SpaceX denies Russian claim that Starlink terminals sold illegally will work in the Ukraine
Russian media sources have recently claimed that Starlink terminals are being sold illegally to Russians for use in the Ukraine and in Russia near the Ukraine border, where they will supposedly work. SpaceX has now denied that claim.
[A]ccording to a report from Russian media outlet ComNews, vendors have been selling the equipment because it allegedly works near the country’s borders and in Ukraine, including the Russian-occupied regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, along with Crimea.
That’s contrary to the official Starlink map, which shows the internet access restricted in Russian-occupied areas. Still, as evidence, ComNews cites the online pages of several vendors, including one that notes the Starlink dish can be used in the “CBO,” a reference to Russian military operation in Ukraine. Although the Russian military has a ban on using Starlink equipment, some volunteer military troops have been buying it up.
The terminals are supposedly obtained secretly through Dubai. The SpaceX denial on X noted that they would deactivate any unauthorized terminal and that…
Starlink also does not operate in Dubai. Starlink cannot be purchased in Dubai nor does SpaceX ship there. Additionally, Starlink has not authorized any third-party intermediaries, resellers or distributors of any kind to sell Starlink in Dubai.
This story however does raise the long-standing question of how SpaceX can control the use and ownership of its terminals. Once shipped to a legal customer, what is to stop that customer from selling that terminal to anyone who can then ship it and sell it to some third party in a blocked region? SpaceX can probably identify the location of its terminals, and if one is found not to be where it should be, deactivate it. But could smugglers eventually block SpaceX from getting this location data?
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Russian media sources have recently claimed that Starlink terminals are being sold illegally to Russians for use in the Ukraine and in Russia near the Ukraine border, where they will supposedly work. SpaceX has now denied that claim.
[A]ccording to a report from Russian media outlet ComNews, vendors have been selling the equipment because it allegedly works near the country’s borders and in Ukraine, including the Russian-occupied regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, along with Crimea.
That’s contrary to the official Starlink map, which shows the internet access restricted in Russian-occupied areas. Still, as evidence, ComNews cites the online pages of several vendors, including one that notes the Starlink dish can be used in the “CBO,” a reference to Russian military operation in Ukraine. Although the Russian military has a ban on using Starlink equipment, some volunteer military troops have been buying it up.
The terminals are supposedly obtained secretly through Dubai. The SpaceX denial on X noted that they would deactivate any unauthorized terminal and that…
Starlink also does not operate in Dubai. Starlink cannot be purchased in Dubai nor does SpaceX ship there. Additionally, Starlink has not authorized any third-party intermediaries, resellers or distributors of any kind to sell Starlink in Dubai.
This story however does raise the long-standing question of how SpaceX can control the use and ownership of its terminals. Once shipped to a legal customer, what is to stop that customer from selling that terminal to anyone who can then ship it and sell it to some third party in a blocked region? SpaceX can probably identify the location of its terminals, and if one is found not to be where it should be, deactivate it. But could smugglers eventually block SpaceX from getting this location data?
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
There is a GPS sensor built into the dish. At bootup it gets its location as part of the process. (There was a tear down video that showed this).
So SpaceX knows fairly closely where any terminal is physically (The dish, not the router, so I guess long cables maybe?) and now it is up to the granularity of their software what they do about it.
Not seeing how this would work. If the terminal reports its GPS location, you would need to spoof that somehow. More than likely that method is stored in the firmware. I suppose you could override the GPS with some sort of jamming device, but that would be a rather expensive way to go. If SpaceX was smart about things, the satellites would know their location as well. The combination of data should be enough information to keep a terminal from working outside designated areas. Now I want to go do some research…
@Joe – so you are suggesting that the history of a dishes satellite connections could be used to assess if the GPS results are correct or wildly off. I.e. A satellite over the antarctic cannot connect to a dish claiming to be in the northern Artic. Good point!
I believe the ground station is a phase-array device and the beam is “steerable”. The dish needs to know where it is to get satellite information to transmit/receive in the correct direction.
If the dish location does not match the configured location, the dish will not find satellites where it expects them to be, and will fail.
There is probably a tagging/encryption layer to protect from your neighboring dishes listening in.
Down direction may have the same limits so that the satellite knows which ground dishes it is responsible for in the moment and ignores the others that might be in range (and managed by a different satellite).
It is easy to spoof GPS. Ways to fight spoofing are to use multiple GPS-like systems like Russia’s GLONASS, Eu’s Galileo, and China’s system (forgot what it is called) in combination. Another defense is having software noticing changes out of the ordinary. Many sites use these systems for time synchronization, if the time starts to skew, some clocks go into a stand-alone mode and use a highly accurate oscillator to maintain the time, until the threat or loss of signal is removed.
The satellites could be used to locate the dish without the dish data. Just like they can find your phone from a cell tower.
If the GPS data does not correlate with the satellite data they could just ignore the dish after that or at most shut off the dish until it gets an all OK from the company.
Plus I am sure that each dish is identified each time it links up. If I move one outside its zip code then the company shuts it off until I call and tell them why it moved. Unless I paid for the mobile subscription used for boats and campers.
It’s not up to the user terminal. It’s all about the satellites.
The Starlink system splits the world up into ~hexagonal cells that are about 15 miles across. At any given moment, one satellite (just one) is assigned to service a particular cell. This assignment changes every few minutes, on 15 second boundaries. If a cell does not have a satellite assigned, there is no downlink and nobody is listening to uplink. So the user terminal is useless.
Thus, if Starlink doesn’t want to service a particular cell, then there will be no service. End of story.
Note… if you are close to the edge of a cell, you may still get service even though you are technically outside the cell. But that trick only works for a fairly short distance.
And yes, the terminal has GPS so it knows it’s location, and thus knows where to point its phased array beam so it can track the assigned satellite. It is possible to disable GPS on the terminal if you are in an area where GPS jamming is prevalent. Then the terminal uses the Starlink satellites to determine its location.
Speaking as a happy Starlink user for the past three years.
Steve Golson
Curious. Does the terminal alternatively allow you to enter the position information manually, rather than acquiring it by GPS?
Not related, Tucker Carlson interviews Vladimir Putin.
https://youtu.be/fOCWBhuDdDo?si=afItJGIGQMppcUVu
I was curious to see how this elderly man with rumors of health problems stood up against Trump and OBiden.
I see now why his people love him.
sippin_bourbon: you cannot enter your location manually. Either the terminal uses its own GPS, or uses the Starlink sats themselves to determine its location (which is a bit less efficient than using GPS).
I don’t know how they do it, but if they are just geolocking with GPS and there’s no requirement for agreement from the satellite, that’d be easy to bypass. It really depends how it is implemented. That’s without even enumerating the various flaws that are common in software-defined-radio software. If a state actor wants to get into a network, they usually can.
A question:
Where is the Starlink operations center located?
Hi Wayne,
Development is done in Renton Washington, but I am willing to bet that the operations center is there or in their Long Beach CA HQ. They do have their own server farms. I do not know if this is true, but I have read that they are also using some of Google’s server farms across the country as well.
Jay-
Thanks for that info.
Someone needs to ask Musk outright, whether or not the NSA has a direct link to his network and listen very carefully to his answer.
Jay-
Thanks for that info.
Someone needs to ask Musk outright, whether or not the NSA has a direct link to his network and listen very carefully to his answer.
By US and most western nation laws all internet services are open to their monitoring.
The data though can not normally be used in any court case inside the US. But other nations have other laws about that.
Even your encryption services are known and are open to the governments.