Patent ID: 8610619

Claim:
A method for validating received positional data in vehicle surveillance applications, wherein vehicles transmit positional data indicating their own position to surrounding vehicles, the method comprising: receiving, with a radio direction finding antenna arrangement of a receiving unit, a signal carrying positional data indicating an alleged position of a vehicle, transmitted from a radio source; estimating a bearing from the receiving unit to said radio source utilizing said radio direction finding antenna arrangement and a received signal; estimating a distance between the receiving unit and the radio source based on a time of flight for a signal travelling between the radio source and the receiving unit at a known speed; calculating an estimated position of the radio source based on the estimated bearing and the estimated distance, and determining a deviation value indicating a deviation or coincidence between the alleged position of the vehicle according to the received positional data and the estimated position of the radio source, wherein the signal carrying the positional data further comprises transmission time information indicating a point in time at which the signal was transmitted, and wherein estimating the time of flight comprises establishing the point in time at which the signal was transmitted based on the transmission time information, and determining a time elapsed between transmission and reception of the signal.