago
        Not just sensitive about their privacy, but there is a particularly ornery set of opinions among rural pilots regarding the government “telling me how to tend my own farm” which I think is at the root of what we see at the surface as being “privacy concerns”. So when someone says these types of aviators aren’t trying to hide themselves I’m highly skeptical on just how well-versed the speaker is with the issues and perspectives this class people have with more and more expensive operating requirements being put on them with diminishing returns for their compliance. Then again, this perspective isn't in line with "rich moguls and their private personal jets" and represents a blue-collar voice that gets left out of discussions in this community with a frustrating frequency; so I'm really not surprised, either. Hell go talk to some ground-based truckers how they feel about having their routes tracked by logistics companies who book them for loads. There’s videos all over YouTube from long haul truckers complaining about faceless entities demanding they install tracking systems or download GPS enabled apps and the constant complaint is “don’t tell me how to drive my truck" These operators want autonomy.
jacquesm 7y ago
I wonder whether those hedge fund people have smartphones and if they do whether they choose Apple, Android or do not care. That would be pretty valuable information in the wrong hands, all it takes is one silly game with a permission too many and your goose is cooked.
- preinheimer 7y ago
  On apple at least there's a lot of repeat asks these days. It doesn't just ask "can X use location data", it asks you a day later "hey X has been using location data while in the background do you still want to allow this". Then again more days later, and again. On iOS at least I think this door is closing.
- kortilla 7y ago
  I think you’re misunderstanding. Hedge fund people want the locations of CEOs, CFOs, mergers and acquisitions lawyers, etc because they can infer a lot about potential deals (or issues). Nobody usually cares where the hedge fund analysts themselves are.
plugger 7y ago
Correction Context: As of the beginning of 2020 all aircraft in the United States are required to have ADS-B out capability.
- xylophone 7y ago
  some exceptions: As such, we have concluded that the same aircraft excluded from the transponder requirement are excluded from the ADS-B Out equipage. Accordingly, an aircraft that subsequently has been installed with batteries or an electric starter would not be required to equip for ADS-B Out. The FAA may consider a technical amendment in the future to remove any confusion due to the discrepancy between the language in§ 91.215(a)(5) and§ 91.225(e). https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/agc/practice_areas/regulations/interpretations/data/interps/2017/schober%20-%20(2017)%20legal%20interpretation.pdf https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/ag... see also https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2017/january/19/ads-b-requirement-clarified-for-nonelectrical-aircraft https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2017/january/19...
- jdubner 7y ago
  This is not true. ADS-B OUT is required to fly in certain classes of airspace, above 10,000 feet, etc. -- anywhere a transponder is currently required. That's all. That leaves a lot of airspace in the US. Someone flying his C182 in eastern Wyoming may not bother with it as he does not see any benefit. Here in western Oregon, I see the benefit (weather and traffic via ADS-B IN) and have equipped my aircraft even though I (mostly) avoid the airspace where it is required.
  - plugger 7y ago
    Thanks for the info. I had read it was becoming mandatory in the US in 2020. That was in the context of Australian regulations where aircraft still aren't forced to have ADS-B.
nkurz 7y ago
> Most networks like Flight Aware allow owners to blacklist aircraft such that their tracks do not appear on the site. Do you know more about how this is done? Is there a fixed price list for this service? Can one "buy" it online? Is there some sort of registry that is shared between networks? > Additionally military aircraft are typically not reported. While I'm sure the military can turn off transponders at will, I presume (?) they often fly with them on. Can these signals be tracked with "standard" gear when they are on?
- Maxious 7y ago
  The FAA runs the blocking programs, there's no fee https://www.fly.faa.gov/ASDI/asdi.html https://www.fly.faa.gov/ASDI/asdi.html https://ladd.faa.gov/ https://ladd.faa.gov/ A copy of the ASDI block list is on https://www.muckrock.com/foi/united-states-of-america-10/faa-list-of-blocked-aircraft-barr-listasdi-block-list-34713/#file-126912 https://www.muckrock.com/foi/united-states-of-america-10/faa... The FAA also has a new program to hand out pseudonymous aircraft identifiers via commercial providers so there probably is a fee for that https://www.faa.gov/nextgen/equipadsb/privacy/ https://www.faa.gov/nextgen/equipadsb/privacy/
  - adsbx-james 7y ago
    FlightAware sells blocking services and dashboards. Don't be fooled, the privacy lobbying is only to make more money for FlightAware and FlightRada24. Feeders sending them free data for fake enterprise dashboards and fake "$89 value" accounts have made David Baker a multi-millionaire.
    - flak48 7y ago
      *Daniel Baker
- kitteh 7y ago
  I've heard that the first few years of flightaware they made most of their money in taking requests for not publishing specific aircraft. As for military stuff - they have additional capabilities for their transponders that provide for responding to interrogators (think identify friend or foe - IFF systems). They're not supposed to disable transponders in the required airspace - they've got to comply with the FAA rules too. There are situations where ATC transfers control over to the military where they are free to do more things. Like in a hot military operating area (MOA) or when ATC transfers traffic separation to the military (MARSA).
Mountain_Skies 7y ago
This will be an interesting wrinkle for US college athletics. Coaches defecting to another university after secret negotiations has become very common. Watching the flights of university owned aircraft and those of prominent boosters has become a way of detecting that such negotiations might be taking place. While public universities would have a difficult time justifying paying to hide their flight data, private universities and boosters have both the means and motive to do so. A source like ADS-B Exchange neutralizes this tactic.
sandos 7y ago
I don't believe private owners are the most interesting black-listed things. Military aircraft anyone? Who doesn't want to see those :) I noticed a helo circling with a huuge spotlight a mile or so from my house, and the skies were empty according to flightradar24, but ads-b exchange showd me that it was a police helicopter. I can see the reason for blacklisting those, so the people being chased cant easily track the helicopter? Otoh theyre bloody obvious due to their noisiness imo so I dont think it would matter one bit for the 1% of criminals aware enough to use flightradar24 to somehow evade capture..
zerd 7y ago
I wonder if any of the security threats brought up in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXv1j3GbgLk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXv1j3GbgLk has been addressed. (Fun demo at 42:00)

jmccorm 7y ago

I think I'm willing to take one of my RTL-SDR dongles, hook it up to the Raspberry Pi, and start giving them a regular feed. If only just to identify a few pesky helicopters that fly over the house that aren't showing up on flightradar24 like everything else. I can appreciate this service.

650REDHAIR 7y ago
Yeah I paid for FR24 and notice a lot of aircraft “flying under the radar” and aren’t marked. This is neat.
AWildC182 7y ago
This was actually how I stumbled upon it. There was a helicopter with a camera gimbal and what appeared to be a radar pod of some sort circling my city. I wanted to see if it was related to our local dystopian-augmented-reality-aerial-imaging-startup and lo and behold, their similarly unlisted cessna caravan covered in camera and weapon pylons was flying nearby...
- 650REDHAIR 7y ago
  Tail number? That sounds like something interesting to watch!
  - AWildC182 7y ago
    N208CN
    - exikyut 7y ago
      I wonder if that will change. (If it can change? Probably yes...)
    - dsalzman 7y ago
      https://churchillnavigation.com/ https://churchillnavigation.com/
  - 7y ago

milofeynman 7y ago

I would like to set one of these up. Is there an extensive guide that explains where to put the sensor, how to setup the pi, etc?

milofeynman 7y ago
This site has a getting started section: https://www.adsbexchange.com/how-to-feed/ https://www.adsbexchange.com/how-to-feed/ but I want to know the hardware to buy, the right place to put the receiver etc. Last time I did this (broadcasting police radio to broadcastify) it was a lot of forum searching and I'm hoping to avoid that this time.
- UnifiedTechs 7y ago
  ADS-B Exchange has a very active Discord channel where they will help you pick the right equipment and walk you though the setup process. https://discord.gg/JJ6QC4c https://discord.gg/JJ6QC4c
yardie 7y ago
I've been using a Pi for a while to track ADS-B and AIS. If you haven't purchased the hardware yet head over to https://www.nooelec.com/store/ https://www.nooelec.com/store/ to get the SDR dongles. And then grab the latest Dump1090 https://github.com/antirez/dump1090 https://github.com/antirez/dump1090 As for guides. It's a pretty big community so just use the keywords from above [RTL-SDR, ADSB, DUMP1090] and you should get a lot of guides on tracking aircraft.
- milofeynman 7y ago
  Thank you!
  - _april 7y ago
    There's also this: https://github.com/wiedehopf/adsb-wiki/wiki/adsb-receiver-shopping-list https://github.com/wiedehopf/adsb-wiki/wiki/adsb-receiver-sh...

throw0101a 7y ago

If one is not using the services of air traffic control (ATC) by flying either IFR or using flight following, i.e., flying VFR, and if one's transponder supports the functionality, it is possible to fly in an anonymous fashion (while still giving position information): * https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2019/february/pilot/ads-b-incognito https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2019/february/p... What happens is that the transponder generates a random self-assigned temporary ICAO ID number. This is for UAT only. * https://www.avweb.com/aviation-news/faa-acts-to-preserve-ads-b-data-privacy/ https://www.avweb.com/aviation-news/faa-acts-to-preserve-ads... So people can tell that someone is flying in a particular position, but not who.

bronco21016 7y ago

It’s surprising to me that AOPA and NBAA have still been pushing the privacy angle on this stuff so much still. I guess that’s part of their lobbying mission though. As someone else pointed out all of these executives carry cell phones and as the recent NY Times series pointed out the things are leaking out location data everywhere. Competitors and hedge funds likely aren’t using ADS-B data to track movements when they can get significantly better data elsewhere. I wonder if high level executives have any kind of training and protocols for avoiding cell phone location tracking.

HeWhoLurksLate 7y ago
But more data, and more data types = more precision and accuracy.
raquo 7y ago
You don't need to be a high level executive to not want to broadcast your location and identity in realtime for anyone to see. This isn't about your choices with mobile devices, this is mandated by the government, and the broadcasted data is literally open to anyone.
kitteh 7y ago
Remember that a lot of folks use fractional air charters for their business needs which provide basically no information about whose in the planes. I know of a few large corporations that own their own jets that when they have to go for something sensitive (M&A activities) they go on fractional operators (netjets, etc.). Last year was talking to a crew who told me all the diff M&A related flights they flew.

AndrewBissell 7y ago

Eric Rosenwald used this information to track the movements of Jeffrey Epstein's plane. Among other things, he found that the plane was in Riyadh on the eve of the 2016 U.S. presidential election, at the same time Jeff Bezos was there to meet with MBS: http://www.ericrosenwaldphotography.com/jeffrey-epstein-business-jets-report http://www.ericrosenwaldphotography.com/jeffrey-epstein-busi... https://www.insider.com/epstein-riyadh-saudi-arabia-private-jet-2019-9 https://www.insider.com/epstein-riyadh-saudi-arabia-private-... The TrueAnon podcast had an interesting discussion with him where he speaks at length about ADS-B: https://www.patreon.com/posts/episode-36-in-33247305 https://www.patreon.com/posts/episode-36-in-33247305

adsbx-james 7y ago
ADSBx was happy to help with that and more! https://www.businessinsider.com/us-intelligence-drones-over-the-black-sea-getting-russian-response-2018-4 https://www.businessinsider.com/us-intelligence-drones-over-... https://www.businessinsider.com/us-sanctions-cause-russian-tycoon-oleg-deripaska-to-lose-private-jets-2018-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/us-sanctions-cause-russian-t... https://www.insider.com/jeffrey-epsteins-private-jet-flight-data-2019-7/commerce-on-business-insider https://www.insider.com/jeffrey-epsteins-private-jet-flight-...

saber6 7y ago

I like this. I think this data should be open-sourced, and recorded forever, without the ability to be changed. Maybe a good use for blockchain? (Please don't downvote!) FWIW: I have been streaming FR24 my ADS-B data for a few years. In return they give you a business account ($50/mo value). Back to the main point: Even the FR24 business-class account data is filtered. Given that this is an open protocol to begin with, I think the data should be recored "straight up" and made available to the public as a common service (benefit). Future thoughts: Imagine if we had tons of people incentivized to deploy these? We could make "cyber" phased arrays on a massive scale by doing time of arrival analysis and so on. It could supplement the FAA primary/secondary radar system on a huge level. Perhaps even provide dense ATC control for drone operations where deploying primary/secondary radars is not feasible. Just my $.02!

mopsi 7y ago
> Imagine if we had tons of people incentivized to deploy these? We could make "cyber" phased arrays on a massive scale by doing time of arrival analysis and so on. This is already going on. Some transponders don't report position (often seen on older turboprop airliners in Europe), so feeds from multiple receivers are combined to triangulate them. It's called multilateration (MLAT). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multilateration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multilateration
nkurz 7y ago
> I have been streaming FR24 my ADS-B data for a few years. In return they give you a business account ($50/mo value). I haven't done it myself, but if you are located somewhere that their network doesn't have good coverage, they'll even send you a free receiver and antenna to get you started: https://www.flightradar24.com/apply-for-receiver https://www.flightradar24.com/apply-for-receiver
- UnifiedTechs 7y ago
  So will ADS-B Exchange.
tjohns 7y ago
For what it's worth, the FAA has been pretty explicit that they don't want drones on ADS-B. There's not enough bandwidth. They have a proposal to create a parallel tracking system just for drones. It's created quite the uproar in the drone/model-aircraft community.

NelsonMinar 7y ago

There's a similar open sharing service for tracking ships in the water: http://www.aishub.net/ http://www.aishub.net/ AIS technology works similar to ADS-B, but the details of being on the water make reception a different problem than for planes. There's three or so major ground-based AIS tracking services out there that compete, and while AISHub isn't the biggest it is the most open.

wpietri 7y ago
I've been participating in AISHub for a few years and really enjoy it. One of my projects is @sfships, a Twitter bot that announces major ships entering and leaving SF Bay: https://twitter.com/sfships https://twitter.com/sfships I also built a Python AIS parsing library with a bunch of command-line tools (e.g., aisgrep, ais2json): https://github.com/wpietri/simpleais https://github.com/wpietri/simpleais If anybody ends up using this, please let me know. On Twitter, I'm @williampietri. I have also been keeping a copy of all the AIS data for the last few years, and am happy to share it.
- adsbx-james 7y ago
  Interested in adding ADS-B to some of those AIS devices? ADSBx is always looking to partner for win-win installs!
  - wpietri 7y ago
    I only have one receiver myself, on the north edge of SF, but I'm happy to set up ADS-B if you aren't covered here yet. Contact me via email or Twitter if you'd like.
- mike_d 7y ago
  Very cool Twitter feed! Would you consider adding a second account that doesn't include cargo/tanker ships so I can follow and turn on notifications?
  - wpietri 7y ago

upofadown 7y ago

I ran across an administrative way to hide the ownership of an aircraft today. Something showed up as blocked on one of the other trackers, ADS-B Exchange gave me an N number that was for an aircraft owned by some sort of trust company. That trust company listed anonymity as one of the features of their service.

zymhan 7y ago
Yeah I see plenty of jets flying into Atlanta that're owned by Wells Fargo Trust
- bronco21016 7y ago
  Fortunately, more and more of them are owned by DAL instead of a bank.

jjwiseman 7y ago

I have a receiver that I use to feed the ADS-B Exchange network. In return I get an API key that I use to power a collection of twitter bots that tweet whenever they detect, in realtime, aircraft circling over various metro areas: https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesSF https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesSF https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesDC https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesDC The bots have detected police and news helicopters and fixed wing aircraft, military aircraft (https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesSF/status/1227832420918935552 https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesSF/status/1227832420918935552), blimps (https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1213310909302493184 https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1213310909302493184), autogryos (https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1216464781869121536 https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1216464781869121536), power line inspection helicopters (https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1210280545952776193 https://twitter.com/SkyCirclesLA/status/1210280545952776193), and helicopters filming race cars (https://twitter.com/lemonodor/status/1228100397337702400 https://twitter.com/lemonodor/status/1228100397337702400). ADS-B Exchange is the only completely uncensored, global aircraft tracking network. And it's powered by a considerable amount of specialized open source software. Even the multilateration client (https://github.com/adsbxchange/mlat-client https://github.com/adsbxchange/mlat-client) and server (https://github.com/adsbxchange/mlat-server https://github.com/adsbxchange/mlat-server) code that can determine an aircraft's position even when it's not broadcasting its coordinates, using the time-of-arrival information from multiple receivers, is online. tar1090 (https://github.com/wiedehopf/tar1090 https://github.com/wiedehopf/tar1090) is a much more efficient replacement for the old Virtual Radar Server front-end that is currently under development, and can be tried at https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/ https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/

jjwiseman 7y ago
And if you want a view into some of the current status of the ADS-B Exchange multilateration (MLAT) network, check out the sync stats page: http://www.adsbx.org/sync/ http://www.adsbx.org/sync/ Select a region to see the details. For example, here are the feeder health stats for the southwestern U.S.: http://www.adsbx.org/sync/1B/ http://www.adsbx.org/sync/1B/ And here's the map of feeder locations in that region: http://www.adsbexchange.com/coverage-1B/ http://www.adsbexchange.com/coverage-1B/

sneak 7y ago

Does anyone know of a similar thing for Wi-Fi stumble output? The wigle.net database is not public.

OrgNet 7y ago

I scanned the waves around my home for aircrafts and it was fairly common to see an airplane in the sky that wasn't broadcasting any signal

jjwiseman 7y ago

And if anyone wants to help contribute data, there are a few ways to get started. 1. The minimal: Raspberry Pi and an RTL-SDR dongle. You can even use the small stock antenna that often comes with a dongle, if you put it near a window. 2. A real 1090 MHz antenna, plus filter + amp will greatly increase your performance, and cost less than $100. Weidehopf has a shopping list: https://github.com/wiedehopf/adsb-wiki/wiki/adsb-receiver-shopping-list https://github.com/wiedehopf/adsb-wiki/wiki/adsb-receiver-sh... As does flightaware: https://flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/build https://flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/build Software-wise, you have a couple nearly-turnkey solutions. The easiest thing is just to follow the guide at https://www.adsbexchange.com/how-to-feed/ https://www.adsbexchange.com/how-to-feed/ You can even use their custom Raspberry Pi image, and instantly have dashboards and maps and all the cool stuff.

toomuchtodo 7y ago
Any “one click buy” resources where I can simply pay for a device to be shipped and put it on my network to ship data back? I have several locations in the US I could colocate such devices.
- UnifiedTechs 7y ago
  There are a number of places, ADS-B Exchange sells a preconfigured kit on their website. If the location is one with weak coverage they may even send one to you for free, definitely worth reaching out to them if nothing more then to ask about a bulk discount.
  - toomuchtodo 7y ago
    Thank you!
- sorenjan 7y ago
  https://www.flightradar24.com/apply-for-receiver https://www.flightradar24.com/apply-for-receiver https://flightaware.com/adsb/request https://flightaware.com/adsb/request

not_exactly__ 7y ago

Also for those interested, check out the FAA's SWIM streaming API. it's a firehose but lots of cool stuff you can do with it. https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/swim/ https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/swim/

jjwiseman 7y ago

ADS-B Exchange also gives data to the Center for Advanced Defense Studies' (C4ADS) Project Peregrine, with the goal to "expose the airborne movements of corrupt global elites, dodgy public officials, and a vast array of illicit and criminal actors including wildlife traffickers and conflict financiers." https://easychair.org/publications/download/wbQQ https://easychair.org/publications/download/wbQQ

adsbx-james 7y ago
Don't forget the United Nations, OCCRP, and investigative journalists globally! https://dictatoralert.org/ https://dictatoralert.org/ https://tech.occrp.org/ https://tech.occrp.org/ https://marketplace.officialstatistics.org/partner/adsb_exchange/ https://marketplace.officialstatistics.org/partner/adsb_exch... https://gijn.org/planespotting-a-guide-to-tracking-aircraft-around-the-world/ https://gijn.org/planespotting-a-guide-to-tracking-aircraft-...

swsieber 7y ago

Oh, this will be fun. We somewhat often get Helicopters near my house. Setting up a dongle / tapping the feed will let me build a heads up tracker so I can anticipate them and prep daughter to spot them (because she loves aircraft).

SergeAx 7y ago

The license plate of an auto is clear-text and can be visible by any individual happened to be around. Is it okay to deploy a network of cameras with real-time plate detection software ($100 setup) to record and broadcast positions of all cars in the world? Is it at least legal?

nougatbyte 7y ago
At least Here in Germany it would be illegal. Even a dummy camera pointing at public area isn't allowed for a private person
tree3 7y ago
In the US, that would probably be legal as long as you have the right to set up a camera at those locations (meaning, your property plus anyone else you get permission from).
gspr 7y ago
A license plate is akin to a person talking on the street — audible to a few others, yes, but not meant for everyone perhaps. An ADS-B transmission is akin to someone putting the same words in a radio ad. Recording the latter seems completely different to me, privacy wise.
- SergeAx 7y ago
  Person talking on a street wants to be heard by peers from one meter. Plane flying in the sky should be "heard" by other planes from tens of kilometers. It is a technical necessity, not a voluntary privacy surrender.
Moru 7y ago
The collection is already being done by a private company, just not broadcasting it freely, you have to pay for access. And they do sell it on to other actors ofcourse :-) Crowdsourcing data. https://www.drnrecovery.com/ https://www.drnrecovery.com/

janee 7y ago

For anyone interested in something similar but for sea vessels check https://www.aishub.net/rpiais https://www.aishub.net/rpiais Also...the DCSA (Digital Container Shipping Association) recently published the first API spec for shipping lines to provide tracking info to the public https://github.com/dcsaorg/DCSA-OpenAPI https://github.com/dcsaorg/DCSA-OpenAPI Glad to see industries moving towards more open standardized API.

artembugara 7y ago

Does anyone use this data to calculate the insurance price for General Aviation (small private jets)?

adsbx-james 7y ago
Yes and No. It has been attempted by a company in the UK, that would raise your rates of you fly in conditions that they deem risky. I think market is so niche and unprofitable that this large data analysis is seem as an unneeded expense for underwriting.
- AWildC182 7y ago
  I definitely see things going in this direction eventually however. They've been trying to push it with cars for a while now, doing it with aircraft is trivial by comparison
- artembugara 7y ago
  Can I get more info about this case? What exactly did they do?

adsbx-james 7y ago

https://adsbexchange.com/data/ https://adsbexchange.com/data/ Setup a reliable feeder sending data to ADSBexchange.com and get a REST API key that would cost you $100,000+ a month from FlightAware or FlightRadar24. Non-commercial enthusiast use only. And please be kind to API, no sending 10,000 requests a second. https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/ https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/ All this data at your finger tips, are you hackers or not! Let's make something useful and fun!