STANAG 4575 NATO advanced data storage interface (NADSI) for ISR systems

What it is

STANAG 4575 is the NATO Standardization Agreement covering the NATO Advanced Data Storage Interface (NADSI), currently Edition 5, promulgated 14 July 2026, superseding Edition 4 of 2 December 2014.

A STANAG is not the specification

A STANAG is the agreement by which NATO nations commit to implement a standard, not the technical specification itself. STANAG 4575's own text is short and administrative: an aim, one interoperability requirement, and the ratification and reporting machinery. The interface requirements themselves are specified in a separate publication, AEDP-06 Edition C, which the STANAG names as the standard participating nations "agree to implement." Anyone actually designing, specifying or testing a NADSI-compliant recorder or ground station needs AEDP-06's own text, not this cover agreement.

What it commits nations to

The stated interoperability requirement is "to promote interoperability among North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) Systems for the download of data stored on Removable Memory Modules (RMMs) and transferred to compliant Ground Stations." The agreement is implemented "when collected intelligence data is transferred from any compliant ISR data acquisition recorder to a compliant ground station via the NATO Advanced Data Storage Interface (NADSI) in accordance with the requirements specified in AEDP-06" - an operational trigger, not a design-stage deadline, which means the interface work has to be finished well before a mission generates data to move.

Who it binds, and how

STANAG 4575 binds nations, not suppliers. It is effective "upon receipt for use by the participating nations and NATO bodies," and it becomes binding on a given nation through ratification, which NATO records in the NATO Standardization Documents Database (NSDD). Allied nations and NATO bodies carry a reporting duty once implemented; partner nations are only "invited to provide their implementation details through the electronic reporting tool (e-Reporting)." A supplier meets STANAG 4575, or the AEDP-06 requirements it covers, only where a contract or tender says so - the document itself sets no obligation reaching a supplier directly, and it names no NATO-wide effective date (its own "NATO EFFECTIVE DATE (NED)" field reads "Not applicable").

How it's evaluated

STANAG 4575 describes no certification scheme and no audit. What it describes is nations reporting their ratification and implementation status to NATO for the record: "National responses are recorded in the NATO Standardization Documents Database (NSDD)." Nobody is "STANAG 4575 certified," and the document never uses that language. It also does not describe how an individual recorder or ground station is tested or verified for NADSI compliance; that detail, if the AEDP-06 publication provides it, is not part of this STANAG.

Standards it references

STANAG 4575 covers AEDP-06, the publication that carries the actual NADSI interface requirements. Reviews of STANAG 4575 itself run under AAP-03. The document also points to Chapter 1, Paragraph 1.3 of AEDP-06 for a further list of related documents, which is not part of this STANAG's own text.