Assessment of Possible Misidentification of AIS Transponders within AIS Data due to Bit Inversions of MMSI

Abstract

For almost two decades now, the automatic identification system (AIS) has contributed to increasing the safety of navigation at sea. In addition to that, the system can provide valuable data for surveillance of maritime traffic on a global scale. For reliable tracking the movement of vessels with AIS, it is important to correctly identify the craft. Nowadays, such identification is based entirely on the maritime mobile service identity (MMSI). Despite extensive research being done on the subject of anomalies detectable within the AIS, with emphasis on spotting and correcting erratic vessel movements, a possibility of accidental falsification of MMSI leading to incorrect track reconstruction of a vessel has so far been neglected. This study focuses on analysing hypothetical situations when the MMSI of an AIS transponder on board a vessel is altered within the transponder software and a valid AIS data message is sent with a false MMSI which accidentally belongs to a completely different vessel. Since such MMSI transformation leaves no traces, an assessment of a speed-based plausibility is additionally proposed to figure out how many MMSI-based injections of false AIS track points can be detected.