Starlink is now on all seven continents, enabled by its space laser network | Hacker News Reader

Starlink is now on all seven continents, enabled by its space laser network

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213 points_Microft202 comments

According to their coverage map (https://www.starlink.com/map) there is no coverage in Africa nor Asia, unless I'm missing something obvious. Or if there are new continents I'm not aware of.

This is availability for purchase map, not coverage.

What is the difference? If I pick an address in Africa, it tells me "Service date is unknown at this time", does that mean they have coverage there but I cannot purchase it if I live there?

So I could, if I live in Africa, buy it and send it to an address in Europe, go pick it up and then use it from my home in Africa?

Hover more thoroughly. Different countries and regions have different tooltips.

But no, you would not be able to ship the user terminal to Africa and use it. You can’t even move it more than a few dozen miles from the address they have on file and keep using it, unless you have the more expensive license for mobile users (think RVs and boats and such). Even then it stops working if you enter an area where service is unavailable.

So realistically then, " This is availability for purchase map, not coverage. " makes no sense, because it is for a fact not available in Africa.

The Starlink dishes have GPS data reported so if you aren't authorized in an area it will be disabled. That said, this coverage map looks like it's for commercial sale, Africa is big complicated continent, if you look at Nigeria for instance, it says availability starting in Q4 2022, which means they likely already have some ground stations installed. If the ground stations are installed and the spectrum is allowed then a local government/school could probably purchase a Starlink dish legally and have it work right now.

All they need is one dish installed on every continent for the 'all seven continents supported' to TECHNICALLY be correct, obviously this tweet is just marketing. It's still pretty cool to see that many incredibly under-served communities in South America/Africa/Asia will be able to be served considering running physical infrastructure is very expensive.

The difference is pretty big!

Without coverage, no one can use Starlink.

If there is coverage, state governments can allow Starlink usage.

To expand, they get their internet from ground stations. If they had just one or two ground stations, like in CA and TX, then everyone would be depending on the laser network and the entire operation would be slow. So they can't sell to a lot of people that would just be getting laser coverage.

That map doesn’t distinguish between waiting for enough satellites to be in the sky overhead and waiting for permission from the local government. For better or worse, each country’s government has to approve the use of any particular frequency, as well as things like transmission power.

That makes perfect sense. If the service is not available, it's not available. The reason why doesn't make a difference "how available" it is. Either it is, or it isn't.

Seems a bit like false marketing to say "Starlink is now on all seven continents" when it's more like "Starlink has satellites over seven continents but you can only actually use it on five of them"

Eh, it depends on who "you" are. I'm pretty sure the USAF can use them on all seven continents. Meanwhile I, not having a contract, can't use them on any continent.

Do you mean to say that the USAF can use devices that cause arbitrary interference on frequency bands that the country they're operating in hasn't reserved for such uses, and said countries tolerate that?

Those countries' poor radio engineers...

The satellites are already there, like gps satellites are already there. I'm assuming they're transmitting whether or not people on the ground have connection or whether or not the government "approves" it.

MIMO antennas aren't transmitting in your direction unless you get their attention by transmitting in theirs. Also, they might be transmitting by default with barely-enough power, in a narrow band, in frequencies everyone generally agrees to not use for anything important; but once you establish a circuit with them, they could start transmitting in your particular direction with more power, in wider bandwidth, or in more-likely-to-be-reserved frequencies.

Uh, yes. The USAF uses electronic warfare systems that don't just accidentally cause such interference, but do so intentionally. Much like every other major military.

Which isn't to say that they would operate those systems (or starlink) in peacetime without the approval of the host country, just that they can use those systems at any time... While I don't know for a fact that SpaceX has left the decision on where to use starlink up to them, I'm pretty sure that would be the case.

I was referring more to countries that host US military bases / allow USAF flyover in peacetime, and which aren't currently considered Starlink-enabled. The Philippines, for example.

> Which isn't to say that they would operate those systems (or starlink) in peacetime without the approval of the host country

To the original point, Starlink wouldn't be claiming that "Starlink is now on all seven continents" unless somebody (e.g. the USAF) was at least conducting connectivity tests in these countries, if not putting Starlink into active use — which would, again, be much to the chagrin of local RF engineers, who had.

>>Starlink wouldn't be claiming that "Starlink is now on all seven continents" unless somebody (e.g. the USAF) was at least conducting connectivity tests in these countries, if not putting Starlink into active use

Elon's history of marketing says otherwise.

I think the radio engineers suffer at the hands of poorly-shielded switch-mode power supplies and inadvertent spark-gap transmitters caused by aging powerline infrastructure more than anything else.

Well, if you hover over various countries where it’s not yet available, it will tell you when they estimate that it will be available. Nigeria says “Q4 2022”, which is not very far away. In order to be sure of having service available in a month or two, they have surely already built a ground station or two, printed some instruction booklets in Nigerian, hired some Nigerian sales reps, etc.

Yeah, I saw that when you hover, it shows you an estimate of when it'll be available. But saying that it's available in X weeks/months/years in Africa directly conflicts with the tweet saying "Starlink is now on all seven continents" when it's not available in Africa or Asia right now.

I think you're being a little obtuse here. The point of the tweet seems to be that the laser links are up enabling a true global network without the need for nearby ground stations.

They have coverage over all seven continents because of that and I have very little doubt that it's been tested in those continents as well. "Availability" here seems to be a proxy for "is technically solved" vs. "is commercially available".

If you're asking "what's the difference?" Think about the war in Ukraine. Starlink wasn't (and isn't?) commercially available there but was able to be deployed in an emergency.

FYI English is the official language of Nigeria, and the one most people who can afford satellite internet speak day-to-day. No need to translate!

Maybe that's why they're getting it months before anyone else :)

There are something like 10-15 countries in Africa where English is the official language, and there is almost as many English speakers in Africa as in the US in total :)

It's much more likely to do with licensing radio bandwidth.

Ahh yes, the language called Nigerian…

If you mouseover the countries you can see that some of them are "Pending regulatory approval".

> For better or worse, each country’s government has to approve the use of any particular frequency, as well as things like transmission power.

I think it’s for the worse if governments disapprove the use of Starlink. Starlink should at least be allowed to send out an SOS message. It could save a life out on the frontier.

> waiting for enough satellites to be in the sky overhead

Seriously, wtf? Look at some orbits. Satellites do not sit stationary over one location, except the ones called "geosynchronous satellites".

https://satellitemap.space/#

Edit: if Starlink is not available in a country it is for one of three reasons:-

- the country is not at the top of Starlink's priority list for connection (commercial reasons)

- the country wants nothing to do with anything based in the USA (politics)

- the country has an obstructive bureaucracy (corruption, stupidity).

> Or if there are new continents I'm not aware of.

Antarctica. Thank you for this.

Perhaps it's available in all seven continents the way Tesla cars have full self driving.

Maritime coverage shows African and Asian coasts in the Mediterranean

The SpaceX tweet says "Starlink is now on all seven continents", not "Starlink is commercially available for general use on all seven continents".

Non-commercial users such as the US military are using it on bases, ships, and aircraft worldwide. Antarctica is notably a continent without US military bases, so the "on all seven continents" claim was not complete until these scientists got a hold of a dish.

Yeah, I get that it could mean a lot of things. I guess it smells kind of funny as they imply that you can use it in seven continents, while maybe it's just their coverage is available in seven continents, but you can't actually contract it.

Would be a bit like saying McDonalds is on all seven continents since mcdonalds.com is reachable on all seven continents, but then you cannot actually order McDonalds at Antarctica so it smells a bit like misleading marketing.

I wonder what's up with that dark spot in Western Australia.

Probably to remove interference with https://www.atnf.csiro.au/projects/askap/index.html

According to its Wikipedia entry, McMurdo Station had a 20Mbit/s satellite link so far.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMurdo_Station#Communications

I'd imagine the latency and per-installation cost is quite high.

It looks like it operates at 35,000 km and relays the signal between the base and Australia. The ping time seems to average a hair under 250ms.

https://www.satellite-calculations.com/Satellite/170HourList...

http://bhs.smokeping.ovh.net/smokeping?target=APAC.AS7474-1

Starlink satellites are mostly in the 550km elevation range. Average pings seem to be in the 50ms range, but this would be single satellite performance. This should drop as more units are brought online and increase capacity. Also, the laser interconnects are theoretically faster than terrestrial fiber, so there are expected to be many long-hauls where starlink will be the fastest option.

https://www.speedcheck.org/starlink-performance-2021/

> It looks like it operates at 35,000 km and relays the signal between the base and Australia. The ping time seems to average a hair under 250ms.

That would be impressive, as that would be 140,000km in 250ms, or about twice the speed of light

Most satellite IP I use starts at about 650ms

Yeah that number seemed low, should have done the math. Going by the IPs, the link I posted is the delay between Quebec and the New South Wales ground station that the satellite links to. So it sounds like McMurdo to Quebec would be a 1 second delay on a good day.

Pings would be bad compared to fiber/cable from your location to somewhere close to you. Pings are potentially better than fiber/cable would be to locations far away from you, depending on the routing. Going up to LEO and then lasering around gets you faster signal propagation out of the atmosphere.

I had a buddy [1] that worked in the kitchen at Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station for a few seasons in 2012-2014. From what he told me: The internet works at certain times of the day at different bandwidths depending on the satellite. I think at that time there was 3 in orbit, and one of them was a retired Navy sat that had like dial-up speed.

Also everything that goes to the station stays there so the vinyl collection is amazing, and they have a huge Betamax / VHS library and most importantly they have /The Thing/ on Betamax.

[1] https://www.portlandmercury.com/Theater/2012/07/26/6564600/m...

Edit: Here's the satellite schedule for this week, https://www.usap.gov/technology/documents/SPSAT%2020220915.p... and you can sign up for a listserv of updates here: https://www.usap.gov/technology/1935/

These are the available birds in orbit for Antarctica:

Broadband: South Pole TDRSS Relay (SPTR) Satellite

Broadband: Defense Satellite Communications System (DSCS)

Broadband: Skynet Satellite Communications System

Narrowband: Iridium Multi-Channel System (IMCS)

> Also everything that goes to the station stays there

What's the reasoning behind that? Presumably people bring back clothes and other personal affects right?

Personal effects must be like 1% (approximately) of what they ship in, by weight. Consider things like the consumables and construction equipment.

Given the cost of getting things there, it's probably polite to leave things like movies that you could easily replace back home, so others have them to watch.

Most things are probably cheaper to replace than to bring back from the most remote area on Earth, and far cheaper to leave for someone else to use than make them bring their own. If unwanted, it’s trash - too expensive to move when there’s presumably an acceptable landfill right there (may sound environmentally unfriendly, but hauling trash back is likely worse).

If I remember right they're actually required to ship all trash back. There are no trash landfills in Antarctica.

Oh, my. Watching "The Thing" in an Antarctic station would be insomnia fodder.

I wonder exactly how many copies/versions/editions of The Thing they have.

Shemya Air Force Base (now Eareckson Air Station) in the Aleutian Islands had a policy that weight limits were waived for entertainment media. So you weren't going to be charged any penalties for bringing in movies, comics, CDs, or books because they increased the quality of life of such an isolated base (you were expected to share).

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

The Thing now has Internet.

Man, I love when sci-fi becomes reality. It's the cool things that get me excited for some parts of the future, and this is exactly that.

Does this mean they've figured out satellite-to-satellite data transfer?

Yup, I think that's the implication of the "space laser network". The plan for Starlink has been to have laser crosslinks between the satellites to provide coverage in places where the satellites can't directly see a ground station.

That's the plan, but it's an unimaginably difficult task. Many have speculated they wouldn't be able to pull it off at scale.

Forgive my ignorance but I don't understand why it's an unimaginably difficult task. The satellites are operating in a vacuum with no weather interference or anything and have line of sight to each other. I would think that it should actually be easy to pull off, and actually should get easier at scale since the distances between individual satellites would shrink and would be easier to align the laser links.

I see it as one of those enormously difficult and yet practical things, like photolithography. The human sweat to produce this system is surely measured in decades, if not centuries depending on whose effort we want to count.

They're also moving in different, independent directions on different planes at extremely high speeds...

Some people have speculated that laser links within the same plane (where satellites are stationary relative to each other) are working and the others are not.

> at extremely high speeds

Absolute speeds or relative to each other speeds?

Both, they have two sets of orbital paths at roughly 90 degrees to eachother (I'm just eyeballing it, it's probably not exactly 90). With more sets if you count the satellites in polar orbits.

Though they could, if they needed to, only connect to the satellites flying at low relative speed.

There's no need for them to transfer data to satellites crossing in perpendicular directions to each other.

Right, that's what I was trying to say with my last sentence.

It would sometimes reduce latency if they're able to though.

Satellites in the same plane aren't moving at all relative to each other and satellites in adjacent planes move very little relative to each other.

I don't remember the details, but I believe one of the issues is that the distances are extremely long.

Mirror tracking is hard. Low orbit stuff etches everything plastic with oxygen.

Lasers don't need an atmosphere to make them difficult to shoot over distances either.

If they wouldn't have been able to pull it off why would they have launched the satellites? I don't get why people constantly underestimate the ability of Elon Musk companies to points beyond what is reasonable. They're not going to just do something that's very likely to fail. That'd be completely uneconomic and unaffordable.

This is the first mention of it working that I've seen. I wonder if it's a limited deployment for Antarctica or the beginning of a large rollout.

That's basically what I'm wondering about. Is this an unfortunate headline, or are we really there already?

It's taken straight from the Twitter account https://mobile.twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1570073223005622274 I just don't see any other info about it.

It can't function in Antarctica without the satellite links, so it's already there.

I think they have and are at least trialing it? I saw a post on reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/StarlinkEngineering/ I think) where someone was showing how they can tell based on satellite positions and latency numbers that they are definitely receiving service even when satellites had no reach to ground stations.

That title is a phrase I'd only expect to hear in a scifi movie. The future is now.

Does this mean Starlink maritime service now works at sea and not just in coastal areas?

It has the potential to yes, assuming there's enough capacity now.

I thought that laser connectivity wasn't going to be available until V2 of the satellite went in to operation/orbit, and that's not going to happen until SpaceX gets Starship or the modified Falcon off the ground?

No, they've been promising laser links with (IIRC) v1.5 for a while.

I very much doubt v2 will be on F9, they're much bigger so the 47 they can fly now will drop significantly (if it can even fit in the extended fairing, I'm not sure it can).

They've got a 'pez dispenser' already worked out too for starship, just need to light that candle now. Ramped up testing again last week so I'm hoping it'll be soon (said that 12 months ago)

No need to doubt.

https://spacenews.com/spacex-adds-falcon-9-back-to-second-ge...

I mean, I know they've been taking the financial hit for the starlink launches as they ramp up the subscriber base, but this seems really ineffective.

No, they've been on all v1.5 satellites that have been launching for a little over a year now.

Does this mean we’ll start seeing more Antarctic TikTokers? Exciting!

A new ice bucket challenge.

There's a 300 degree club at the south pole. Strip, jump in 200 degF water, then run outside around the building where it's -100 degF.

I was skeptical that 200F water would not cause almost immediate damage.

Turns out this challenge involves a 200F sauna, so 200F air, not water.

The people who I have met, who have participated, are very interesting people. Very interesting stories from amazing engineers.

Edit: I don't know if these two participated but I knew them from the NJIT CSTR. Some of the smartest people I met who were basically volunteering just so they could get flown down every year: https://youtu.be/ciqAZSoOmr8?t=676. Gil was just getting through some back surgery at this point, was in massive pain, and still flew out that year if memory serves me correct.

I think it is one of these cases where everyone agrees that the Fahrenheit scale should be used.

I can't imagine the engineering involved to be able to calculate and maintain a space based laser network with thousands of vehicles traveling in orbit.

That is some real deal holyfield physics and math knowledge right there.

Perhaps, this is a message to Apple

…Availability on all continents might be a requirement to qualify as a provider for satellite emergency services like the one Apple will soon offer with iPhone 14 Pro

They're already doing that with the T-Mobile deal announced recently.

In case you missed this amazing video last week

https://www.reddit.com/r/space/comments/x7oowo/starlink_sate...

Yes this happens right after they're launched. They're no longer visible after a few weeks.

One thing that may be related to Starlink, or not - it happened to me already twice that I was just randomly gazing at stars and noticed long streak of satellites in a row. One around last christmas and one few weeks ago. In places cca 1500km apart in Europe.

First one the satellites were evenly spaced, sometimes 1-2 were 'missing' and I could see between gap in the clouds maybe 7-8 at the same time. Altogether maybe 30.

Second time, the spacing wasnt even but there were at least 60 of them till the show finished.

Of course real number could be much higher since I noticed them ranfomly when looking up. Their line was perfectly aligned and they were going fast (probably close to Earth).

I guess this is how satellite launches look these days, but never saw more than 1 satellite at the same time in the same trajectory on the sky, and then this. Very futuristic experience.

Yes those must have been Starlink's. I was in awe the first time I saw that string of lights. And if you wait a bit, they come around again! They are in a low orbit and very fast relative to earth because of that.

Cool, maybe one day they'll post a phone number or an email you can reach them on.

Cool, time to get one of these: https://www.concordaerospace.com/products/jewish-space-laser...

SPACE LASERS!!!

Sorry. The inner child in me got far too excited by this.

I read the title and couldn't help but hear it as something Steve Carrell would exclaim really loudly in some sitcom.

"Boots on the Moon!"

[Deleted]

You're definitely right, but one mitigating factor is that Starlink satellites are in a pretty low orbit. They'll naturally decay relatively quickly and drop out of orbit at end of life.

Edit: a link that goes over some of this https://www.spacex.com/updates/#sustainability

I agree that the debris problem is one of those commons-type issues that’ll cost way more to fix than if we’d prevented it in the first place.

However, for starlink specifically aren’t the satellites all low enough to deorbit and burn up automatically within 5 years? This should eliminate the orbital debris problem for this constellation specifically.

A different problem is what happens with all the burnt up aluminum and other metals in the high atmosphere. I saw a post mentioning this once recently but also don’t know much about the scale or effects of this problem.

[Deleted]

If something perturbs a Starlink orbit, it might raise apogee but would also lower perigee, which means it would fall out of the sky even faster.

I think this comes from a misunderstanding of orbital dynamics. Without *active* effort by the engines, these sort of satellites are low enough they drop out of orbit within a year or two because of friction against the atmosphere. Basically, these solve their own junk problem

They are in a very low earth orbit designed to naturally decay and deorbit in years instead of decades. Yes, there are a lot of them but they did design for this. Not nearly as big a problem as satellites in higher orbits which keep being destroyed into thousands of pieces intentionally with no care for their consequences.

This isn't a serious problem in LEO. Absolute worst case scenario from starlink is we decide there's too much space crap and we wait 5 years for LEO to clear out.

Totally agree. Not sure I care about Starlink.

Chatted once on a Webex with Chris Hadfield about 6-12 months ago, who said that the service was somewhat better and more reliable than his current satellite connection, but also that it wasn't necessarily good enough for a change in mindset. He knew that sometimes he wouldn't have good enough connection for video calls out there, and that was ok by him.

I don't think he was thinking about the space dust / negative externalities

I find no Google results that are appropriate for "Starlink satellite retrieval"

The Starlink website notes "95% of "all components of this design will quickly burn in Earth's atmosphere at the end of each satellite's lifecycle".

It's amazing that it's already looking like this: https://satellitemap.space/

And of course, it's not black and white. Took me a bit longer... had to remember that Corporate Social Responsibility departments exist, but in February 2022 SpaceX put out a statement at least: https://www.spacex.com/updates/

Funny - so they've done a reasonable amount of work to minimize space junk, which is great! Absolutely no mention of helping out astronomers with the line of sight problem.

> who said that the service was somewhat better and more reliable than his current satellite connection, but also that it wasn't necessarily good enough

A beta product isn't perfect, more news at 11.

SpaceX has extensively worked with astronomers, including having a working group that meets weekly, presenting at conferences, doing multiple iterations of design changes and so on.

I don't like Starlink. It increases light pollution, even in places without much human activity, which is a disaster for astronomers.

Moreover, sending satellites to space is really inefficient. It wastes a lot of energy and pollutes a lot. To increase coverage, the amount of satellite they'll need will be more and more. And the skies will become more and more full of space junk (each satellite lives for 7 years).

I think there are other solutions. But of course, other solutions do not favour Elon Musk as much.

> But of course, other solutions do not favour Elon Musk as much

How a single man can be responsible to so much nuisance to the rest of humanity...

By the media turning him into a boogeyman and simultaneously a poster child.

SX is actively solving the light pollution problem.

A few satellites orbiting use far fewer materials to provide coverage of the entire planet than doing so terrestrially would.

As Starlink satellites age out they de-orbit. No space junk.

You’re welcome to propose & implement better solutions. Until then, this is the very best humans can do to lift all of humanity with minimal environmental impact.

What solutions?

Fortunately, NIMBYism isn't holding things up in low earth orbit.

That's fair. I will say that my parents are loving it. They live in a very rural area.

Until Starlink, the fastest speed they could get from Verizon (the only provider they have access to) was maybe 4 to 5Mbps. And it was still capped at 20GiB a month. Starlink gets them 60 to 70Mbps during overcast/rainy days and 100 to 120Mbps on sunny days with no cap.

I know it isn't altruistic of Starlink to cover these areas, but at least they are. I can now see my parents via video chat multiple times a month vs. seeing them a couple of times a year.

Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, the cable providers, etc. just don't care about them. And rightfully so. They are an extremely small market. It annoys me how much money the US government has given to these ISPs in the hopes that they'll expand rural access, but they never do. Or they use the money to pay lobbyist to say "4g is fine for them"

> It increases light pollution

Not the conventional definition of light pollution. The conventional definintion of light pollution is sky glow, which is not caused by satellites.

Further, the satellites are around 6th magnitude, which is below human eye visible, but certainly still problematic to astronomers.

> which is a disaster for astronomers.

A "disaster" is overstating it. Take a look at this study for example https://www.caltech.edu/about/news/palomar-survey-instrument...

> "There is a small chance that we would miss an asteroid or another event hidden behind a satellite streak, but compared to the impact of weather, such as a cloudy sky, these are rather small effects for ZTF."

> Moreover, sending satellites to space is really inefficient. It wastes a lot of energy and pollutes a lot.

Space launch is a miniscule portion of global emissions and there is no reasonable way it would seriously contribute to global emissions going forward. Further, as the fuel costs are such a small portion of launch costs, it would be easy enough to produce the fuel via direct carbon capture and have it still be economic, which is a path forward in the future.

> To increase coverage, the amount of satellite they'll need will be more and more.

The goal is never to serve high density areas. It's to serve areas that are functionally impossible to serve any other way without massive government subsidy.

> And the skies will become more and more full of space junk (each satellite lives for 7 years).

You've misheard. Those satellites don't stay in orbit very long as their orbits are so low. They'll deorbit within a few years, even if completely lost, but normally they'll de-orbit automatically at the end of life, producing no debris.

How about providing free internet to China and Russia, to give the people there proper information without government oversight?

How about getting Tesla banned from China and possibly starting an orbital war that triggers the Kessler syndrome?

What would be banned are the dishes. China doesn’t need to send a missile to LEO (which would be unnecessarily costly for them).

China wouldn't need anti-satellite weapons to punish Elon Musk, since he has business interests in China. Hence "ban Teslas".

China has previously demonstrated anti-satellite weapons multiple times just to demonstrate they have them (and maybe make sure they work), I doubt they'd be that worried about the cost to demonstrate that they mean it and are willing to use them.

Russia has done the same demonstration last year [1]. And yet they have not destroyed starlink, even though SpaceX donated many dishes to Ukraine[2].

So there still seems to be some restraint around the concept of shooting down foreign satellites. I guess it's a "mutual assured destruction" type situation: once you shoot down a satellite, you'd better be prepared to lose your own.

[1] https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_188780.htm

[2] https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/22/elon-musk-spacex-thousands-o...

Ukraine isn't Russian territory even though Russia would like to believe differently.

On the other hand, providing free media merely to subvert the people of main land China could be seen as a company over stepping it's bounds by far.

I will bet China would sanction anyone who dealt with Starlink.

Nobody is going to disclose & use anti-satellite technology over internet censorship. Hell, China isn't even aiming for bulletproof terrestrial censorship - they are happy with "good enough".

> Nobody is going to disclose & use anti-satellite technology over internet censorship.

This constellation is plausibly if not probably duel-use technology. You can bet that China is planning ways to disable it if war breaks out.

If war breaks out is the key. They'd rather keep their ability to destroy it under wraps until it becomes a matter of national security. Disclosing it or using it prematurely over a benign issue such as internet censorship would be stupid.

In the unlikely event that SpaceX tries to enter the Chinese market illegally, I wouldn't put it past China to swat one of Starlink's satellites using a conventional anti-satellite weapon (one of the sort they have already revealed), just to make a statement. But I think SpaceX won't do this anyway; they'll continue to comply with local/national laws during peacetime. It's not in their interest to stir the pot and cause diplomatic trouble.

But more to your point I agree; they won't try to destroy the constellation itself over something as petty as a few people using Starlink to circumvent their 'Great Firewall'. People sufficiently motivated to get around the firewall already can, without the need for Starlink. The CCP doesn't seem to care about it; the firewall doesn't need to be perfectly airtight to control the population, it only needs to be 'good enough'. And they wouldn't want to expose any new anti-satellite weapons they have, particularly soft-kill weapons that might be addressed after discovery with a software patch.

Also, the backbone of Tesla's production rests on the factory in Shanghai.

You know both Russia and China are perfectly capable of targeting and destroying satellites, yes?

Neither could destroy SpaceX satellites as fast as they can be launched. No State can.

The issue would be whether they could cause enough damage to make the orbital plane (temporarily) unusable.

The Starlink orbit is low enough that it would only be unusable for a year or so I'd imagine. Small debris will drop out quite fast.

Are those protected from EMP that can kill scores at once?

The point of Starship is to launch hundreds at once, several times a week if it goes as planned (that's a few years away.) Forget Mars colonization, the only practical use for such a booster is to fight a war in LEO.

There's currently more than 3,000 satellites in the constellation. Killing scores or even hundreds isn't enough. The only known EMP weapons that could really impact the constellation is nuclear, and at that point, knocking out Starlink is the least of our worries.

I think a laser mounted on one of their satellites could get the job done. Their militaries may even have that already.

They have directed energy weapons that could probably destroy individual satellites one at a time faster than they could be launched.

Who does? I think there's a [citation needed] for this claim.

China does.

The probably is there for a reason though, the exact extent of their capabilities is unclear.

Here's a citation: https://thediplomat.com/2022/06/chinas-directed-energy-weapo...

That's rumour, not a citation. Maybe I'm wrong and directed energy weapons can destroy thousands of satellites in LEO, but it's never been demonstrated by any nation.

It's a citation that they have them, which is all I claimed definitively. If I could cite the part of the statement after "probably", there wouldn't be a "probably" there.

I would not call it rumors. If you'd like a more authoritative citation, here is a DIA (Defense Intelligence Agency, i.e. US military) report cited in the article I cited above: https://www.dia.mil/Portals/110/Documents/News/Military_Powe...

Go read page 24. It doesn’t say what you are claiming.

Page 24 definitely doesn't, it's about Russia. Page 17 on the other hand

> During the past two decades, Chinese defense research has proposed the development of several reversible and nonreversible counterspace DEWs for reversible dazzling of electro-optical sensors and even potentially destroying satellite components. China has multiple ground-based laser weapons of varying power levels to disrupt, degrade, or damage satellites that include a current limited capability to employ laser systems against satellite sensors. By the mid- to late-2020s, China may field higher power systems that extend the threat to the structures of nonoptical satellites.

The discussion of current capabilities is primarily about optical satellites (though it can be read to include other components), but it probably applies to giant sensitive phased array antennas too.

They could absolutely destroy them fast enough. The also only need to destroy them fast enough that SpaceX finds it economically infeasible to continue launching them or blocking them themselves.

I also think that both countries could launch geosync satellites or using existing geosync satellites to just generate a shitton of noise on whatever spectrum Starlink would use.

Starlink of course won't get a license for spectrum in either country.

What mechanism do you believe they could use to destroy the hundred of satellites necessary to destroy the constellation?

They'll find it easier, both technologically and diplomatically, to target and destroy Starlink receivers (and their owners) within their borders.

> You know both Russia and China are perfectly capable of targeting and destroying satellites, yes?

This would be an act of war and open their birds to retaliatory strikes. Tracking down the receivers and levying draconian punishments on those caught would do the trick. Moreover, from the example of Chinese students abroad, it's unclear access to information would do much.

China, I'm not so worried about. At this point though, Putin doesn't have a lot to lose other than his head.

A few, yes.

Not by the thousands, short of taking ALL satellites out.

> Not by the thousands, short of taking ALL satellites out.

Kessler syndrome takes care of them all once you generate enough space junk.

I would make a joke about equating “free internet” with “proper information” but in 2022 that joke writes itself. And let’s not get started on the “without government oversight” part of your comment.

You think the USG that funded SpaceX/Starlink isn't going to have control over it...?

While Starlink was marketed as a boon to rural democratic internet access, those promises have been walked back and its pretty clear that it the limited bandwidth is primarily intended to increase the Pentagon/ICs communications capabilities in the field, much like the Internet itself.

The USG did not fund a swarm of satellites so that American (nor Russian, nor Chinese) farmers can watch Netflix.

Why wouldn't the Pentagon want to blanket China with US propaganda?

Sure, but how do you propose to "blanket" China with Starlink modems?

I'm sure there are plenty of ingenious smugglers in China.

You could, but what difference would it make? You'd only be able to get them to relatively few people, and the "Great Firewall" is already porous enough to let those with sufficient motivation slip through. China doesn't care about that; so long as their firewall still works for most people then it still works for population control.

Most of the things they smuggle probably aren't intended to go on your roof where all the neighbors can see, though.

There are much easier, and more discrete ways for users to bypass content filters than installing a giant, radiation emitting antennae on your roof.

Because you can't give free internet to China or Russia to give people proper information without government oversight. It's not going to happen without the co-operation of these governments who will actively prevent you from doing that. That's basically why.

That's not even mentioning the sanctions on Western technology entering Russia at the moment.

Valid comments here but with the very recent developments on satellite connections direct to mobile phones, how long until you don't need a giant satellite? It may be sooner than we think. Certainly there are other enforcement mechanisms but the trend towards the internet becoming a ubiquitous utility is still making a lot of progress and this is the next paradigm shift.

Indeed. Without veering of into another discussion, other enforcement includes apps and phone monitoring. This isn't limited to other apps on a phone but firmware, input methods, even simply switching IPs.

As well as VPNs existing, international sim cards also 'bypass' internet filtering. Absolute restriction of the internet is not the goal. The goal is to not allow anything approaching a critical mass to do so, especially less technically literate who would not seek out VPNs etc unless they were marketed to or directly facilitated. The next is to all but remove the browser, email is truly dead having never been a big thing socially, with a domestic app orientated landscape; mobile penetration is far beyond lap/desktop.

This doesn't make it better, but it is how it is.

It's far more straightforward to use a VPN. And as much as a VPN might or might not stick out depending on it and how it's used, procuring and using a Starling dish would far more.

Incidentally, HN is blocked in China. Am using a VPN.

I mean, they kind of are, right? If the Chinese and Russian people came up with their own gear to receive/send compatible signals with the signal, then they could use it. Of course, authorized accounts would probably be problematic. Getting Starlink branded gear to use will also be hard in those countries.

No, they could not use it. I'm pretty sure the satellites turn off their transmitters and receivers when passing over unlicensed countries (if for no other reason than to save power).

that's just a software update though if Starlink so chooses to do so. they cost like $0.50 a piece, so if Putin wants to spend money effort to take a couple out to prove whatever point, then it costs them much much more than it does starlink. and at the rate they are getting launched, it won't be a very long lasting worthless accomplishment

They make a loss on the terminals.

I'm not worried about Starlink's bottom line. I'm just guessing that China would want Chinese hardware. Not sure what type of export restrictions this type of hardware would have applied to it related to these 2 countries.

I was just implying that I'm guessing getting actual Starlink hardware through legit channels is probably not something that will be available.

They definitely turn off when passing over areas where there are radio telescopes, which was a bigger problem to astronomers than light reflections

Um, encryption?

What's the end-to-end level of starlink vis-a-vis encryption? I have to imagine it's pretty good.

In Soviet Russia, encryption breaks you!

I'm sure the backdoor master key "everyone" is pushing for would find a practical use in this situation

Practical reasons?

The government would restrict or ban import or sale of the hardware. They'd make them illegal and use possession of one as a reason to throw the owner in jail.

Hey, if that's a cause you believe in, how about you start a non-profit to do it? You could really help some people.

Satellite terminals can become targets as soon as they turn on their uplink transmitter (and possibly even in receive-only mode unless their IF oscillator is perfectly shielded, which it probably isn't). This is why Musk tweeted to Ukrainian users "Turn on Starlink only when needed and place antenna as far away from people as possible." [0]

[0] https://www.dw.com/en/ukraine-is-using-elon-musks-starlink-f...

what about providing 'proper' information without corporate oversight to people in the USA?

Yeah. Because there is 'proper' information without government oversight in the West.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10613795/Joe-Biden-...

They can't without breaking international law.

One step closer to Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative.

It's now the Space Development Agency's (SDA) National Defense Space Architecture (NDSA). But yes, Starlink looks a hell of a lot like the Transport Layer of the NDSA, which is meant to be a mesh network comprising of thousands of satellites in LEO.

Either Starlink is the Transport Layer of NDSA, or it proves that SpaceX has the technical ability to create the Transport Layer (no other company does.)

I really wouldn't put it that way, though. The core part of SDI, the missile defense, isn't part of NDSA. And the "transport layer" is something new to NDSA as far as I can tell.

It depends on which version of SDI you're talking about, there were numerous proposed architectures using different technologies, updated through the years as technology changed. In several of the proposals, orbital Boost Surveillance and Tracking Systems (BSTS) would communicate with orbital interceptors using inter-satellite laser links. Brilliant Pebbles particularly called for thousands of orbital interceptors with IR sensors to track missiles, but to arrange an intercept in time a Pebble would need to receive track information from the BSTS, or other pebbles. The challenge of doing that with thousands of pebbles was one of the factors that sank the proposal (the other big problem being the difficulty of actually launching thousands of interceptors into LEO.)

The mesh network aspect of NDSA / Starlink is new insofar as they've now figured out how to do what they wanted to do back then.

Space-based interceptors are missing from NDSA as it's described in public. But all the technical challenges have been resolved, what remains is the political challenge. Since the space-based interceptors are the politically contentious part, if they were going to do this it would make sense for them to build the 'benign' parts first while not talking about the rest.

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