Lethal Adaptation or Overpriced Junk? A Practitioner-Informed Assessment of Geospatial-Enabled Threats by Non-State Adversaries

Violent non-state actors (VNSAs) are increasingly using commercial geospatial technologies – e.g., unmanned systems, geographic information systems, and the Internet of Things – to conduct attacks. We conduct qualitative content analysis on interviews of twenty subject matter experts (SMEs), informing why some VNSAs use geospatial technologies, and how they choose among available technologies to augment tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). We find that experts note two key dimensions: barriers to adoption and the technical capabilities of threat actors. Our analysis helps to categorise risks and offers insights into both the relative prevalence of different kinds of attacks, and the mechanisms by which geospatial technologies may shift the threat landscape.

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