Report: Wars putting satellites at risk

According to the French National Agency for the Security of Information Systems (ANSSI) there were 1,082 proven cyber intrusions last year, and a 37 per cent increase from a year earlier. While not each of these attacks were focused on satellites, many were.

A Russian hacking group (Killnet) happily went public with claims that it had successfully attacked Lockheed Martin because the business had supplied military equipment to Ukraine. Lockheed Martin, however, denied the reports.

Robin Dickey, space policy and strategy analyst at Aerospace’s Center for Space Policy and Strategy, is blunt in her warning, saying: “In crises and conflicts, commercial space actors risk getting caught in the middle of a tense and escalatory environment.”

Dickey says that deliberate attacks can occur because commercial satellite system is misidentified as a military system, adding: “commercial companies will not be exempt if conflict breaks out.”