Electronic warfare on the high seas has evolved from a sporadic nuisance into a systemic crisis for global trade, with latest figures revealing that thousands of commercial vessels are navigating through severe, sustained GPS interference. Data from maritime AI firm Windward underscores the massive scale of this operational threat: a staggering 11,600 vessels suffered from GPS jamming in the third quarter of 2025 alone, followed by another 6,700 ships impacted in the final months of the year, signaling a dangerous new normal across the world's most critical shipping lanes.
The Middle East Gulf remained the epicentre of the problem, accounting for 57% of all reported jamming incidents in the fourth quarter of 2025. Nearly 20% of incidents occurred in the Black Sea, while continued interference was also recorded across the Mediterranean, the Red Sea, the Arctic, and Russia’s eastern oil export terminals.
How much GPS jamming was recorded in 2025 and 2026?
Across the second half of 2025, GPS jamming affected more than 18,300 vessels globally. In Q1 2026, the trajectory accelerated sharply, with approximately 978,000 events recorded globally, 98% concentrated in the Middle East Gulf, and more than 1,100 vessels affected in the region. The Q1 2026 figure represents the largest single-quarter concentration of maritime jamming events ever recorded, according to Windward.
The contrast between the two periods underscores the evolution of GPS jamming from a persistent maritime risk into a strategic operational threat. While the fourth quarter of 2025 demonstrated that GPS interference had become a structural feature across several key shipping regions, the first quarter of 2026 revealed how rapidly the threat can escalate during a major conflict.
As highlighted, the widespread deployment of jamming capabilities during that period effectively saturated a critical maritime chokepoint, severely disrupting the AIS-based vessel tracking systems on which the global shipping industry relies.
- New jamming theaters emerged across 2025 and 2026, including Russia’s eastern port of Nakhodka, Venezuelan waters, and persistent activity across the Mediterranean, Red Sea, and Arctic regions.
- GPS jamming now operates as a routine military and operational tool, with Windward observing persistent jamming at all of Russia’s oil export ports to deter drone attacks, alongside contested waterways and active conflict theaters.
- The cumulative effect is structural, with AIS-based maritime monitoring no longer reliable as a single source in jamming-affected regions that now span four major seas.
What made GPS jamming mainstream
The transition from episodic disruption to structural feature was driven by three convergent factors across 2025 and 2026.
The first is active conflict, generating intense military jamming activity. The Russia-Ukraine war, the Iran conflict, and the broader gray-zone competition between major powers have all produced sustained jamming presence in the conflict theaters and surrounding waters.
The second is infrastructure protection by state actors. Russia’s deployment of jamming at all of its oil export ports to deter Ukrainian drone strikes is the clearest documented example, but the pattern extends. State actors are increasingly using jamming as a defensive perimeter around critical infrastructure, applying the capability to maritime areas where commercial shipping must operate.
The third is the normalization of jamming as a routine operational tool. What was once a high-end military capability deployed selectively in active conflict is now being used more routinely, by both state and non-state actors, in gray-zone competition that falls below the threshold of open conflict.
GPS jamming was detected off Venezuela for the first time in December 2025, coinciding with the largest U.S. naval presence in the Caribbean in nearly 40 years. The appearance of jamming in a region where it had not previously been observed illustrates how the geographic footprint of the capability is expanding.
"The trajectory of GPS jamming in the rest of 2026 will depend on the evolution of the conflict environments driving most current activity, but the structural pattern of the past two years suggests several developments are likely. "
…Windward highlighted.
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