Evaluation of Low-Cost Jamming Attacks on the LoRa Physical Layer

Low power wide area network (LPWAN) technologies, particularly LoRa, are increasingly deployed around the world for applications such as smart agriculture, environmental monitoring, and industrial automation. Despite their advantages in long-range and low-power communication, the physical layer of LoRa remains vulnerable to intentional radio-frequency interference. This paper experimentally evaluates the susceptibility of a LoRa communication link to low-cost jamming attacks. A testbed consisting of ESP32-based LoRa nodes equipped with SX1278 transceivers and an Arduino-based interference source is developed to emulate a realistic adversary model. Experimental results demonstrate a significant degradation in communication reliability, with packet loss increasing substantially under active jamming conditions. These findings highlight critical physical-layer security weaknesses in LoRa-based systems that could impact emerging IoT deployments. The results emphasize the need for improved anti-jamming strategies to ensure the reliability and resilience of national IoT infrastructure.