Elon's biggest problem @ Twitter - he's not funny at tweeting

Almost everything you said is wrong. I have Starlink. It’s like a mobile phone in a sense. Only SpaceX also makes the phone. You can’t just acquire a phone / dish and get free internet. Your dish has to be authorized to use the network.

SpaceX knows every single dish on the network and where it is located. They couldn’t transmit data otherwise. If someone isn’t paying, they will be cut off. My guess is Musk isn’t solving this problem both because he is getting paid and he doesn’t care that the Russians are using the network.

 

Who said anything about free internet? I didn't realize I needed to spell that out in that minute of a detail. Yes monthly payment is required, obviously.
Yes, it's like a prepaid phone.

As I stated, it's difficult for them to know. There is no KYC for activation and there isn't is little check box that says 'not a russian'.

 

This you? So you're saying someone stole my phone and I'm going to keep paying the bill. SpaceX can easily determine where every one of their dishes are located and who is paying for it.

Somehow the Ukrainians can figure out the Russians are using Starlink, but SpaceX can't. Bullshit.

 

I suppose we should nationalize SpaceX and give it to Ukraine since you have all the answers.

This isn't a 'losing your cellphone' comparison.

And no, they do not know who is paying for everyone of them. Again, there is no KYC. There are no credit checks.

 

You just said "it's like a prepaid phone". And you previously said the "Russians are using fully functional equipment Ukrainians left behind"? You are talking in circles, but I'll bite again. Explain to me how this is not like losing a cellphone.

 

Lol, 2 engineers.

 

Probably, but at the very least Elon should have his security clearances revoked.

 

What does that accomplish? Should we also revoke known violators?

 

At this point musk has gone full maga, repeating and amplifying any crazy maga kook conspiracy tweets...

 

The estimated number of starlink terminals in Ukraine is ~42,000. Most of these are provided through government services.

You're convoluting the conversation for the sake of trying to be right (since you own and operate a starlink terminal, this makes you a subject matter expert).

First, Russia could acquire brand new terminals that are fully operational in Ukraine. As I explained, Starlink terminals are easy to obtain. yes, you can buy them at home depot, your local hardware store. Starlink offers service to ~70 countries. It would not be difficult at all for Russia to obtain Starlink terminals that have had the services prepaid months in advance.
To make this conversation simple, Starlink could whitelist all terminals in Ukraine, however nobody here knows the impact of such measure. It might be more detrimental than allowing Russia forces to use the service. Maybe they already do.

Even with a whitelist, Russia can still find ways to use the service. One such way, as mentioned, is recovered abandoned starlink equipment. If we take a moment and stop pretending all Russians are stupid and incompetent, you can open yourself up to the idea that operatives can find creative ways to use the service. If Iran could hijacked a US military drone, I am pretty sure Russians can find a way to use the service. Afterall, Starlink is not a military harden system. They can manipulate the TRANSEC in various ways. They can spoof MAC addresses. Those are just two of the simplest ways.

As a counter, SpaceX can geofence off areas that are under full Russian control. They can also monitor the traffic. I am sure they have other creative measures. Either way, its not a flippant wave of the hand fix as you keep implying. This is real electronic war with intelligent people on both sides, not some troll disrupting your lame-ass COD game. Ukrainian forces aren't calling up Starlink customer service saying "uhh Ser, I lost my Starlink terminal when I was retreating from Russian forces, can you plz deactivate it and not charge me anymore".

 

Tesla "investors" on twitter don't seem very happy with Elon.

Doesn't help TSLA trading is sideways while NVDA is having its moment.

 

They will come groveling back right behind their leader, Gary Black.

 

You are clearly trying to google-fu your way out of this. TRANSEC, spoofing MAC addresses, home depot - it's nonsense. I'm not an expert because I own a Starlink. I have years of practical expertise with GIS programming. I'm willing to bet SpaceX has a dashboard with a map that can zoom into any area of the world and see dish locations.

SpaceX has this data. Every dish has a GPS chip. Beyond the GPS, once the dish is connected, it's impossible for the system to work without pinpoint accuracy. The dish is sending signals to moving satellites miles in space. I find it inconceivable that Starlink is not collecting telemetry from the dish. In fact, I know they collect telemetry because I can get on the app and see what data they are willing to share with end users.

Here is an example. I can check my specific outages down to the 10th of a second.
At 6:03 PM - No Signal Received for 0.7s - Your Starlink had trouble talking to the satellite. This issue should resolve itself

I'm confident they can geo-locate individual dishes and shut them off if necessary.

 

Ukrainian minister says they have proposed an alg to SpaceX.

 

What is a "known violator"?

 

I didn't realize I was getting too deep in the weeds. As a self proclaimed expert for owning a SL terminal, I thought you would understand some of the basics. Soz #notsoz I should have realized when you had to mansplain to me that starlink service required a reoccurring monthly charge. And thanks for mansplaining to me about GPS. I thought when I mentioned SpaceX could geofence and blacklist any terminals in that area, youe vast GIS experience would naturally assume I would already know all terminals have GPS. Afterall, every cell phone has one. Oh, for your edification, all terminals have a native feature that allows manual GPS entry.

As I explained, its hard to know who is who on the front lines. I can reassure you the tech doesn't exist that allows the SpaceX NOC to zoom in so accurately they can determine if its a Russian face or Ukrainian face behind the terminal.

Again, back to spoofing. If you want to have a better understanding, read this. Its a bit over my head but i get the gist.
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/58fe/ed17a1eecaa0e8217d3b3ccbed5fe8d4dccd.pdf

Starlink Terminals use a low cost active phased array setup. Its not the greatest or cutting edge, but it works. And since GPS spoofing is rather elementary on a commercial product, it also can make it pretty easy to spoof the transec side as its not terribly accurate.

Kymeta antennas, which mostly use one web, use passive array holographic beamforming meta surfaces. This uses pinpoint accuracy in the signal bursts (which I am referring to as the transec)

All.Space has an interesting design, however they do not have anything on the market. If this design works, this is the future.

Lol what alternate? One Web?

 

Was unaware you identified as female. What are your pronouns?

 

alg = algorithm, not alternate

 

It seems one easy way to whitelist a dish would be to send an encrypted message. Anyone not sending the message and located in Russian held territory would be highly suspect and investigated further.