Melbourne ATC Hacked: Virgin Flight Aborted Landing

Real World Aviation
#1

Melbourne Airport Air traffic control transmissions have been hacked 15 times in the last two weeks. A Virgin Australia flight was forced to go around after they were given false commands by an unknown hacker. The importation and use of transmitters is strictly prohibited for use by unauthorised controllers and tighter policies are being placed on them. The Australian Federal Police is currently investigating the matter, as the hackers can still take control of the frequencies.
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http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/hoax-call-forces-virgin-air-plane-to-abort-melbourne-landing/news-story/35ff9afc719b5a3cd07223fc56d5a279

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#2

Oh dear, that could have caused huge problems.

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#3

Yes, the Virgin flight had to perform a tight go around close to the runway.

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#4

Saw this on Sunrise this morning, I start to wonder how it happens, it makes me start to wonder how secure Australian ATC frequencies are

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#5

Or how secure any frequencies are! Anyone with a transmitter setup could do this.

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#6

You would think there would be an investigation into this

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#7

There is, by the Australian Federal Police at the moment. I think the ATSB will get onboard too.

#8

You would think the AFP would also be having a good look at other major Australian airports eg Sydney to make sure this type of event never happens again

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#9

I herd about this earlier today. Notice how all the links contain Virgin aus?!

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#10

It took place on secret city two, on the TV show they had to have an American ship take control of ATC. And a380 was landing in Canberra too!

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#11

That has been the only major incident so far

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#12

Did it go to Avalon then? Perhaps because they’re still using Windows XP.

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#13

I’m pretty sure this is all at Tullamarine. I could be wrong.

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#14

I meant diverting there.

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#15

No, it went around and landed safely at Tullamarine.

#16

Here is a video of another transmission:


The hacker was pretending to be in a light aircraft with an engine failure.

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#17

On another note, here is another ATC transmission unrelated to this recent incident. A little crazy I must say…

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#18

Probably has a bathtubs in the tower

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#19

I thought that at first haha

#20

Stuff like this makes me think that we’ll eventually lose sources like ATC.NET one day.

1 Like