Hacker News Reader

Comment by obogobo | Hacker News Reader

wondering what / if any impact "the space internet" (or like networks) will have on national government's ability to disrupt comms. or if it just shifts the goalposts to a different network operator

View on HN

It will shift a lot of power from the countries where the internet users are located to the countries where the space internet companies operate from. Both in the free countries like the EU, and in non-free countries like Belarus. That being said, the user's country still has some level of control:

* the companies want to be paid by their users somehow, and local governments usually have control over money flows inside their own banking systems

* the country can ban receiving/sending equipment. It's not small and thus easier to spot but people will likely get creative and build their own equipment instead of importing it

* the country can also install jammers but those cost money to set up and maintain and while you can put jammers close to the users, you can't put jammers close to the satellites. I'm not sure what that means about ability to jam both directions, as directional receivers on the ground should still be able to receive a signal, but maybe ground jammers can just send at larger strengths.

* International treaties and national laws prohibit sending radio signals into the country if the countries government doesn't give you permission. Space ISPs are very unlikely to do so without permission except at the behest of their home government.

Yeah, I continue to be baffled by this argument that starlink et all are going to somehow crack open totalitarian states. There's not a chance in the world of any of these companies risking their licensing and relationship with the ITU. No one is going to be smuggling in ground terminals, let alone macgyvering their own, because the network isn't gonna talk back.

> There's not a chance in the world of any of these companies risking their licensing and relationship with the ITU

SpaceX doesn't have to worry about the ITU. All they have to worry about is (1) keeping the US government happy (2) avoiding conflict with powerful foreign countries like Russia, China, etc

So long as they obey US laws and keep the US government happy, and avoid making unnecessary enemies of powerful foreign countries, SpaceX can completely ignore the ITU

(Belarus is a complex situation because it is right next to Russia. If SpaceX was helping the US install a pro-US regime in Belarus, that is going to offend Russia, and it would be dangerous for SpaceX to offend Russia. But if we were talking about some other country which was not immediately bordering a major world power, that consideration would not apply.)

Why would it be dangerous for SpaceX to offend Russia?

in a small enough country , location could be spoofed perhaps ? Or in the border regions it could be harder to block ?

The trick is that a Sat must know where it is, and the fact that Starlink operate at LEO, they only have a solid visibility of a few hundred square km.

Can you point to a specific treaty? Radio Free Europe has been doing it for decades. Photons don't stop at national borders, and the footprint of a satellite is likely going to mean that Belarus will have transmissions from satellites, even if no one wants that to happen.

Article 18.1 or the ITU Radio Regulations (a binding treaty) states that

> No transmitting station may be established or operated by a private person or by any enterprise without a licence issued in an appropriate form and in conformity with the provisions of these Regulations by or on behalf of the government of the country to which the station in question is subject (however, see Nos. 18.2, 18.8 and 18.11).

SpaceX cannot help establish, or help operate, these ground stations. Technically could they sell them in another country? Maybe, I don't think the ITU would accept that considering that have to have control over the software for routing purposes, and that they know exactly where the ground station is because of beam forming.

The Outer Space Treaty article 3 also states that

> States Parties to the Treaty shall carry on activities in the exploration and use of outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, in accordance with international law, including the Charter of the United Nations, in the interest of maintaining international peace and security and promoting international co- operation and understanding.

(Later incorporated against private entities in a different article).

It would not be much of a stretch to consider this a violation of this article as well.

It is slightly less clear cut than I remember though.

While the first iteration of Starlink requires a ground station somewhat close (hundreds of kilometers) to the user, once they deploy intersatellite links, the only ground station required will be close to the destination IP, far away from the censoring country.

While radio licenses will probably prevent them from operating in geographically large countries like Russia, information can seep in through regions several hundred kilometers away from the border.

Take a look at this map representing current coverage: https://satellitemap.space/

Belarus is covered by a single satellite.

Ah, I meant "user terminal" when I said ground station in this context.

Will try to find the relevant treaty again tonight if no one else does first. It might have been space specific/it might have a cutout for the government (either would explain radio free europe).

SpaceX uses phased array antennas, so they know where they are sending their service.

Serious question: how would a satellite ISP know where a user is located? Moreover, how can a satellite ISP ensure that its signals are not entering a particular country, especially a geographically small country?

If you just took a standard antenna that approximately speaking broadcast evenly in every direction, you couldn't (or at least you would have to bother triangulating the signal). If you did that though you wouldn't be able to offer high speed internet because you would be incredibly bandwidth constrained.

Instead, what these satellites are doing is using something called a phased array antenna, that let's them narrowly select what area they are broadcasting to and receiving from at any point in time with some fancy electronics controlling an array of many little antennas that constructively/destructively interfere. As a result, they have to know where the base stations are reasonably precisely.

I'm not actually sure how they discover where base stations are, my guess would be GPS on the base stations and omni-directional signalling to find them, in which case they know to within meters where a base station is. If that guess is wrong, you might be able to be a small amount over a border and have SpaceX not know it, but not substantially.

These new generations of satellite constellations also are proposed to operate at MUCH lower altitudes and in much greater numbers than something in geosynchronous orbit. We're talking distances closer than the ISS, which is this far away: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ISS-42_Florida_in_th...

Doesn't seem like it would be that hard of a task at that proximity.

> Doesn't seem like it would be that hard of a task at that proximity.

What is the task you are talking about?

Aiming a directional antenna, having a geographically limited broadcast area, or aiming a phased array, etc.

Yeah, like that stopped Radio Free Europe delivering real news into the Eastern block.

They can imprison people with terminals but they can't radio shield their airspace.

Indeed Radio free Europe recently (in the last few days) turned on their medium wave broadcasts in Belorussian. I don’t know when they last sent them out.

Now we're calling state-sponsored propaganda outlet "real news"

You haven't lived in a communist country to get the feel of real propaganda my friend. Radio Free Europe was a breath of fresh air compared to official news. You should probably see the Goodbye Lenin movie.

Like Radio Free Europe is "real news"

Yes; can't they just declare that Starlink's particular transmission bands are reserved for Belarussian military use, and then fine them for broadcasting on military bands?

How would a state extract fines out of an external entity who does not operate in that state? International court? Those only deal with human rights, resources and border disputes.

Shoot down the satellites?

For a constellation as large as starlink, that would probably require a lot of missiles, even accounting for Kessler effects.

Also, doings such a thing to an American corporation that's only one or two degrees of separation from the USDoD may prove to be a costly mistake. I think Belarus would need to depend on the strength of their relationship with Russia to avoid retaliation. That hasn't protected Syria though, so maybe Belarus [Lukashenko] should think twice before attempting some hotheaded shit like that.

I doubt Belarus has the infrastructure to shoot them down, them asking Russia to and giving Russia the excuse that the US violated the Outer Space Treaty first might do the trick though. Depends on how much of a war monger Russia wants to be at the relevant point in time.

They are spread out with many satellites over a small number of orbits, pretty ideal for Kessler, or pretty ideal for another satellite to pass by a whole line of them and stick a bullet (small detachable impactor) in each.

Or some Russian hardware mysteriously is “stolen” and ends up in Belarus with some little green men to operate it.

Would they need to shoot down the entire constellation? I could imagine them threatening to shoot it down (and maybe a few demonstrations) would be enough to convince SpaceX to stop sending signals into Belarus.

I dislike Putin, but I think he's too smart to start shooting down hundreds of American satellites (barring WWIII.) That's far brasher than anything else they've done in quite a while.

That's much harder to do under the table though. Most of these I ternet blocking orders do their best to avoid leaving a paper trail of responsibility.

Russia and China have already moved to prohibit access to these LEO internet services, or try to compel the providers to bring down all data that originates in their country to in-country servers for review and control. They are also developing their own constellations in order to provide a service which they can control.

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/technology/russia-bans...

https://www.scmp.com/abacus/tech/article/3085146/does-elon-m...

https://www.scmp.com/abacus/tech/article/3089481/satellite-i...

Russia to create orbital Internet satellite cluster by 2025 - Tass https://tass.com/science/1005554

I don't see Starlink shutting down subscribers if the Belarussian government asks them to, at least not very quickly. If the terminals are available, this is going to make all of the national internet projects (Russia, China, Iran) much more difficult to pull off.

My guess is Starlink isn't going to turn off subscribers for small countries, but large countries like Russia and China may have more influence.

The real question is if there's going to be enough receivers to make a difference.

Any country which has the capability of shooting down satellites has more influence than countries which can't do it. But even a country with like 100 million residents, if it doesn't have a space program (or someone protecting it with a space program), it doesn't have much of a say.

Anti-satellite weaponry doesn't really apply here for the same reason land based artillery doesn't apply for trying to block pirate radio coming from a neighboring country

You can also use a different analogy of an airplane that's in a foreign country's airspace without permission, not following any instructions by ATC.

The international law is very different for space and airspace.

Shooting down an American-owned satellite would be an act of war against the United States. Not many countries have enough control over the US domestic political process to keep the potential risks of that low enough to justify the benefits.

Countries that have that capability can't shoot down 40000 of them.

A few hits would provide enough junk for runaway process

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome

I don't think a country with space capability is seriously considering making orbit useless over censorship. That'd be like shooting yourself in the foot right after you've trained for a marathon, in order to ingratiate yourself with firearms manufacturers.

And private company would not consider such risk either. Like with nuclear weapon ability to shoot is enough. Funny how it works with

s/country/private company/

s/space/nuclear/, s/orbit/land/

If this becomes a thing, they will put a laser on a satellite and call it a day. All of the big 3 (military, not economically, you know who I am talking about) can do this easily.

edit: In response to below - they are putting SHORAD lasers on Strykers soon. Things have become a lot more compact.

High powered lasers on an aircraft carrier work because it has a nuclear power plant onboard. How will you launch a nuclear power plant into space?

Note that the response to star wars contributed to the Soviet Union's bankruptcy :).

Depends on duty cycle. It may only need enough power for a couple of big bursts. Chemical lasers might work quite well here if you can address temperature fluctuation issues. The power output can be sufficiently massive with a relatively compact storage of that power. The downside is just that they can't be easily recharged.

Soviet union had nuclear powered radar sattelites for reconnaissance, with a real reactor onboard, not RTG. it's definately doable.

But the whole point of a laser is that you don't need to put it in space, it could be a large facility on the ground.

Main considerations are political impact, not technical feasability.

As for Soviet bancrupcy, impact of Chernobyl was definately much larger than space program shenanigans.

Even countries that have the ability to shoot down satellites probably aren't going to shoot down hundreds or thousands of starlink sats, which is what it would take to end coverage.

Good point, and indeed they can't, but they can cause a mess by shooting down a few. The other satellites will have to evade the debris which will cause headaches to the operator company.

> My guess is Starlink isn't going to turn off subscribers for small countries, but large countries like Russia and China may have more influence.

That Musk guy lives in America? What about some extra persuasion?

I'll be surprised if Starlink satellites are going to be transmitting any signals to countries where they are not holding the appropriate licenses to do so.

Do GPS sats stop transmiting while over adversary tertitory? No. But GPS is a military project.

You can use scramblers for satellite communication, that why you have to register your satellite phone in Russia otherwise it barely works.

Source: Myself, in a very bad situation without a working Sattelitephone

Starlink requires a proprietary receiver, right? I suspect these authoritarian regimes won't be allowing starlink installations on the ground unless they get to have a kill switch.

Unfortunately it's very easy for governments to make ownership of unblockable receivers illegal and to simply jam appropriate wavelengths on top of that. Just look at how radio was regulated after its invention.

Usually there is no proper technical solution for a political problem.

Jamming, and radiolocating satellite terminals is not that easy.

China for example been trying to crack down on vsat ownership for decades, to no avail

Yes, continuously jamming a whole country (even not a big one such as Belarus) is not feasible, and AESA terminals make this task even more difficult. But I meant that during critical events (such as massive protests) government can jam population centers by simply relying on an overwhelming power of jamming signal, thus making proper coordination significantly harder.

One can still go to a radio silence area like on top of a mountain or uninhabited countryside. They would need a very strong sat based jammer.

Belarus currently allows satellite phones:

https://blog.telestial.com/2017/11/countries-where-satellite...

Imagine a US company of strategic importance becoming the defacto internet provider for much of the developing world. There's no way Starlink is happening organically or in a policy vacuum. This is like a CIA/NSA wet dream.

Also, people forget that low latency global internet is a requirement for next generation drone operations, particularly removing pilots from high performance aircraft. Again, this is strategic and something the Pentagon has gushed over for 30+ years. To see it as anything but is naive.

I always thought the Pentagon has had a robust global satellite communications network for decades already.

(I don't know whether it is Internet-protocol based. My guess is yes.)

Just look what happened when Iridium failed and became propped up by government users who wanted its capabilities.

A businessman bought the Iridium assets in bankruptcy and put a lot of effort into selling the service to the US government. It absolutely wasn't just the US government picking it up.

High latency, low bandwidth

Low latency, high bandwidth

1. They make it illegal and good luck! You may escape but others might be beaten and jailed.

2. Any company will think really hard about doing something against the government wishes. They might be frozen out for ages and the next dictator will not like what you did either.

An ISP must be registered with the government and must follow laws in place for filtering content and working with the government. Whether the ISP is using any local infrastructure or "going to space" doesn't matter.

The question isn't whether or not there are laws against it, it's how you enforce the laws. For example, the USSR had to jam radio stations to stop external content getting into it's borders. Would a country like Belarus try to do the same type of thing when it comes to satellite internet?

I donct know if they jammed anything, they built radios and TV sets with Eastern band. But that was easily circumvented.

They explicitly jammed radio free Europe , for example.

Who did so, the USSR? A certain Eastern leader paid Carlos the Jackal to perpetrate a terror attack at Radio Free Europe. Of course that didn't stop shut it down.

https://pressroom.rferl.org/a/carlos-the-jackal-and-the-bomb...

USSR did. My dad lived in Belarus during the time (I was born there as well but we moved to the US when I was a kid) and said it was a bit of cat and mouse game re exact wavelength to catch the American radio. Ofc my memory is post soviet and there was no blocking but we still listened to it in the 90s.

I guess the idea would be that, like with satellite phones now, you could theoretically use a hypothetical satellite internet from any country and get the same experience. It may run afoul of local laws, but there wouldn't be a technical obstacle, barring country wide jamming.

> An ISP must be registered with the government and must follow laws in place for filtering content and working with the government. Whether the ISP is using any local infrastructure or "going to space" doesn't matter.

An ISP should not be registering with the government, and it must follow any laws. Oppose censorship.

Anonymous, censorship free communications is a lethal threat to rogue regimes.

It allows opposition to organise and subvert their governments without a threat of its leaders being exposed, and killed.

> "Anonymous, censorship free communications is a lethal threat to rogue regimes."

Saudi arabia is still a dictatorship, despite being our 'allies' and having internet. They even dismember dissidents from time to time.

They even dismember dissidents from time to time.

...and look how well that went over? I'm not sure I'd chalk that one up as a win for MBS.

How did it go over? I have not seen the royal family suffer serious material consequences for murder. Have i missed something?

Usually they just throw them out of a copter. Like in the good old fascist Latin American times.

ISPs must follow the laws of the countries they operate in so I am not sure this will work out.

On the flip side, I don't think they can block communications forever, so is that tactic even going to work ?

People are still going to be pissed in one month.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com