The Sea is Not Always Honest
In recent years, ships have begun to disappear, not physically, but digitally. Cargo vessels, oil tankers, and fishing boats all over the world have quietly vanished from tracking systems, only to reappear days later in entirely different waters. Their disappearance isn’t due to storms or piracy. It’s the result of GPS spoofing, a technique that manipulates a vessel’s reported location and allows operators to hide their true movements.
This is not a theoretical risk or a technical quirk. It’s an increasingly common practice in global shipping and particularly in Southeast Asia, a region already under pressure from territorial disputes, piracy, and under-regulated maritime corridors.
Understanding how GPS spoofing works and why it’s used has become essential for those working in international trade, corporate investigations, legal compliance, and strategic logistics.
How GPS Spoofing Works in Maritime Environments
GPS spoofing involves sending false satellite signals to a receiver, causing it to report incorrect location data. When this technique is applied at sea, a ship’s position on tracking platforms like AIS (Automatic Identification System) can appear hundreds or thousands of kilometers from its real location. Sometimes the vessel appears to be at sea when it’s docked in port; in other cases, it disappears entirely from monitoring systems.
The spoofed data can be generated by onboard transmitters or by external actors including jammers positioned on nearby vessels or land- based installations. The result is a digital falsehood: the ship’s true path is hidden, and official records reflect a journey that never happened.
Real, World Incidents and Emerging Patterns
- Shanghai 2019: Hundreds of vessels suddenly appeared on GPS systems far inland. Investigations by C4ADS and MIT’s Technology Review suggested deliberate spoofing, possibly linked to military or port security operations.
- Dark fleets in Southeast Asia: Tankers carrying sanctioned oil from Iran or Myanmar often vanish from AIS near Indonesia or the Andaman Sea. Satellite imagery shows them clearly, but their systems report false data or go offline entirely.
- Piracy with spoofing: In the Sulu and Celebes Seas, small armed groups have reportedly used jamming or spoofing to mask their approach and evade maritime patrols.
Who Is Behind the Spoofing and Who Is Affected?
Sometimes crews are unaware their vessel is being spoofed externally. In other cases, operators themselves enable spoofing to cover illicit activities such as:
- Transporting sanctioned goods
- Fishing in restricted waters
- Bypassing customs inspections
- Conducting ship, to, ship transfers of oil, arms, or resources
Spoofing technology is no longer reserved for militaries. Off-the-shelf radios and open source tools can emit fake GPS signals, increasingly found onboard vessels under investigation.
Victims include regulators misled by false data, insurers relying on compromised records, and legitimate shipping firms forced to share waters with “ghost ships.”
From the Sea to the Office: GPS Spoofing for Everyday Use
GPS spoofing isn’t just for smugglers and pirates, it’s quietly entered everyday life. A common example is employee check, in apps used by HR departments. These apps require staff to clock in from a specific location, usually the office.
But with spoofing apps, an employee can fake their GPS location to appear at their desk while actually working from home or somewhere else entirely. While this may sound harmless, for managers and organizations with large remote teams, it undermines accountability and opens the door to compliance risks.
Just like at sea, the ability to falsify location data raises questions about trust, oversight, and the integrity of digital systems.
Implications for Southeast Asia and Global Trade
For Southeast Asia, where the world’s busiest shipping lanes converge, GPS spoofing creates real vulnerabilities. It undermines cargo tracking, complicates compliance, and disrupts supply chains. In disputed waters, spoofed signals can even blur geopolitical accountability.
Whether at sea or in the office, GPS spoofing shows how easily appearances can deceive. In an age where both tankers and employees can be “present” without really being there, the ability to verify the truth has become a strategic necessity.