AirDrop: A Convenient App Causing Havoc In The Aviation Industry
Several airline incidents have occurred in the past few months due to Apple’s AirDrop, a feature that allows data transfer between iOS and OS X devices.
This feature is generally accepted as safe; however, it can potentially cause havoc when an attacker uses it for nefarious purposes. This article will highlight how AirDrop is quickly disrupting the aviation industry.
Apple’s AirDrop allows users to send a photo to anyone in their vicinity, whether or not they have AirDrop turned on. You can change the settings so that you can only receive messages from friends, or you can choose to receive content “from everybody.”
Apple’s AirDrop Incidents in Aviation
On a recent flight from Israel to Turkey the pilot was forced to return to the airport after passengers received pictures of airplane crashes on their mobile phones.
Terrified passengers alerted the crew, who stopped the plane at the gate. It took hours for airport authorities to conduct a security check on passengers and luggage. Nine passengers were arrested.
In another incident, someone AirDropped a picture of a suicide vest to multiple people on a JetBlue flight, prompting an evacuation.
The plane was about to take off from Newark Liberty Airport on Saturday, bound for Tampa, Fla., but had to be evacuated and searched after a photo of the phone belonging to one of the flight attendants appeared on smartphone screens.
It was reported that the pilot immediately declared an emergency and took people, luggage, and cargo off the plane onto the tarmac. A bomb-sniffing dog was brought in, but nothing was found.
In a final example, a teenage girl grounded a Hawaiian Airlines flight for 90 minutes by accidentally sending fake crime scene photos to other passengers over AirDrop.
Flight 23 was already taxiing the runway on Friday morning when passengers started reporting their concerns to the crew. The 15-year-old distributor was trying to send photos from her high school class to her mother.
Passengers who received the image were concerned and started reporting the incident to the flight crew. The crew showed the pictures to the pilot, who decided to return to the gate where police could investigate.
What Can Be Done
AirDrop has become a powerful and easy tool for cyberattacks in the aviation industry. The risks to the flight’s safety may be minimal, but they are real and can cause considerable financial damage to airlines.
Airlines must ensure that pilots and flight crew are properly trained and informed of this potential vulnerability to quickly mitigate and solve such situations, as they will only increase over time.
The pilot QHR (Quick Reference Handbook) has no reference or checklist to handle such scenarios. Airlines have no instructions or mitigation to overcome such events, and so, every pilot handled the situation mentioned above as they felt. We strongly suggest that pilots must be trained to handle constantly evolving cyberattacks to prevent this situation.
TO All BLOG 
