satellite

Elon Musk’s SpaceX says it has cut Starlink satellite communication links to more than 2,500 devices used by scam compounds in Myanmar.

More than 30 compounds are believed to be operating along the Thai-Myanmar border, where people from around the world are trafficked and forced to work on scams generating tens of billions of dollars annually.

Announcing the move, Lauren Dreyer, head of Starlink business operations, said the firm takes action on the rare occasion it identifies violations.

The service’s termination follows Monday’s takeover of one of the largest compounds, KK Park, by the Myanmar military, as it retakes territory lost to insurgent groups over the past two years.

Campaigners have long warned that Starlink technology has enabled the mainly Chinese crime syndicates to operate from remote locations along the border.

Myanmar has become infamous for these operations, which defraud victims through romantic ploys and bogus investment schemes.

Workers are lured under the guise of legitimate jobs, only to be held captive and forced into criminal activity.

Survivors recount gruelling conditions, long hours, torture and beatings for failing to meet targets. Many of the victims come from African countries.

“In Myanmar… SpaceX proactively identified and disabled over 2,500 Starlink Kits in the vicinity of suspected ‘scam centers’,” Dreyer said in a post on X.

“We are committed to ensuring the service remains a force for good and sustains trust worldwide: both connecting the unconnected and detecting and preventing misuse by bad actors,” she added.

On Monday Myanmar’s military said it had “cleared” KK Park, releasing more than 2,000 workers and confiscating 30 Starlink terminals.

Photographs show the satellite dishes on the compound’s rooftops and footage supplied to the BBC showed thousands of workers leaving KK Park on foot.

However, at least 30 other scam compounds remain active along the border, employing tens of thousands globally. Many are protected by militia groups loyal to the Myanmar military and it is unclear whether they have also lost access to Starlink services they once relied on.

These centres have become a key component of Myanmar’s wartime economy, as the junta battles various rebel groups while relying on Chinese support to maintain its hold on power.

India’s largest telecoms company Reliance Jio and its rival Bharti Airtel have signed separate deals with Elon Musk’s SpaceX to bring the Starlink internet service to the country.

The move has caught most analysts by surprise, as Musk has publicly clashed with both companies recently.

It comes as Indian and US officials discuss a trade deal. US President Donald Trump has threatened to impose retaliatory tariffs on 2 April.

The agreements, touted to expand satellite internet coverage across India, are still conditional upon SpaceX obtaining the Indian government’s approval to begin operations.

Starlink had 4.6 million subscribers across the world, as of 2024.

SpaceX has been aiming to launch services in India since 2021, but regulatory hurdles have delayed its arrival.

Both Jio and Airtel say they will leverage their mobile network along with Starlink to deliver broadband services to communities and businesses across the country, including in rural and remote regions.

Jio will offer Starlink equipment in its retail outlets and online stores along with providing installation support for the devices, while Airtel says it is exploring the same.

Airtel also says the tie-up, along with an existing deal with Starlink rival Eutelsat OneWeb, would help to expand its connectivity.

Many had not anticipated Starlink’s simultaneous deals with Jio Platforms and Airtel.

Up until the announcement, Jio was seen as Starlink’s biggest competitor in India’s satellite broadband market.

Billionaires Mukesh Ambani and Sunil Bharti Mittal, who own Jio and Airtel respectively, had jointly opposed Musk’s demand to administratively allocate satellite spectrum.

Mr Musk had argued that spectrum should be allotted as this would align with international standards.

Ambani and Mittal had wanted it to be auctioned instead in a competitive bidding process.

Last October, in a major win for Musk, the Indian government announced that spectrum would be allocated administratively.

The tie-ups come off the back of that policy and Musk’s meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Washington last month, during which they discussed cooperation in areas of space technology and mobility.

Musk’s influence on the US government is “sky-high” and “probably a good reason why Delhi took a contrarian position with respect to Jio’s ask for spectrum auction rather than allocation, which is rare”, says Prasanto K Roy, a technology analyst.

India is the world’s second largest internet market but more than 670 million of its 1.4 billion people have no access to the internet, according to a 2024 report by GSMA, a trade body representing mobile network operators worldwide.

Satellite broadband provides internet access anywhere within the satellite’s coverage.

This makes it a reliable option for remote or rural areas where traditional services like DSL – a connection that uses telephone lines to transmit data – or cable are unavailable. It also helps to bridge the hard-to-reach digital divide.

“Starlink is a clear winner here,” says Tarun Pathak, an analyst at Counterpoint Research. If approved, the tie-ups give Musk access to 70% of India’s mobile users.

Musk has been “eyeing a presence [in India] because its size will also give him economies of scale” given how expensive satellite internet is, he says.

These partnerships are also a quick way for Starlink to comply with India’s data localisation laws, he adds.

For consumers, how the services are priced will be key, given mobile data in India is among the cheapest globally.

Satellite broadband plans cost around $150 a month, whereas mobile data is 150 rupees ($2; £1.33).

But a partnership with both Airtel and Jio could help bring prices down to around 3,000 rupees, says Roy.

“Also, pricing may be better from Musk’s point of view and not rock-bottom, with Jio and Airtel offering the same services,” he says.

For Airtel and Jio, the partnership with Musk is a clear result of the telecoms policy not favouring them, analysts say.

“Jio was hoping that it would raise the entry barriers for others by pressing for the auction route. But since that hasn’t happened, they must have felt it is better to change tack and do a tie-up,” says Roy.

Pathak says the Indian government, on the other hand, possibly felt it would be better to “co-operate” rather than “compete” with Musk with Trump’s tariffs looming and a trade deal under discussion.

The world’s first wood-panelled satellite has been launched into space to test the suitability of timber as a renewable building material in future exploration of destinations like the Moon and Mars.

Made by researchers in Japan, the tiny satellite weighing just 900g is heading for the International Space Station on a SpaceX mission. It will then be released into orbit above the Earth.

Named LignoSat, after the Latin word for wood, its panels have been built from a type of magnolia tree, using a traditional technique without screws or glue.

Researchers at Kyoto University who developed it hope it may be possible in the future to replace some metals used in space exploration with wood.

“Wood is more durable in space than on Earth because there’s no water or oxygen that would rot or inflame it,” Kyoto University forest science professor Koji Murata told Reuters news agency.

“Early 1900s airplanes were made of wood,” Prof Murata said. “A wooden satellite should be feasible, too.”

If trees could one day be planted on the Moon or Mars, wood might also provide material for colonies in space in the future, the researchers hope.

Along with its wood panels, LignoSat also incorporates traditional aluminium structures and electronic components. It has sensors on board to monitor how its wood reacts to the extreme environment of space during the six months it will orbit the Earth.

Dr Simeon Barber, a space research scientist at the Open University in the UK, said: “We have to be clear that this is not a satellite completely made of wood… but the basic premise behind the idea is really interesting.

“From a sustainability point of view, wood is a material that can be grown and is therefore renewable,” he told the BBC.

“The idea that you might be able to grow wood on another planet to help you explore space or make shelters – explorers have always used wood to make shelters when they’ve gone to a new land.”

Dr Barber said it wasn’t the first time that wood had been used on spacecraft.

“We use wood – cork – on the re-entry, outer shell of vessels of spacecraft to help them survive re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere.”

Russian and Soviet lunar landers used cork to help the rover have grip as it was descending to the surface, he added.

“There’s nothing wrong with using wood in space – it’s using the right material for the right task.”

He pointed out that wood has properties that are hard to control.

“So from an engineering point of view it’s quite a difficult material to work with… I think wood’s always going to have a problem to make critical structures like parts of spacecraft where you need to predict how strong it’s going to be.”

The researchers at Kyoto University hope using wood in making spacecraft could also be much less polluting than metal ones when they burn-up on re-entry at the end of their life.

Experts have warned of the increasing threat of space junk falling to Earth, as more spacecraft and satellites are launched.

Dr Barber acknowledged the space industry was under growing pressure over the amount of pollution it puts into the atmosphere but he was sceptical using wooden spacecraft could provide the answer.

“In principle having materials such as wood which can burn up more easily would reduce certainly those metallic contaminants… But you may end up taking more material with you in the first place just to burn it up on the way down.”

Il Regno Unito lancerà nel 2025 il satellite Amber-2, sviluppato dall’azienda britannica Horizon Technologies, per migliorare la sicurezza marittima e contrastare attività illegali come l’immigrazione clandestina e il traffico di stupefacenti.

Il progetto, sostenuto dalla Uk Space Agency con un investimento di 1,2 milioni di sterline (1,4 miliardi di euro), mira a migliorare le capacità di sicurezza marittima del Regno Unito, monitorando le cosiddette “navi fantasma”, ossia quelle che disattivano il loro Sistema di Identificazione Automatica (Ais) per evitare il rilevamento. Il satellite sarà in grado di rilevare segnali a radiofrequenza, permettendo l’identificazione delle navi anche quando i loro sistemi sono spenti. Tuttavia, l’amministratore delegato di Horizon Technologies, John Beckner, ha osservato che il mercato dell’osservazione terrestre basata su frequenze radio è ancora in fase di sviluppo, simile al tracciamento tramite Ais. Ciò indica che il successo di questo nuovo satellite richiederà una combinazione di sistemi terrestri e dati spaziali.

Per contrastare l’immigrazione irregolare verso l’Europa il primo ministro ungherese Viktor Orban ha invece stipulato con il governo del Ciad un accordo di partenariato di cooperazione. Il documento è stato firmato a settembre dal ministro ungherese degli Affari esteri e del commercio, Peter Szijjarto, e dall’omologo ciadiano Abderahman Koula Allah, e si declina in quattro accordi di cooperazione distinti, due dei quali nel settore della difesa. Secondo la presidenza del Ciad, uno di questi riguarda lo status dei soldati ungheresi di stanza in Ciad, Paese crocevia dei traffici migratori e partner tradizionale dell’Occidente nel contrasto all’immigrazione illegale.

Il governo Orban puntava da mesi a fare del Ciad, dopo il Niger, il nuovo bastione saheliano contro i flussi irregolari provenienti dall’Africa sub sahariana. “La migrazione dall’Africa verso l’Europa non può essere fermata senza i Paesi della regione del Sahel. Questo è il motivo per cui l’Ungheria sta costruendo un partenariato di cooperazione con il Ciad”, ha scritto Orban su X nei giorni degli incontri. Soddisfazione è stata espressa in modo esplicito dalla presidenza ciadiana, secondo cui “con questo bilaterale” fra Orban e Deby “l’asse N’Djamena-Budapest è ormai chiaro”: per la giunta militare “si apre ora una nuova era grazie al desiderio manifestato dai due leader di dare impulso alle relazioni tra i due Paesi”. In base agli accordi, peraltro, il figlio 32enne del primo ministro ungherese, Gaspar Orban, oggi capitano dell’esercito nazionale, diventerà “agente di collegamento per aiutare a preparare la missione in Ciad”.

Per contribuire alla lotta contro l’immigrazione clandestina ed il terrorismo, il parlamento ungherese ha autorizzato a novembre del 2023 il dispiegamento di 200 militari in Ciad. Secondo diversi osservatori internazionali, tuttavia, inviando queste unità nel Paese africano, Orban ha sostenuto unicamente i propri interessi economici nella regione. L’Ungheria ha di recente concluso accordi di cooperazione per la promozione del commercio e degli investimenti in Ciad, e le autorità dei due Paesi stanno valutando l’apertura di un centro di assistenza umanitaria e diplomatica nella capitale N’Djamena, oltre che altri accordi nei settori dell’agricoltura e dell’istruzione. L’agenzia governativa ungherese per gli aiuti umanitari e lo sviluppo, Ungheria Helps, ha inoltre aperto il suo primo ufficio di rappresentanza in Africa proprio a N’Djamena, all’inizio del 2024.

L’avvicinamento di Budapest a N’Djamena si inserisce, non da ultimo, nei mutati equilibri geopolitici che interessano il Sahel. Il Ciad, infatti, ospita oggi l’ultima delle basi francesi ancora presenti nella regione, dove Parigi ha lasciato circa mille uomini, ma da tempo ormai il governo Deby – così come già fatto, in maniera più plateale, dai vicini Mali, Niger e Burkina Faso – guarda alla Russia, di cui subisce l’influenza politica e diplomatica. Agli occhi ciadiani, dunque, l’Ungheria – che intrattiene ottimi rapporti con Mosca – si configura come un collegamento con l’Europa alternativo alla Francia, con cui sviluppare molteplici ambiti di cooperazione ma, soprattutto, rafforzare l’apparato di difesa regionale in un territorio fortemente instabile, dove i combattenti dell’ex gruppo paramilitare russo Wagner – ora ribattezzato Africa Corps – sono sempre più presenti.

La Commissione ha lanciato il nuovo satellite Sentinel di Copernicus, denominato Sentinel-2C, per continuare a fornire gratuitamente dati e servizi di osservazione della Terra all’avanguardia a utenti pubblici e privati.

L’accesso a dati ottici aggiornati consentirà a soggetti pubblici e privati di migliorare il loro processo decisionale e di affrontare meglio urgenti sfide ambientali quali incendi boschivi, inondazioni e siccità. Altri settori che beneficeranno di una maggiore fornitura di dati saranno l’agricoltura, il settore marittimo, la silvicoltura e non solo.

Sentinel-2C sarà calibrato nei prossimi mesi, prima di diventare pienamente operativo e fornire le prime immagini del nostro pianeta. Il lancio è il risultato della collaborazione con partner fidati, l’Agenzia spaziale europea e Arianespace.