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SpaceX reportedly fought Russian jamming attacks on Starlink with “eye-watering” speed.
A Pentagon official revealed their amazement at the speed with which SpaceX recently countered a Russian jamming attack on its Starlink service over Ukraine, a report from Business Insider reveals.
Speaking at the C4ISRNET Conference on Wed., April 20, Dave Tremper, Director of Electronic Warfare for the Office of the US Secretary of Defence, explained how Starlink’s operators fought off the attack faster than he believes the US military would have been able to.
Infrastructure
Just after the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in late Feb., SpaceX CEO Elon Musk responded to a request from Ukraine’s Vice PM, Mykhailo Fedorov, to provide access to Starlink internet in Ukraine amidst Russia’s destruction of communications infrastructure.
On Mar. 26, Musk tweeted that Starlink had so far “resisted all hacking & jamming attempts.” The comment came after reports that Russia had co-ordinated cyber-attacks on 1,000s of satellite modems to coincide with the start of its invasion.
US Military Could Learn from SpaceX Agility
Tremper’s comments provide an insight into Russia’s attempts at jamming the satellite internet service in Ukraine. The Pentagon official stated that only 1 day after the Russian jamming attack, “Starlink had slung a line of code & fixed it.”
“How they did that was eye-watering to me,” Tremper observed. The top Pentagon official also added that the US military usually required a “significant timeline to make those types of corrections,” & that “there’s a really interesting case study to look at the agility that Starlink had in their ability to deal with that problem.
Upgrade
In the way that Starlink was able to upgrade when a threat showed up, we need to be able to have that agility.”
SpaceX has put more than 2,000 Starlink satellites into orbit.
The private space company has been praised for providing communications services to civilians in war-torn Ukraine, though it has also taken criticism for the number of satellites it plans to send to orbit, because of the problem of space debris & interference with astronomical observations.
NASA
SpaceX’s chief partner, NASA, recently warned that the Starlink’s huge no. of satellites — which could grow up to as many as 30,000 — could reduce the US space agency’s capacity for detecting potentially hazardous asteroids on a collision course with Earth.
However, the satellite internet service has proved successful in helping civilians in Ukraine, with reports that it has helped co-ordinate the evacuation of child cancer patients, allowing them to continue to receive treatment.
Russian Forces
Musk did recently say, however, that users should be cautious when accessing the service, as it could make them a target for Russian forces who may be able to pinpoint their location by tracking satellite data.
General Tad Clark, director of the US Air Force’s Electromagnetic Spectrum Superiority Directorate, explained this form of warfare will only increase.
He believes the US needs to be more innovative when it comes to building new space technology.
