The Arctic’s Ghost Signals: GNSS Interference, Hybrid Pressure, and the Security Politics of Critical Infrastructure in the European High North
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https://doi.org/10.66871/trf-j.v1i2.019##semicolon##
GNSS interference Hybrid warfare Critical infrastructure European Arctic Security dilemmaसार
GNSS interference in the European Arctic is no longer a marginal technical disturbance. It has become a recurring feature of a region where infrastructure, mobility, and security are closely bound together. This paper examines repeated episodes of jamming and spoofing in the European High North and argues that they are best understood not simply as disruptions to navigation, but as politically consequential forms of hybrid pressure. Their significance lies partly in their effects on aviation, maritime movement, and emergency response, but even more in the uncertainty they create over intent, responsibility, and threshold. Read against the backdrop of worsening NATO-Russia relations and the decline of Arctic exceptionalism, these incidents encourage securitisation and visibly strengthen the politics of infrastructure protection. Yet such protective responses are not neutral. Measures introduced in the name of resilience can themselves be read as a strategic posture, deepening mistrust in an already tense region. The paper, therefore, argues that critical infrastructure protection has become part of Arctic security politics in its own right.
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