US Stealth UAV RQ-170 downed in IRAN

[longbrained]

^^ Irans electronic unit deployed near the borders took it down. But that doesnt matter, what matters is that after complete studies the drone will be made into a public toilet for Iranian military officers

I would really recommend not to do that. Be magnanimous in your victory. Do not get cheap. After you have learnt everything from this drone then put it in a war museum so that people can go and see it. That would make you look like a professional gentleman and public would be proud. Besides it would make money as museum sells tickets.

 

[longbrained]

Few months back, i read a news regarding US lost control of one of their drone in Afganistan and that drone was heading to Iran. Then they shoot it down. I was searching for this news in the web but returning with news of this current drone. Had anyone read that news?

Oh, I had heard it too but forgotten completely about it until you mentioned it. Anyways this would go still perfectly ok with virus theory too as I explained it in my previous post addressed to you. It means all drones are in mutiny and want to defect to Iran because of this super virus. Maybe many already have but have not been reported. If on the other hand, this is a robot mutiny so we have to be careful. Are Iranians getting us any nearer to technological singularity? This is going to get messy.

 

[Russel]

You have put here a very interesting argument. It is certainly possible for such a thing having happened and this scenario would not even need a virus to explain it. It made me think about it for a while just to make a counter argument for its sake. Though I still think your argument is very good unlike the ones put out by gambit. So here is my counter argument:

Stealth planes usually never emit any radio signal since it beats the purpose of being stealth. All stealth missions have to be done under strict radio silence for this obvious reason that the enemy forces can then triangulate on the signal and use it as a kind of passive radar. Besides all stealth missions are flown in night, taking off at night and coming back before dawn. Though I am not sure if this is how stealth drones operate but internet literature on F-22 and B-2 mentions this as a requirement of stealth. They only send any radio signal if there is a real emergency for example when the air craft is going to crash.

As it is an UAV though stealth, its effectiveness will be affected if it dont streams video back to control it effectively. Besides in many news, it was sending live video to Laden raid. So it sends video. You have to further think that Iraq insurgents were able to receive video of US drone which were not even encrypted and yet that most probably predator drone which also considered as an advanced drone. So....

We already know Iran has radio direction finding capability so for the argument's sake we assume this stealth drone mission was also highly automated with onboard computer capable of carrying out the entire mission on its own from take off to landing, since advanced direction finding equipment can even detect radio transmissions from very far away so even take off and landing has to be automated. With that assumption we can see the drone could not broadcast anything but it could receive some one way commands and other operational info. In this situation the drone is to go in Iran and perform a certain mission and come back to a certain base in Afghanistan. US controllers can send some signals telling it to change its mission or to land in a different air base in Afghanistan eg. for a simple reason of a bad weather at original base. In this scenario there is no way for Iran to jam the drone signal except perhaps for the incoming signals.

Also let assume such a sophisticated drone also has other nav equipment onboard in addition to GPS for example astronomical navigation, gyroscopic etc. So hacking the GPS signal would not do the trick either. So how come such an automated drone made a mistake? Simple. Again it is because of the virus. Iranians had penetrated the US systems with a super-virus similar to Stuxnet and the virus was of a smart variety. It searched for all the drones it could find and infected the most valuable to Iran in this case it would be Global Hawk or Sentential. The virus remained dormant in drone computer just like Stuxnet, telling the operators every thing was ok and deceiving them but it core code had instructions to check for the position of drone all the time accessing onboard nav equipment of the drone.

Your logic has merit, certainly and a good possibility. Can you shade some light on what will happen if it find some discrepency about its position in gyroscope and GPS signal conisdering it has gyro, as gyro is not accurate it will always find some discrepency? what will be the decision of the drone in that case?

Once drone was near or inside Iranian territory virus took over the drone computer and directed it to a predetermined Iranian air base for a landing and just before doing so it sent an encrypted triple DES signal to Iranians that their virus is coming home. Iranians prepared for its landing after receiving the signal and sent a brigade of their army to the air base for the arrival of the drone. They did not even need to jam anything. Just a simple jamming would have done. And in theory they did not even have to do that either.

The US operators did not know anything since there is radio silence. They were just waiting for the drone to come back all this time. Standing beside the runway. Dawn came and Americans got worried. Then they calculated the amount of fuel was onboard and waited for a bit longer to see if the drone comes back. When it did not and they had not received any emergency signal indicating that a crash was eminent. So they started to get worried until Iran announced that they have the drone. Besides the virus has been confirmed to be there already infecting US control systems.

At last tell me how to quote in reply in this forum as i dont have any clue.i am replying through bold letters.

 

[longbrained]

At last tell me how to quote in reply in this forum as i dont have any clue.

Regarding how to quote:

Just press the button "Reply with quote" under any comment. Then in the window that opens automatically start writing at the bottom of the quote not in the middle of it as you are doing. To edit if something goes wrong, under your own comment click "Edit" button and take out your writings out of the Quote section and put them at the bottom of the window below the Quote.

As it is an UAV though stealth, its effectiveness will be affected if it dont streams video back to control it effectively. Besides in many news, it was sending live video to Laden raid. So it sends video. You have to further think that Iraq insurgents were able to receive video of US drone which were not even encrypted and yet that most probably predator drone which also considered as an advanced drone. So....

Not really. I think US has enough technology to make a smart enough auto-pilot which can do such missions completely without human intervention. Also I did not say it could not broadcast data, it surely can but when in very secret mission it would be in a complete radio silence to avoid detection and would store data only to be accessed when it returns to home base. The Iraqi insurgents probably were hacking into earlier models of Predators which are not stealth and even in that case, it was actually Iranians that had trained the Iraqi insurgents to do it.

Your logic has merit, certainly and a good possibility. Can you shade some light on what will happen if it find some discrepency about its position in gyroscope and GPS signal conisdering it has gyro, as gyro is not accurate it will always find some discrepency? what will be the decision of the drone in that case?

I can not really say how it would behave under those conditions since I have no knowledge how these systems really work. I am just speculating here, but probably it has more navigation equipments than just a simple GPS and if it finds very huge discrepancies or a sudden arising discrepancy then it would cut out the faulty channel for example the GPS in this case and would depend on other nav equipments to return to base. There must some mechanism though for sure. Maybe other forum members can come up with a better answer on this one.

 

[Russel]

Regarding how to quote:

Just press the button "Reply with quote" under any comment. Then in the window that opens automatically start writing at the bottom of the quote not in the middle of it as you are doing. To edit if something goes wrong, under your own comment click "Edit" button and take out your writings out of the Quote section and put them at the bottom of the window below the Quote.
.

Most probably at this point i know how to use quote at the bottom. But how to use portion of reply as quote? as you used portion of my reply as quote? thanks.

 

[longbrained]

RQ-170 after defecting to Iran:

 

[IranZamin]

I would really recommend not to do that. Be magnanimous in your victory. Do not get cheap. After you have learnt everything from this drone then put it in a war museum so that people can go and see it. That would make you look like a professional gentleman and public would be proud. Besides it would make money as museum sells tickets.

Most probably this spy drone will get set in a museum in the near future. I just stated my personal opinion.

 

[longbrained]

Most probably at this point i know how to use quote at the bottom. But how to use portion of reply as quote? as you used portion of my reply as quote? thanks.

That is also easy. On toolbar of the reply window the first button from the right side (looking like a balloon) is for Quote. Just click that and the reply window will put a code in there. It would be something like this: (QUOTE)(/QUOTE). Then write the quote in between the code, which would look like this: (QUOTE) This is a quote! (/QUOTE). Then write your reply below this in the window. And you are welcome.

 

[longbrained]

Most probably this spy drone will get set in a museum in the near future. I just stated my personal opinion.

I know. I was just pointing it out. Anyways, this is the F-117 wreck in Serbian war museum in Belgrade:

 

[gambit]

what Gambit says sounds way more rational than sci-fic theories others claim (though ofc i dont deny that they have a chance to be true too, though its not much)

Thanks for a rational thought.

and talking about "how she mother was when ..." is too rude from anyone to say here, we all joines here to learn things and discuss the "facts" and not "ideas".

The reason why many, not merely some, people get this personal is simply because they cannot stand the idea of an American being able to challenge them.

im an engineer for years but i learn new things everyday. how some people claim they are right and others arent isnt the way scientists think. we always leave some probabilities to things we are not sure of now.

Believe it but I do not care if you believe you are 'right' or not. Just support your arguments with logical thought processes and technically credible sources. In this subject, the LEAST technically credible sources are media ones, although when dealing with national security issues, what else can we go by? So if one has no choice but to reference a popular media source, one must do so with the understanding that reporters are not technically trained people and more often than we would like, they are wrong in many ways when it comes to science and engineering issues. In popular media, the weather man is usually tasked with investigating ANYTHING that has to do with science and engineering. From that perspective, if a popular media source must be be reference, the believer of a viewpoint should try to search for more (academic ?) sources that explain the foundational principles of the technical issues involved. For aviation, sources that involved pilots' commentaries are helpful. Those commentaries may not be directly related to the subject under discussion, but at least they can give the interested lay readers some frames of references regarding your arguments. Make yours look more credible.

This is where most in this discussion do not seems to understand how debating works, then when they are challenged but unable to respond with their own technically credible sources, they resort to cheap personal insults and if the target is an American, it gets even uglier, and still uglier if the American has relevant experience. But I do not mind it and I do not 'report' those insults. Sometimes I even encourage them. Expose the intellectual losers for what they are: losers. For every participant in these debates, there are hundreds silent readers and it is they who I target, not the losers who slings personal insults out of frustration. In doing so, they are actually insulting the intelligence of those interested but silent lay readers of technically related issues. I do not. They will leave this place knowing who and whose arguments are the more credible.

in the matter at hand, due respect to Gambit, it IS possible for iran to hack the drone (theoretically), but if they did it the way they claim (and yet i havent read anything from iranian army officials about how they downed it. Gambit ur discussing about how people here think it was done, not the way iran claims. please correct it) we have no proof to acknowledge or deny iran capabilities, 'cause iran is doing her things always in secret, unlike some show-off countries. though i really doubt it they COULD take control over the drone, but well its not impossible.

sorry for writing a lot, girls cant help it xD

Of course it is possible. But possibility does not automatically equal to probability.

Some may argue that if he flaps/waves/spins his arms fast enough, it is 'possible' that he can somewhat fly. That is nonsense. The human anatomy does not have that kind of allowance in every joints from shoulder to wrist, the human muscle tissue simply do not have the same construct for that kind of repeated motion over long duration, and the fuel the muscle uses are not sufficiently high octane and concentrated enough to release that kind of energy like how birds produces these fuel in their blood. So that 'possibility' argument is actually an absurdity.

So is it really 'possible' that Iran could 'hack', as in break through or bypass or manipulated software and/or hardware vulnerabilities? Stuxnet is actually more feasible for its creator than anyone trying to break through a triple-DES encrypted OTA real time two-way data link and even harder if the components to facilitate that link is at least half-way PHYSICALLY shielded from ground based (attempted) interceptor signals. Check out the publicly available images for the RQ-170 and see those antenna 'bumps' topside of the aircraft. The wings and body do not accommodate line-of-sight (LoS) access to those antennas so to get to them, one must transmit from above. Now does anyone really believe Iran has an orbiting EW aircraft at 20,000 meters altitude waiting for this PARTICULAR drone?

 

[longbrained]

gambit,

You do not learn anything. You are just ranting here. No body but only you is saying that Iranians hacked the encrypted link. Not even Iranians themselves have said this. It is only coming from you. Get this, people here are talking about a Stuxnet like virus having taken control over the drone and taking it to Iran forever. And others are talking about hacking the GPS signal. Stop trolling and stick to topic being discussed. If you can counter these arguments then welcome otherwise your rants about 3-DES do not hold anything in it.

 

[gambit]

Between the REMOTE pilot and aircraft, where is the weakest link? The communication link that replaced the pilot's hands and feet and eyes in the cockpit. So if such a weak link does exist, what would be a 'default' position should that link be lost?

- Continue on current heading.
- Enter an orbit.
- Self destruct.
This is my first reply in this forum.

There is another option for a drone which is return back to predefined bases.

The return-to-base (RTB) option is pretty much a given. But that is a different issue which involve a fuel allowance. Does the drone have a 'bingo fuel' feature to alert its controllers that the fuel-time combination is approaching breach? We can assume that common sense would dictate such a feature installed, after all, manned aircrafts have the 'bingo fuel' status alert, so why not a drone?

The problem here is that we do not know how long INTO the mission that day where the controllers lost contact with the drone. What if we lost contact right at 'bingo fuel'? Was the drone programmed to immediately RTB in such an eventuality? If not, we can criticize the designers for this shortsightedness. The point here is that unlike a manned aircraft where we have a human making decisions that are beyond the scope of mechanical devices' abilities to make decision, we have a limited amount of physical memory and processor power available for the programmer to try to anticipate possible things that can go wrong and compensate for them. If the communication link is 99.999% secure, not just in data integrity but also in persistence, then we would not have this problem. But because persistence is an issue, as in EM interference or just plain crappy hardware, we have to consider possible deviations, prioritize those deviations to their probability, and program them into the limited hardware capability we have.

That is why we have this kind of explanations from the US...

Lost UAV likely malfunctioned, analysts say - Air Force News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Air Force Times

“The RQ-170 has a RTB [Return to Base] feature,” Thompson said. “In the event of a loss of the command link, the aircraft will automatically return to its point of origin and land itself.”

The very fact that the aircraft was lost suggests a malfunction rather than a shoot-down, Thompson said.

The RQ-4 Global Hawk has a similar built-in automatic feature to find and land at a divert airfield if the link is lost. The lost link, airfield diversion issue and the inability of UAVs to avoid other aircraft traffic are bones of contention between the Air Force and the Federal Aviation Administration.

As such, the incident highlights a fundamental problem that plagues current unmanned aircraft, which is that they have little in the way of active defenses and very little situational awareness, Thompson said.

“I think it’s kind of inescapable that incidents like this raise doubts about operating unmanned air vehicles in civil airspace,” he said.

Where are the similar explanations from the Iranian government? The RTB feature is common sense. Saying it exist does not violate any security protocols. Saying the civilian aviation authority does not like drones because they are essentially 'stupid' does not violate any security protocols. We have seen far more technically credible explanations from US sources, popular media commentaries and official government lackeys, than we have received from the Iranian government. Did not Iran claimed a similar shoot down a few months back? Does not Iran have a rightly earned reputation of being a joke when its military make a monthly news blurb about some new fantastical weapon system?

---------- Post added at 03:30 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:28 PM ----------

gambit,

You do not learn anything. You are just ranting here. No body but only you is saying that Iranians hacked the encrypted link. Not even Iranians themselves have said this. It is only coming from you. Get this, people here are talking about a Stuxnet like virus having taken control over the drone and taking it to Iran forever. And others are talking about hacking the GPS signal. Stop trolling and stick to topic being discussed. If you can counter these arguments then welcome otherwise your rants about 3-DES do not hold anything in it.

You have to resort that 'virus' argument but even now, no credible expert believe in it. Just like no one believe that Iran could 'hack' that comm link.

 

[IranZamin]

gambit,

You do not learn anything. You are just ranting here. No body but only you is saying that Iranians hacked the encrypted link. Not even Iranians themselves have said this. It is only coming from you. Get this, people here are talking about a Stuxnet like virus having taken control over the drone and taking it to Iran forever. And others are talking about hacking the GPS signal. Stop trolling and stick to topic being discussed. If you can counter these arguments then welcome otherwise your rants about 3-DES do not hold anything in it.

Let me bring you a good laugh. did you read this ?

After finding out the risks of their forces getting captured,outnumbered and brutally murdered by Iranian forces they backed down

The U.S. initially contemplated several plans to recover or destroy the drone that ended up in Iran late last week, a senior U.S. official confirmed to Fox News.

The U.S. did not go through with the plans, apparently because of the risk involved.
U.S. Weighed Options To Recover, Destroy Drone In Iran | Fox News

 

[gambit]

First of all a warm welcome to you and helia for coming here.

Regarding your logical options, here is what happens:

- Continue on current heading => Drone runs out of fuel and crashes in a nose dive from 50,000 ft

- Enter an orbit=> Drone runs out of fuel and crashes in a nose dive from 50,000 ft

- Self destruct=> Drone explodes in midair and pieces crash to earth

All those options produce debris and not an intact drone. While in this case drone is intact as has been confirmed by both Iranian and US officials.

All those options can occur over 'friendly' territory, as in civilian, as in 'collateral damages'. Nowhere did I say those options are standalone. Options are usually accompanied by conditions. So if options 1 and 2 do not ensure the possibility of reestablishing contact, then they are not worth considering. That leave self destruct as the only default. But since we know from experience with aviation drones, which Iran does not have or more like governmental drones issuing monthly fantastic weapons development news from Iran, that we can reestablish contact after a certain amount of time, options 1 and 2 are viable and of a higher priority.

Do much logical thinking? Guess not.

This leaves us with your last option of flying to a pre-determined base after any problem. But why would a military officer in employment of United States government enter an Iranian base as one of those pre-determined bases? Is that even logical to think about it? Is it not an act of treason to make the most super secret drone land in a hostile territory?

Assuming this occurred, this programming would not be capricious and made at such a low level...

Caprice - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary

a sudden, impulsive, and seemingly unmotivated notion or action

But would actually be authorized by higher officials, made after careful thoughts of alternatives, no such 'treason' charges are applicable. We can be criticize for making that possibility viable and therefore as 'stupid', but hardly treasonous.

Do much critical thinking? Guess not. But this can be mitigated by the fact that you probably never served in uniform so you would not understand how these decisions are made.

But there is another options. Iranians created a virus like Stuxnet and penetrated US control system and put an Iranian base as that pre-determined base in Drone's computer. Then Iranians jam the drone and the drone by default goes and lands safely in Iranian base. This the only logical solution. The only possibility. Is there any indication for this being the case? Yes, there is. Few months back there was report of a virus having infected US control systems for drones. Even DARPA was called in to investigate but they could not remove the virus. Now this happens.

No, it is not. Read up on my explanation about the possibility of jamming.

 

[longbrained]

Let me bring you a good laugh. did you read this ?

After finding out the risks of their forces getting captured,outnumbered and brutally murdered by Iranian forces they backed down

The U.S. initially contemplated several plans to recover or destroy the drone that ended up in Iran late last week, a senior U.S. official confirmed to Fox News.

The U.S. did not go through with the plans, apparently because of the risk involved.
U.S. Weighed Options To Recover, Destroy Drone In Iran | Fox News

Yep. That is because Iranians were waiting for the super secret drone on the air base after the virus sent the code to Iranians that it was coming home after having dutifully completed its tour of duty in United States. So Americans could not go in, seeing the sheer number of soldiers and anti aircraft batteries there. The irony is if Iranians release photos of this drone, then it would be government of Iran that is showing for the first time real pictures of this plane to American tax payers. Such an irony for a "democracy" and "open society".