1
00:00:00,040 --> 00:00:02,200
Speaker 1: I was able to see the sort of traffic people

2
00:00:02,200 --> 00:00:06,080
Speaker 1: were sending over their satellite Internet connections, so stuff like

3
00:00:06,280 --> 00:00:08,600
Speaker 1: text messages from people who are using in flight Wi

4
00:00:08,640 --> 00:00:11,600
Speaker 1: Fi services, or things like passengers on cruise ships when

5
00:00:11,600 --> 00:00:14,400
Speaker 1: they were making payments at point of sales systems. Also

6
00:00:14,440 --> 00:00:17,799
Speaker 1: a lot of like passport numbers, really concerning data to

7
00:00:17,840 --> 00:00:25,040
Speaker 1: be getting in clear text from Bloomberg News and iHeartRadio.

8
00:00:25,360 --> 00:00:32,320
Speaker 1: It's the big take, I'm West Kasova today. The latest

9
00:00:32,360 --> 00:00:46,280
Speaker 1: target for hackers satellites. Thousands of satellites circling high above

10
00:00:46,320 --> 00:00:48,920
Speaker 1: our heads make it possible to do many of the

11
00:00:48,960 --> 00:00:52,080
Speaker 1: things we take for granted every day. When you send

12
00:00:52,080 --> 00:00:55,000
Speaker 1: it texts, find your way with Google Maps, use your

13
00:00:55,040 --> 00:00:59,000
Speaker 1: credit card, even check the time on your phone, chances

14
00:00:59,040 --> 00:01:01,760
Speaker 1: are some bit of your info was beamed up to

15
00:01:01,840 --> 00:01:06,319
Speaker 1: a satellite from one place and beamed back down instantly

16
00:01:06,360 --> 00:01:09,200
Speaker 1: to where it needed to go. The downside to this

17
00:01:09,360 --> 00:01:15,200
Speaker 1: invisible miracle of technology, satellite systems aren't always as secure

18
00:01:15,440 --> 00:01:17,840
Speaker 1: as they should be, and this means they can be

19
00:01:18,000 --> 00:01:22,080
Speaker 1: easy targets for hackers looking to steal information for profit,

20
00:01:22,560 --> 00:01:26,720
Speaker 1: or governments looking to steal secrets or cripple the communications

21
00:01:26,760 --> 00:01:30,360
Speaker 1: systems of their rivals. What's extraordinary is it seems that

22
00:01:30,360 --> 00:01:32,760
Speaker 1: the Russians, if it were them, were prepared to take

23
00:01:32,840 --> 00:01:37,920
Speaker 1: extraordinary risks because they were aiming for the Ukrainian military.

24
00:01:38,360 --> 00:01:42,720
Speaker 1: That's my Bloomberg colleague Katrina Manson. She investigated a real

25
00:01:42,760 --> 00:01:46,319
Speaker 1: life example of this, a mysterious satellite hack on the

26
00:01:46,480 --> 00:01:49,840
Speaker 1: day Russia invaded Ukraine, and she joins me now to

27
00:01:49,960 --> 00:01:54,760
Speaker 1: tell us what she found. Katrina, can you start by

28
00:01:55,280 --> 00:02:01,160
Speaker 1: describing the satellite hack that happened in February of twenty

29
00:02:01,200 --> 00:02:03,800
Speaker 1: twenty two, just a little over a year ago, as

30
00:02:04,000 --> 00:02:07,440
Speaker 1: Vladimir Putin was saying he was launching a special military

31
00:02:07,440 --> 00:02:13,880
Speaker 1: operation on Ukraine. Ukrainian military communication connections that rely on

32
00:02:14,240 --> 00:02:16,600
Speaker 1: modems that link up to a satellite, we're going dead.

33
00:02:17,200 --> 00:02:20,720
Speaker 1: And it turned out that satellite communications were going dead

34
00:02:21,080 --> 00:02:26,119
Speaker 1: across Europe. These are all broadband internet connections that rely

35
00:02:26,240 --> 00:02:30,840
Speaker 1: on one single satellite, and it provides satellite connections to

36
00:02:31,639 --> 00:02:36,280
Speaker 1: more than one hundred thousand users across Europe. But specifically,

37
00:02:36,360 --> 00:02:39,320
Speaker 1: the thing that mattered so much to the Ukrainian military.

38
00:02:39,639 --> 00:02:43,760
Speaker 1: So imagine military are often in frontline positions in remote

39
00:02:43,760 --> 00:02:46,600
Speaker 1: locations where they can't get Internet the usual way you

40
00:02:46,680 --> 00:02:50,160
Speaker 1: would through a static connection. This allows you to dial

41
00:02:50,240 --> 00:02:53,960
Speaker 1: up essentially to connect to a satellite more than twenty

42
00:02:53,960 --> 00:02:57,480
Speaker 1: thousand miles up in space, and that's how you get

43
00:02:57,520 --> 00:03:01,440
Speaker 1: your Internet connection. And that's what went dead across Ukraine

44
00:03:01,680 --> 00:03:04,680
Speaker 1: and Europe. Now, this satellite is owned by a company

45
00:03:04,800 --> 00:03:09,360
Speaker 1: named Viasat. That's a US company based in California, so

46
00:03:09,480 --> 00:03:13,600
Speaker 1: a continent away. Users who rely on that satellite, their

47
00:03:13,600 --> 00:03:19,560
Speaker 1: connections started going dead. So when that happened, what actually

48
00:03:19,639 --> 00:03:23,040
Speaker 1: was happening? Why were these connections going dead? After a

49
00:03:23,120 --> 00:03:26,480
Speaker 1: lot of research and forensic analysis and all the things

50
00:03:26,480 --> 00:03:29,160
Speaker 1: that people have to do to what's called reverse engineer

51
00:03:29,280 --> 00:03:30,920
Speaker 1: a hack like this, and it turns out to have

52
00:03:30,960 --> 00:03:35,640
Speaker 1: been a very complicated hack. Attackers breached what's called a VPN,

53
00:03:35,640 --> 00:03:38,400
Speaker 1: a virtual private network that's an entry point into a

54
00:03:38,440 --> 00:03:41,600
Speaker 1: network that is meant to be secured. It wasn't. There

55
00:03:41,680 --> 00:03:44,240
Speaker 1: was what's called a misconfiguration. We don't have much more

56
00:03:44,240 --> 00:03:47,280
Speaker 1: information about that. They got into the network and then

57
00:03:47,320 --> 00:03:50,800
Speaker 1: they moved across the network again, another thing they shouldn't

58
00:03:50,800 --> 00:03:53,400
Speaker 1: be able to do. There should be doors, as it were,

59
00:03:53,440 --> 00:03:57,080
Speaker 1: fire doors preventing you from making the next move. They

60
00:03:57,120 --> 00:04:01,080
Speaker 1: get to a network management server that's essentially something that

61
00:04:01,400 --> 00:04:05,240
Speaker 1: controls the flow of information. They put in a malicious

62
00:04:05,280 --> 00:04:10,000
Speaker 1: software toolkit that's basically the bad instruction, and then that

63
00:04:10,040 --> 00:04:14,480
Speaker 1: bad instruction is sent to modems across Ukraine and Europe

64
00:04:14,880 --> 00:04:19,120
Speaker 1: and it wipes the modems. It overrides a part of

65
00:04:19,120 --> 00:04:22,520
Speaker 1: the modem which is used for memory, and the modems

66
00:04:22,520 --> 00:04:24,800
Speaker 1: are no longer operable, they can no longer make that

67
00:04:24,880 --> 00:04:28,520
Speaker 1: connection to the satellite. The rest of the system get online.

68
00:04:28,720 --> 00:04:31,760
Speaker 1: So essentially a piece of malware was distributed throughout the

69
00:04:31,760 --> 00:04:35,440
Speaker 1: network and it fried the modems. It's a really extraordinary

70
00:04:35,480 --> 00:04:39,280
Speaker 1: attack because people connect to the Internet through the satellite

71
00:04:39,480 --> 00:04:41,640
Speaker 1: just via your home moodem. That's the same thing that

72
00:04:41,720 --> 00:04:44,400
Speaker 1: gets the Internet signal into your house, and then it's

73
00:04:44,400 --> 00:04:47,040
Speaker 1: often distributed through a router so you can connect via

74
00:04:47,120 --> 00:04:50,560
Speaker 1: Wi Fi. That was the ultimate target of the attack.

75
00:04:50,680 --> 00:04:54,560
Speaker 1: So more than forty five thousand modems that connect to

76
00:04:54,560 --> 00:04:59,240
Speaker 1: the satellite system effectively were wiped. And when they were wiped,

77
00:04:59,240 --> 00:05:02,760
Speaker 1: they couldn't make the connection. So they determine that this

78
00:05:03,080 --> 00:05:07,320
Speaker 1: was a hack. Do they know who did the hacking? Well, interestingly,

79
00:05:07,600 --> 00:05:10,760
Speaker 1: vias at the company that owned the satellite and its partner,

80
00:05:11,200 --> 00:05:14,440
Speaker 1: Utel Sat that's a French company that ran the network

81
00:05:14,440 --> 00:05:18,120
Speaker 1: in partnership with Viasat, have never said They have only

82
00:05:18,120 --> 00:05:22,640
Speaker 1: ever said attackers. When I press them, they explain that

83
00:05:22,680 --> 00:05:26,600
Speaker 1: they are quite cage in order to preserve the network.

84
00:05:27,000 --> 00:05:29,839
Speaker 1: What did happen is it fell to countries. It fell

85
00:05:29,920 --> 00:05:32,839
Speaker 1: to the European Union, to the US, to the UK,

86
00:05:33,600 --> 00:05:38,680
Speaker 1: Australia and Canada to blame Russia And what basis did

87
00:05:38,680 --> 00:05:42,440
Speaker 1: they blame Russia for being responsible for this attack? US

88
00:05:42,480 --> 00:05:45,479
Speaker 1: intelligence spent something like four weeks looking into this attack.

89
00:05:45,760 --> 00:05:48,479
Speaker 1: At the moment that the attack happened, via SAT told

90
00:05:48,920 --> 00:05:52,159
Speaker 1: defense contractors and the US government through a specific way

91
00:05:52,160 --> 00:05:56,000
Speaker 1: that they share information because that same satellite that provides

92
00:05:56,520 --> 00:05:59,800
Speaker 1: your average Internet for users at home who just want

93
00:05:59,839 --> 00:06:03,599
Speaker 1: to stream movies or go on the Internet, the same

94
00:06:03,640 --> 00:06:07,680
Speaker 1: satellite also provides sensitive government services. It's a different part

95
00:06:07,720 --> 00:06:11,520
Speaker 1: of the satellite, but bias that immediately informed its government partners,

96
00:06:11,880 --> 00:06:15,520
Speaker 1: and the US launched an intelligence investigation into what had happened.

97
00:06:16,000 --> 00:06:19,600
Speaker 1: So did intelligence services in France and the UK, and

98
00:06:19,720 --> 00:06:23,839
Speaker 1: after four weeks, US intelligence determined that the GRU were

99
00:06:23,839 --> 00:06:28,320
Speaker 1: the attackers. The GRU is a Russian military intelligence unit

100
00:06:28,400 --> 00:06:31,880
Speaker 1: that has acquired quite a reputation for hacking. Do they

101
00:06:31,920 --> 00:06:33,720
Speaker 1: say with certainty that it was the Russians so they

102
00:06:33,760 --> 00:06:36,560
Speaker 1: just suspected? How were they able to determine that it

103
00:06:36,640 --> 00:06:40,919
Speaker 1: was actually the GRU. They haven't said much about that,

104
00:06:40,960 --> 00:06:44,080
Speaker 1: and in fact, in the public attribution, I think it's

105
00:06:44,120 --> 00:06:48,080
Speaker 1: only one country, Estonia, that has ever publicly labeled it

106
00:06:48,240 --> 00:06:52,680
Speaker 1: as the GRU. So all of these assessments have stayed private.

107
00:06:52,920 --> 00:06:58,360
Speaker 1: But the EU blamed clearly Russia. Others blamed Russian military hackers.

108
00:06:58,600 --> 00:07:01,400
Speaker 1: So there's a range of public contribution, but their private

109
00:07:01,400 --> 00:07:04,320
Speaker 1: work of the intelligence community is not something that anyone's

110
00:07:04,480 --> 00:07:08,320
Speaker 1: made public. And I imagine that the Russians take exception

111
00:07:08,400 --> 00:07:12,880
Speaker 1: to this conclusion. I did speak to the Russian embassy

112
00:07:12,960 --> 00:07:17,040
Speaker 1: in Washington, DC, and the statement they sent me, I think, said,

113
00:07:17,120 --> 00:07:21,920
Speaker 1: this is total nonsense. Internet users who were customers of

114
00:07:21,960 --> 00:07:25,480
Speaker 1: this satellite had their Internet and knacked out, but they

115
00:07:25,520 --> 00:07:29,560
Speaker 1: weren't really the target of this hack, is there? Right? Yeah?

116
00:07:29,600 --> 00:07:31,840
Speaker 1: What so extraordinary is it seems that the Russians, if

117
00:07:31,840 --> 00:07:35,120
Speaker 1: it were them, were prepared to take extraordinary risks because

118
00:07:35,560 --> 00:07:40,320
Speaker 1: they were aiming for the Ukrainian military communications and that's

119
00:07:40,320 --> 00:07:43,680
Speaker 1: what was knocked out. But there was what's called overspill.

120
00:07:43,840 --> 00:07:46,400
Speaker 1: So I'm told that they knew that the attack that

121
00:07:46,440 --> 00:07:50,480
Speaker 1: they pursued would affect other countries. And not only did

122
00:07:50,480 --> 00:07:54,120
Speaker 1: it affect other countries, they were NATO countries, and it

123
00:07:54,200 --> 00:07:57,880
Speaker 1: wasn't just people sitting at home, it was critical infrastructure.

124
00:07:57,960 --> 00:08:02,640
Speaker 1: So five thousand, eight hundred systems that monitor wind turbines

125
00:08:02,680 --> 00:08:06,520
Speaker 1: in Germany and across Europe, those monitoring systems were knocked out.

126
00:08:06,520 --> 00:08:09,920
Speaker 1: That counts as critical infrastructure, which is protected, and the

127
00:08:10,000 --> 00:08:12,720
Speaker 1: other is just sitting at home being on internet. Internet

128
00:08:12,720 --> 00:08:16,840
Speaker 1: communications are considered critical infrastructure. All of that is significant

129
00:08:16,880 --> 00:08:19,480
Speaker 1: because it raises the question of whether NATO had any

130
00:08:19,920 --> 00:08:25,080
Speaker 1: responsibility or potential to respond. Article five, which is that

131
00:08:25,440 --> 00:08:28,240
Speaker 1: mutual defense clause, the idea that if one is attacked,

132
00:08:28,600 --> 00:08:32,400
Speaker 1: everyone is attacked and you can respond, has been very

133
00:08:32,440 --> 00:08:36,200
Speaker 1: clearly expanded to include cyber No one's ever acted on

134
00:08:36,240 --> 00:08:38,720
Speaker 1: that yet, but there, of course there was potential for

135
00:08:38,840 --> 00:08:42,199
Speaker 1: NATO to say we two have been attacked. What was

136
00:08:42,240 --> 00:08:44,840
Speaker 1: the file out would eventually happen? How did they or

137
00:08:44,960 --> 00:08:48,360
Speaker 1: did they fix the problem. They ended up having to

138
00:08:48,360 --> 00:08:50,880
Speaker 1: send out more than forty five thousand modems and this

139
00:08:50,960 --> 00:08:55,280
Speaker 1: took weeks. They say that they prioritized getting modems to

140
00:08:55,559 --> 00:08:59,000
Speaker 1: Ukrainian distributors, so that was their main effort. And then

141
00:08:59,040 --> 00:09:01,760
Speaker 1: I think the other thing that's really interesting is the

142
00:09:01,880 --> 00:09:05,280
Speaker 1: US led a quiet diplomatic campaign over the course of

143
00:09:05,320 --> 00:09:10,520
Speaker 1: six weeks. Once they got that internal decision or assessment

144
00:09:10,559 --> 00:09:13,439
Speaker 1: that it was the gru the Russians military hackers who

145
00:09:13,440 --> 00:09:16,480
Speaker 1: were responsible for this, they tried to commence the European

146
00:09:16,600 --> 00:09:19,000
Speaker 1: Union that this was the case as well. They shared

147
00:09:19,040 --> 00:09:21,600
Speaker 1: technical information and then they went above and beyond and

148
00:09:21,640 --> 00:09:25,880
Speaker 1: shared additional intelligence information with two key members of the

149
00:09:25,920 --> 00:09:29,320
Speaker 1: European Union who were also the biggest victims of this

150
00:09:29,440 --> 00:09:33,360
Speaker 1: attack outside of Ukraine, France and Germany. And that is

151
00:09:33,440 --> 00:09:38,080
Speaker 1: so important because they are also the most influential members

152
00:09:38,160 --> 00:09:41,079
Speaker 1: of the European Union. And they have also historically been

153
00:09:41,240 --> 00:09:45,120
Speaker 1: very reluctant to blame anyone for attacks in public, even

154
00:09:45,120 --> 00:09:48,160
Speaker 1: if they reached that same assessment in private. They don't

155
00:09:48,200 --> 00:09:52,800
Speaker 1: tend to attribute attacks because of two main reasons. Really. One,

156
00:09:53,200 --> 00:09:56,680
Speaker 1: you can make things worse, you can incite attacks against

157
00:09:56,720 --> 00:09:59,840
Speaker 1: yourself and you could be wrong. It's quite difficult to

158
00:09:59,840 --> 00:10:03,280
Speaker 1: do attribution. And a ladder third. Germany in particular, was

159
00:10:03,360 --> 00:10:06,920
Speaker 1: navigating very complex relations with Russia right at the start

160
00:10:06,960 --> 00:10:10,760
Speaker 1: of that invasion because it took them so much by surprise,

161
00:10:11,120 --> 00:10:13,800
Speaker 1: and figuring out what their response would be of course

162
00:10:14,000 --> 00:10:18,320
Speaker 1: changes the rest of European history. In the end, did

163
00:10:18,360 --> 00:10:22,120
Speaker 1: the alleged target of this attack, the Ukrainian military, suffer

164
00:10:22,240 --> 00:10:24,560
Speaker 1: big setbacks in the early days of the war because

165
00:10:24,559 --> 00:10:26,760
Speaker 1: of this. Was it successful in carrying out what it

166
00:10:26,760 --> 00:10:30,880
Speaker 1: was trying to do? One Ukrainian cyber official said they

167
00:10:30,880 --> 00:10:33,720
Speaker 1: suffered a really huge loss in communications at the start

168
00:10:33,760 --> 00:10:36,400
Speaker 1: of the war. That's pretty much the most they've ever

169
00:10:36,480 --> 00:10:39,760
Speaker 1: put on record about this. My understanding is that two

170
00:10:39,800 --> 00:10:43,480
Speaker 1: main things were affected. Military communications. Command and control. Your

171
00:10:43,480 --> 00:10:46,480
Speaker 1: ability to reach your frontline troops and say move your

172
00:10:46,480 --> 00:10:50,839
Speaker 1: troops here really really matters at the start of any invasion,

173
00:10:50,880 --> 00:10:53,560
Speaker 1: and particularly this invasion, which, as we know now, the

174
00:10:53,640 --> 00:10:56,319
Speaker 1: Russians were intending to take the capital within three days.

175
00:10:56,320 --> 00:10:59,079
Speaker 1: This was intended to be a blitz quig, so disabling

176
00:10:59,120 --> 00:11:01,760
Speaker 1: satellite communication and the ability for the military to move

177
00:11:01,760 --> 00:11:05,440
Speaker 1: around and respond was an attempt to stave off any

178
00:11:05,480 --> 00:11:08,760
Speaker 1: counterattacked by the Ukrainians. Ultimately it did not work, but

179
00:11:08,840 --> 00:11:11,440
Speaker 1: that was what I'm told is the intention. The other

180
00:11:11,480 --> 00:11:14,880
Speaker 1: thing is that drones for espionage for tracking where the

181
00:11:14,920 --> 00:11:18,400
Speaker 1: Russians are rely on satellite internet, and I'm told that

182
00:11:18,440 --> 00:11:22,120
Speaker 1: it affected that as well. I think what's interesting about

183
00:11:22,160 --> 00:11:24,439
Speaker 1: this is the Ukrainians were able to come back very

184
00:11:24,520 --> 00:11:27,800
Speaker 1: very quickly, essentially because of a tweet to Elon Musk

185
00:11:28,040 --> 00:11:31,920
Speaker 1: and saying can we please have starlink. Starlink is the

186
00:11:32,040 --> 00:11:36,080
Speaker 1: satellite system owned by SpaceX's Elon Musk SpaceX that provides

187
00:11:36,160 --> 00:11:40,280
Speaker 1: an equivalent satellite Internet. It works in low Earth orbits,

188
00:11:40,360 --> 00:11:44,640
Speaker 1: so it has multiple thousands in fact, of satellites circulating

189
00:11:44,640 --> 00:11:47,360
Speaker 1: the Earth, so it's harder to take out a single satellite,

190
00:11:47,360 --> 00:11:51,079
Speaker 1: whereas the vias system relied on a geostationary satellite much

191
00:11:51,200 --> 00:11:55,199
Speaker 1: higher up and just that one single satellite. Vias AT

192
00:11:55,280 --> 00:11:59,040
Speaker 1: continues to face threats against this network. They told me

193
00:11:59,080 --> 00:12:03,120
Speaker 1: they face on and dynamic threats even up to today.

194
00:12:03,280 --> 00:12:06,600
Speaker 1: So although nothing has been successful at all in the

195
00:12:06,720 --> 00:12:09,880
Speaker 1: way that that February attack was last year, it certainly

196
00:12:09,880 --> 00:12:22,920
Speaker 1: could conceptually happen again. Our conversation continues after the break, Katrina,

197
00:12:23,000 --> 00:12:26,120
Speaker 1: what are our governments and companies doing to try to

198
00:12:26,480 --> 00:12:30,840
Speaker 1: harden their systems to wark future attacks. I think the

199
00:12:30,840 --> 00:12:33,760
Speaker 1: answer there is not enough. That's certainly what the researchers

200
00:12:33,840 --> 00:12:37,080
Speaker 1: I speak to are saying. But there is a push

201
00:12:37,200 --> 00:12:41,640
Speaker 1: to develop standards. These are minimum cybersecurity standards that affect

202
00:12:41,679 --> 00:12:45,840
Speaker 1: all parts of code in the satellite, encrypting data in

203
00:12:45,840 --> 00:12:49,080
Speaker 1: that link, raising standards across the board. But this is

204
00:12:49,080 --> 00:12:53,360
Speaker 1: a process that is really just beginning today. Something like

205
00:12:53,520 --> 00:12:57,000
Speaker 1: five thousand active satellites are in orbit around the Earth.

206
00:12:57,040 --> 00:12:59,559
Speaker 1: That's already a huge amount to try and protect, given

207
00:12:59,559 --> 00:13:02,839
Speaker 1: you also have all the associated systems that make them work.

208
00:13:03,240 --> 00:13:06,000
Speaker 1: This is growing so fast that I think that's why

209
00:13:06,000 --> 00:13:08,040
Speaker 1: it's been such a wake up call to the industry.

210
00:13:08,440 --> 00:13:11,360
Speaker 1: By twenty thirty, some high end estimates suggest that there

211
00:13:11,400 --> 00:13:14,720
Speaker 1: could be one hundred thousand active satellites in orbits, So

212
00:13:14,760 --> 00:13:16,800
Speaker 1: from five thousand to day to one hundred thousand in

213
00:13:16,800 --> 00:13:20,640
Speaker 1: the space of seven years. This problem is so set

214
00:13:20,800 --> 00:13:23,320
Speaker 1: to rise, and there are so many different ways to

215
00:13:23,360 --> 00:13:26,679
Speaker 1: attack satellites. Way back at the beginning of the space age,

216
00:13:26,840 --> 00:13:30,040
Speaker 1: no one even conceived anyone would be hitting And it

217
00:13:30,080 --> 00:13:34,520
Speaker 1: turns out that I've spoken to hackers, individual hackers, security researchers,

218
00:13:34,559 --> 00:13:38,160
Speaker 1: who've proved, who've shown that each of these is vulnerable.

219
00:13:38,640 --> 00:13:41,559
Speaker 1: What are some of the things that all these satellites

220
00:13:41,600 --> 00:13:46,439
Speaker 1: are doing. Well, there's Internet, that's one. There's satellite TV,

221
00:13:47,160 --> 00:13:52,280
Speaker 1: there's earth observation, earthquake monitoring, spying. The US has its

222
00:13:52,320 --> 00:13:55,040
Speaker 1: own spy satellites. But it was explained to me that

223
00:13:55,600 --> 00:13:59,160
Speaker 1: every single element of the US economy that matters, whether

224
00:13:59,200 --> 00:14:05,360
Speaker 1: it's chemical, industrial processes, looking for oil, even atomic clocks.

225
00:14:05,520 --> 00:14:08,280
Speaker 1: So the way we get our time, the way cash

226
00:14:08,320 --> 00:14:10,920
Speaker 1: machines function, the way you get gas at the pump,

227
00:14:11,400 --> 00:14:14,679
Speaker 1: everything now depends on satellites. What are the things that

228
00:14:14,720 --> 00:14:19,000
Speaker 1: you're paying a specially close attention to Given everything that

229
00:14:19,040 --> 00:14:22,240
Speaker 1: you're describing here, I think I'm really interested in any

230
00:14:22,280 --> 00:14:24,720
Speaker 1: time China puts up a system that could potentially be

231
00:14:24,760 --> 00:14:28,600
Speaker 1: independent of the US, anytime China has a relationship with

232
00:14:28,640 --> 00:14:33,720
Speaker 1: a US satellite company. All of those things are areas

233
00:14:33,720 --> 00:14:35,960
Speaker 1: that I think you'll see the US government look at

234
00:14:36,320 --> 00:14:40,040
Speaker 1: more and more, and really a push from the US

235
00:14:40,120 --> 00:14:43,200
Speaker 1: government to see how far they're going to squeeze industry

236
00:14:43,280 --> 00:14:46,440
Speaker 1: to actually do anything about this. A White House official

237
00:14:46,480 --> 00:14:49,960
Speaker 1: told me that companies need to radically improve the security

238
00:14:50,160 --> 00:14:53,720
Speaker 1: of satellite ground systems, and that they even go to

239
00:14:53,840 --> 00:14:57,480
Speaker 1: companies on occasion and tell them, hey, we've discovered a vulnerability.

240
00:14:57,600 --> 00:14:59,600
Speaker 1: You need to patch this. And they don't want to

241
00:14:59,640 --> 00:15:03,160
Speaker 1: say it a public because that would raise awareness of

242
00:15:03,200 --> 00:15:06,440
Speaker 1: a vulnerability that could be exploited by attackers. They tell

243
00:15:06,480 --> 00:15:10,040
Speaker 1: companies in private, and they say sometimes companies do not

244
00:15:10,200 --> 00:15:12,680
Speaker 1: take that advice and do not patch. And I think

245
00:15:12,720 --> 00:15:15,280
Speaker 1: companies would have just as many criticisms back if they

246
00:15:15,280 --> 00:15:18,160
Speaker 1: were speaking freely of the US government too. And so

247
00:15:18,240 --> 00:15:21,880
Speaker 1: that relationship between government and commercial satellite players has got

248
00:15:21,920 --> 00:15:25,320
Speaker 1: to get if it's to be solved a lot closer.

249
00:15:25,600 --> 00:15:27,640
Speaker 1: They haven't quite got the level of trust that I

250
00:15:27,680 --> 00:15:31,400
Speaker 1: think everyone would want. And there's a problem with classified briefings.

251
00:15:31,600 --> 00:15:34,040
Speaker 1: A lot of this information is classified, and yet a

252
00:15:34,040 --> 00:15:36,680
Speaker 1: lot of the hacks are happening on a commercial sector.

253
00:15:36,920 --> 00:15:39,240
Speaker 1: So really breaching that gap needs a lot more work.

254
00:15:39,880 --> 00:15:42,040
Speaker 1: Kultri in a man saying thanks so much for talking

255
00:15:42,040 --> 00:15:46,840
Speaker 1: with me today, thank you for having me. Let's hear

256
00:15:46,880 --> 00:15:49,760
Speaker 1: now from someone who knows how easy it can be

257
00:15:49,960 --> 00:15:54,560
Speaker 1: to hack a satellite, because he's done it himself. James

258
00:15:54,600 --> 00:15:58,040
Speaker 1: Pervoor tapped into commercial satellites as part of his PhD

259
00:15:58,240 --> 00:16:02,400
Speaker 1: program at Axford Universe. He now works on satellite security

260
00:16:02,640 --> 00:16:06,520
Speaker 1: for the Pentagon. James, let me just start by asking

261
00:16:06,560 --> 00:16:09,400
Speaker 1: you first, how did you become a hacker. I've been

262
00:16:09,480 --> 00:16:12,400
Speaker 1: doing computer security stuff basically since I was a child.

263
00:16:12,560 --> 00:16:15,120
Speaker 1: So when I was like in middle school, I was

264
00:16:15,160 --> 00:16:18,240
Speaker 1: playing around with like shutting down people's computers while they're

265
00:16:18,240 --> 00:16:19,920
Speaker 1: sitting next to me in the lab, that kind of

266
00:16:19,960 --> 00:16:22,880
Speaker 1: like little windows hacking type thing. And I've just always

267
00:16:22,920 --> 00:16:25,800
Speaker 1: been really interested in seeing how things work under the hood.

268
00:16:26,280 --> 00:16:28,840
Speaker 1: And as a hacker, like exploiting things is all about

269
00:16:28,880 --> 00:16:32,640
Speaker 1: like understanding technology behind the scenes, and so that's really

270
00:16:32,680 --> 00:16:35,480
Speaker 1: been super interesting for me. It's just always been like

271
00:16:35,600 --> 00:16:37,200
Speaker 1: figure out how something works and then figure out how

272
00:16:37,240 --> 00:16:39,520
Speaker 1: he can break it. And then you took that kind

273
00:16:39,520 --> 00:16:41,880
Speaker 1: of plane around as a kid much more seriously a

274
00:16:41,960 --> 00:16:46,520
Speaker 1: PhD now from Oxford, and as part of that dissertation,

275
00:16:47,600 --> 00:16:52,200
Speaker 1: you actually were hacking satellites for real to show vulnerabilities.

276
00:16:52,320 --> 00:16:55,160
Speaker 1: Is that right? Yeah, exactly. So. Over the course of

277
00:16:55,200 --> 00:16:58,520
Speaker 1: my PhD at Oxford, I focused on satellite system security,

278
00:16:58,720 --> 00:17:02,280
Speaker 1: and in particularly like radio signals that come to satellites

279
00:17:02,440 --> 00:17:06,159
Speaker 1: from Internet users and like satellite broadband services. When I

280
00:17:06,240 --> 00:17:10,840
Speaker 1: say satellite broadband services, what I really mean is basically

281
00:17:11,080 --> 00:17:13,920
Speaker 1: when you're using a satellite to get Internet access, and

282
00:17:14,000 --> 00:17:16,040
Speaker 1: typically that means that you send a message up to

283
00:17:16,040 --> 00:17:18,720
Speaker 1: the satellite, which is like get me this website, and

284
00:17:18,760 --> 00:17:21,480
Speaker 1: the satellites basically a bent pipe. You can think of

285
00:17:21,480 --> 00:17:25,520
Speaker 1: the satellites as fairly dumb objects. They receive data on

286
00:17:25,520 --> 00:17:27,920
Speaker 1: one antenna and then they take the data they receive

287
00:17:28,000 --> 00:17:30,680
Speaker 1: and send it out on a different antenna, basically, and

288
00:17:31,000 --> 00:17:34,679
Speaker 1: they do no thinking, no processing, at least for Internet satellites.

289
00:17:34,800 --> 00:17:37,080
Speaker 1: So they're just a pipe. You put information in one

290
00:17:37,080 --> 00:17:39,480
Speaker 1: side and it comes out another side, and the only

291
00:17:39,480 --> 00:17:42,959
Speaker 1: difference is when it comes out it covers a huge area.

292
00:17:43,040 --> 00:17:46,440
Speaker 1: And so when you send Internet requests up to a satellite,

293
00:17:46,480 --> 00:17:48,720
Speaker 1: you're just pumping information into this pipe and then it's

294
00:17:48,760 --> 00:17:51,120
Speaker 1: coming out the other side to your internet service provider.

295
00:17:51,119 --> 00:17:53,320
Speaker 1: And when you get a response like a web page

296
00:17:53,320 --> 00:17:56,200
Speaker 1: you've downloaded or a document you've received, it's the same thing.

297
00:17:56,200 --> 00:17:57,840
Speaker 1: The service wrider is putting it into one end of

298
00:17:57,880 --> 00:17:59,400
Speaker 1: the pipe and then it's coming out at the broad

299
00:17:59,520 --> 00:18:02,840
Speaker 1: end to your dish. The interesting thing about satellite services

300
00:18:02,840 --> 00:18:05,240
Speaker 1: is that beam that comes back down to you can

301
00:18:05,320 --> 00:18:07,320
Speaker 1: cover like a third of the Earth's surface, so an

302
00:18:07,359 --> 00:18:10,879
Speaker 1: attacker can be thousands of miles away and getting that information.

303
00:18:11,320 --> 00:18:14,119
Speaker 1: So I bought some gear and pointed at satellites and

304
00:18:14,160 --> 00:18:16,760
Speaker 1: tried to interpret what was going on. And it turns

305
00:18:16,760 --> 00:18:18,840
Speaker 1: out that there's like lots of really interesting and really

306
00:18:18,880 --> 00:18:22,119
Speaker 1: sensitive information in these signals that an attacker with like

307
00:18:22,160 --> 00:18:25,960
Speaker 1: relatively inexpensive equipment can get access to. So you said

308
00:18:25,960 --> 00:18:27,679
Speaker 1: you bought equipment, would you buy I mean, is it like,

309
00:18:27,800 --> 00:18:31,160
Speaker 1: you know, going on Amazon just getting common stuff? Basically, yeah,

310
00:18:31,160 --> 00:18:34,080
Speaker 1: So about four hundred dollars in home television equipment, the

311
00:18:34,160 --> 00:18:36,760
Speaker 1: kind of satellite dish that you'd see on someone's house

312
00:18:36,800 --> 00:18:39,840
Speaker 1: if they had satellite internet service, and then a special

313
00:18:39,840 --> 00:18:42,600
Speaker 1: card that is designed to let you watch satellite TV

314
00:18:42,680 --> 00:18:46,000
Speaker 1: on your computer. But I basically repurposed it to take

315
00:18:46,040 --> 00:18:47,879
Speaker 1: these Internet signals and get them in a format I

316
00:18:47,880 --> 00:18:50,560
Speaker 1: could mess around with. I pointed my dish at satellites

317
00:18:50,600 --> 00:18:53,960
Speaker 1: in geostationary orbit, so that means they're thirty thousand kilometers

318
00:18:53,960 --> 00:18:56,240
Speaker 1: above the Earth's surface and they basically don't move. They're

319
00:18:56,240 --> 00:18:58,200
Speaker 1: always in the same spot in the sky, which makes

320
00:18:58,200 --> 00:19:01,679
Speaker 1: them pretty easy to find and intercept signals from. And

321
00:19:01,800 --> 00:19:05,560
Speaker 1: these were primarily like broadband Internet services, and I was

322
00:19:05,600 --> 00:19:08,120
Speaker 1: able to see the sort of traffic people were sending

323
00:19:08,240 --> 00:19:12,400
Speaker 1: over their satellite Internet connections, So stuff like text messages

324
00:19:12,440 --> 00:19:14,600
Speaker 1: from people who were using in flight Wi Fi services

325
00:19:14,640 --> 00:19:17,960
Speaker 1: when they're on like Transatlantic flights, or things like passengers

326
00:19:17,960 --> 00:19:20,040
Speaker 1: on cruise ships when they were making payments at point

327
00:19:20,080 --> 00:19:23,199
Speaker 1: of sales systems. So also a lot of like passport numbers.

328
00:19:23,280 --> 00:19:26,639
Speaker 1: So when like crews, especially like cargo vessels pull into ports,

329
00:19:26,640 --> 00:19:28,600
Speaker 1: they'll send information about everyone on the ship to the

330
00:19:28,680 --> 00:19:31,880
Speaker 1: port authorities. That's typically over a satellite feed, and so

331
00:19:32,280 --> 00:19:35,359
Speaker 1: it's pretty easy to identify those messages when you're like

332
00:19:35,520 --> 00:19:37,760
Speaker 1: listening to the satellite traffic and just get like a

333
00:19:37,840 --> 00:19:39,800
Speaker 1: list of everyone on the crew and when they were

334
00:19:39,840 --> 00:19:43,040
Speaker 1: born and what their passport number is. Like really concerning

335
00:19:43,119 --> 00:19:46,120
Speaker 1: data to be getting in clear text. Did it surprise

336
00:19:46,200 --> 00:19:49,320
Speaker 1: you how much you were able to get? Yeah, I

337
00:19:49,400 --> 00:19:52,080
Speaker 1: was stunned. I think that a lot of it comes

338
00:19:52,119 --> 00:19:55,080
Speaker 1: from an assumption that you would need much more expensive equipment.

339
00:19:55,240 --> 00:19:58,359
Speaker 1: The gear I used was very unreliable if I wanted

340
00:19:58,400 --> 00:20:01,280
Speaker 1: to use it to actually be a satellite Internet customer

341
00:20:01,400 --> 00:20:03,560
Speaker 1: when it worked, because I was missing a lot of packets,

342
00:20:03,560 --> 00:20:05,600
Speaker 1: there was a lot of corruption. But what I was

343
00:20:05,640 --> 00:20:09,560
Speaker 1: able to do is basically reconstruct enough of the transactions,

344
00:20:09,560 --> 00:20:11,560
Speaker 1: like enough of the data that I could start to

345
00:20:11,600 --> 00:20:14,439
Speaker 1: get interesting information. Because a hacker doesn't need one hundred

346
00:20:14,440 --> 00:20:17,600
Speaker 1: percent reliability to succeed. So the change in the model

347
00:20:17,720 --> 00:20:19,399
Speaker 1: was this idea that you could get away with a

348
00:20:19,440 --> 00:20:22,359
Speaker 1: lot less if you're just trying to be disruptive. So

349
00:20:22,520 --> 00:20:26,160
Speaker 1: here you are hacking these satellite signals and you're doing

350
00:20:26,160 --> 00:20:29,520
Speaker 1: it for academic purposes to show how vulnerable they are.

351
00:20:29,600 --> 00:20:32,600
Speaker 1: But if you were doing it for nefarious reasons to

352
00:20:32,600 --> 00:20:34,679
Speaker 1: try and steal this information, you would have had a

353
00:20:34,680 --> 00:20:36,920
Speaker 1: lot of stuff that could have caused people a lot

354
00:20:36,920 --> 00:20:40,320
Speaker 1: of trouble. Definitely the data that was in there. I'm

355
00:20:40,359 --> 00:20:42,560
Speaker 1: glad that as a security researcher, I was able to

356
00:20:42,640 --> 00:20:44,879
Speaker 1: kind of get to it first and share it with

357
00:20:44,920 --> 00:20:48,760
Speaker 1: the satellite Internet service providers and kind of raise awareness

358
00:20:48,800 --> 00:20:51,359
Speaker 1: about this vulnerability so that they could work towards fixing it.

359
00:20:51,400 --> 00:20:54,640
Speaker 1: Because I think adversaries, when they get access to data

360
00:20:54,680 --> 00:20:57,040
Speaker 1: like this, could cause a lot of harm. So when

361
00:20:57,040 --> 00:21:00,000
Speaker 1: you went to companies like that, what did they say

362
00:21:00,080 --> 00:21:03,000
Speaker 1: they alarmed, did they immediately patch it? It was a

363
00:21:03,080 --> 00:21:06,200
Speaker 1: mix of reactions. There are some companies that were fantastic.

364
00:21:06,440 --> 00:21:09,720
Speaker 1: They were immediately like, thank you for sharing this information,

365
00:21:09,760 --> 00:21:11,840
Speaker 1: We'll get right on fixing it. And I think they

366
00:21:11,880 --> 00:21:14,760
Speaker 1: did end up making improvements to their security. They ended

367
00:21:14,840 --> 00:21:16,959
Speaker 1: up checking what kind of data they were sending. There

368
00:21:16,960 --> 00:21:21,040
Speaker 1: are other companies that either ignored the research, like never responded,

369
00:21:21,200 --> 00:21:23,080
Speaker 1: or there were even some who like threatened to sue us.

370
00:21:23,800 --> 00:21:26,440
Speaker 1: So whole gamut of different things. But I think that's

371
00:21:26,440 --> 00:21:30,760
Speaker 1: just the nature of like offensive security research and vulnerability research,

372
00:21:30,880 --> 00:21:33,200
Speaker 1: is that you kind of play a game where people

373
00:21:33,240 --> 00:21:36,800
Speaker 1: may get very defensive or very hostile to your findings,

374
00:21:36,880 --> 00:21:38,720
Speaker 1: but it's still important to get it out there so

375
00:21:38,880 --> 00:21:41,000
Speaker 1: people can kind of if they want to choose to

376
00:21:41,040 --> 00:21:43,040
Speaker 1: fix things, at least they know what they should be fixing.

377
00:21:43,960 --> 00:21:55,840
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. Now that you've completed your research,

378
00:21:56,000 --> 00:21:59,200
Speaker 1: you have your PhD, you've gone to work with the pentagain,

379
00:21:59,280 --> 00:22:03,080
Speaker 1: what exactly are you doing for them? I work at

380
00:22:03,119 --> 00:22:06,399
Speaker 1: the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office, which is a

381
00:22:06,440 --> 00:22:08,840
Speaker 1: new office within the Office of the the Secretary of Defense,

382
00:22:09,320 --> 00:22:11,679
Speaker 1: and my agency within that as called the Directorate for

383
00:22:11,720 --> 00:22:14,679
Speaker 1: digital services, And it's a pretty generic name because the

384
00:22:14,800 --> 00:22:18,919
Speaker 1: job is incredibly broad. It's a lot of emergency engineering,

385
00:22:19,000 --> 00:22:22,040
Speaker 1: so like something pops up in the world that needs

386
00:22:22,040 --> 00:22:24,720
Speaker 1: something built, coded, or developed within like forty eight hours,

387
00:22:24,800 --> 00:22:27,720
Speaker 1: and so instead of like going to defense contractors, we

388
00:22:27,760 --> 00:22:30,240
Speaker 1: have like in house engineering expertise who can build that

389
00:22:30,320 --> 00:22:33,000
Speaker 1: kind of emergency tech. So obviously I can't go into

390
00:22:33,040 --> 00:22:35,000
Speaker 1: a ton of detail about all the projects I work,

391
00:22:35,280 --> 00:22:38,680
Speaker 1: but it's a lot of just like really rapid organic

392
00:22:38,760 --> 00:22:42,719
Speaker 1: software development and security work and advisory work for like

393
00:22:43,160 --> 00:22:47,840
Speaker 1: very impactful topics. What attracted you to the penan, I

394
00:22:47,920 --> 00:22:51,760
Speaker 1: think for me, the opportunity to work as a civil

395
00:22:51,760 --> 00:22:55,879
Speaker 1: servant in government is really compelling because you're close to

396
00:22:55,920 --> 00:22:59,639
Speaker 1: the decision makers who are kind of deciding what the future,

397
00:23:00,400 --> 00:23:03,520
Speaker 1: in this case the military will look like. And having

398
00:23:03,520 --> 00:23:05,280
Speaker 1: a seat at that table and having a voice in

399
00:23:05,280 --> 00:23:09,280
Speaker 1: those conversations can be a much bigger impact than simply

400
00:23:09,280 --> 00:23:13,359
Speaker 1: like finding vulnerabilities at a big contractor and then selling

401
00:23:13,359 --> 00:23:16,080
Speaker 1: them off. So for me, that's what really matters, is

402
00:23:16,240 --> 00:23:19,120
Speaker 1: this idea that I could shape a safer future by

403
00:23:19,440 --> 00:23:22,480
Speaker 1: being in the room when those conversations are happening. So

404
00:23:22,600 --> 00:23:25,439
Speaker 1: walk us through how satellites actually work, what are the

405
00:23:25,480 --> 00:23:29,000
Speaker 1: different components, and where are the places that are vulnerable

406
00:23:29,080 --> 00:23:33,359
Speaker 1: to hacking you can break satellite security into. I guess

407
00:23:33,400 --> 00:23:35,439
Speaker 1: there are four domains that I like to think about.

408
00:23:35,880 --> 00:23:39,119
Speaker 1: One is the ground systems, So those are the devices

409
00:23:39,160 --> 00:23:41,479
Speaker 1: that users use to connect to the systems, think like

410
00:23:41,520 --> 00:23:44,719
Speaker 1: a starlink modem or a ground station that's run by

411
00:23:44,720 --> 00:23:47,480
Speaker 1: a satellite service provider to collect data from their satellites.

412
00:23:47,920 --> 00:23:51,159
Speaker 1: And when you're hacking ground systems, typically it's going to

413
00:23:51,200 --> 00:23:53,159
Speaker 1: look a lot like bread and butther hacking, you're going

414
00:23:53,240 --> 00:23:55,680
Speaker 1: to be targeting like the Windows computer that's plugged into

415
00:23:55,680 --> 00:23:59,240
Speaker 1: the satellite antenna and using your Windows malware to exploit it.

416
00:24:00,040 --> 00:24:03,240
Speaker 1: Then there's the communications link, so that's the radio signals

417
00:24:03,240 --> 00:24:05,720
Speaker 1: that go from a ground station to a satellite, and

418
00:24:05,800 --> 00:24:07,720
Speaker 1: that's what I was looking at in my PhD thesis.

419
00:24:07,760 --> 00:24:11,440
Speaker 1: For the most part, that's often like radio signals engineering

420
00:24:11,480 --> 00:24:15,280
Speaker 1: type work and kind of looking at communications security. Then

421
00:24:15,320 --> 00:24:18,879
Speaker 1: there's the bird. So there's the satellite in orbit, and

422
00:24:19,440 --> 00:24:21,520
Speaker 1: there's kind of a zone of trust once you're on

423
00:24:21,560 --> 00:24:24,199
Speaker 1: the satellite. Everything on the satellite trusts everything else in

424
00:24:24,240 --> 00:24:26,879
Speaker 1: the satellite. So if you were like compromise a camera

425
00:24:27,000 --> 00:24:29,480
Speaker 1: on a satellite, you could send instructions to a flight

426
00:24:29,520 --> 00:24:32,960
Speaker 1: controller because they're all plugged into the same like bus,

427
00:24:32,960 --> 00:24:35,040
Speaker 1: which is basically like a wire that sends messages from

428
00:24:35,040 --> 00:24:38,240
Speaker 1: devices to other devices. And so when you're thinking about

429
00:24:38,240 --> 00:24:41,520
Speaker 1: like satellite security, it's often about compromising these embedded systems

430
00:24:41,640 --> 00:24:44,720
Speaker 1: in orbit. And then the last topic area is kind

431
00:24:44,720 --> 00:24:47,560
Speaker 1: of this broader like policy domain in terms of how

432
00:24:47,600 --> 00:24:51,560
Speaker 1: people interact with and regulate satellites. I did some research

433
00:24:51,560 --> 00:24:55,080
Speaker 1: on my PhD on space situational awareness data, for example,

434
00:24:55,080 --> 00:24:58,080
Speaker 1: which is how countries tell each other what space debris

435
00:24:58,200 --> 00:25:00,439
Speaker 1: is out there so we don't like crash into debris

436
00:25:00,560 --> 00:25:03,560
Speaker 1: and cause damage to the space environment. And so I

437
00:25:03,560 --> 00:25:05,480
Speaker 1: looked a lot at like what happens if countries lie

438
00:25:05,520 --> 00:25:08,040
Speaker 1: to each other, How could those lies be detected? And

439
00:25:08,119 --> 00:25:10,440
Speaker 1: that's kind of more ephemeral. There's not like a part

440
00:25:10,480 --> 00:25:12,280
Speaker 1: of the satellite you can touch that is that, but

441
00:25:12,280 --> 00:25:15,840
Speaker 1: it's still an important component of space security. James, which

442
00:25:15,880 --> 00:25:19,399
Speaker 1: of those four areas of vulnerability you're describing out the

443
00:25:19,480 --> 00:25:23,240
Speaker 1: easiest for hackers to pry their way in. I think

444
00:25:23,280 --> 00:25:26,439
Speaker 1: the vast majority of historical attacks on satellites have been

445
00:25:26,480 --> 00:25:30,879
Speaker 1: against either the radio domain primarily jamming attacks, So a

446
00:25:30,880 --> 00:25:34,120
Speaker 1: lot of countries as a mechanism of censorship or protest,

447
00:25:34,280 --> 00:25:36,639
Speaker 1: will jam other people's satellites, and that's been going on

448
00:25:36,720 --> 00:25:40,399
Speaker 1: for decades. And then there's also the ground systems. Because

449
00:25:40,440 --> 00:25:43,359
Speaker 1: there's so much like traditional IT systems with just like

450
00:25:43,800 --> 00:25:47,320
Speaker 1: Windows computers plugged into a satellite antenna. It's easy to

451
00:25:47,359 --> 00:25:49,800
Speaker 1: either accidentally hack them if you're just doing like a

452
00:25:49,840 --> 00:25:53,080
Speaker 1: broad attack, or to find and hire the expertise you

453
00:25:53,080 --> 00:25:56,080
Speaker 1: would need for a more targeted attack against those. So

454
00:25:56,240 --> 00:26:01,560
Speaker 1: what can companies, governments due to satellites actually enhanced the

455
00:26:01,640 --> 00:26:05,520
Speaker 1: security so this sort of thing doesn't happen. I think

456
00:26:05,560 --> 00:26:08,679
Speaker 1: that opening up a little bit to security research is

457
00:26:08,680 --> 00:26:11,719
Speaker 1: a big step in that direction. The industry has gotten

458
00:26:11,720 --> 00:26:14,919
Speaker 1: by for a long time on this assumption that satellites

459
00:26:14,960 --> 00:26:17,800
Speaker 1: are so expensive and so complicated that no one will

460
00:26:17,840 --> 00:26:20,760
Speaker 1: ever be able to hack them, and that has sort

461
00:26:20,760 --> 00:26:25,000
Speaker 1: of been true. But as technology has advanced and satellites

462
00:26:25,000 --> 00:26:28,840
Speaker 1: have become more and more like other Internet of Things devices,

463
00:26:28,880 --> 00:26:32,840
Speaker 1: basically that's getting less true. And there are transferable skills

464
00:26:32,880 --> 00:26:35,719
Speaker 1: hackers might develop that can be applied to satellites, and

465
00:26:35,760 --> 00:26:38,440
Speaker 1: so I don't think the space industry can continue to

466
00:26:38,480 --> 00:26:40,280
Speaker 1: kind of hide in the shadows and get by with

467
00:26:40,480 --> 00:26:43,320
Speaker 1: their easier targets. So no one's going to bother with us,

468
00:26:44,000 --> 00:26:47,000
Speaker 1: And so relying in like open source protocols that can

469
00:26:47,040 --> 00:26:50,520
Speaker 1: be validated at like source code level for their communications,

470
00:26:51,080 --> 00:26:55,480
Speaker 1: and relying on open firmware and operating systems that people

471
00:26:55,520 --> 00:26:58,200
Speaker 1: can test and prove or secure will go a lot

472
00:26:58,240 --> 00:27:01,880
Speaker 1: further than hoping that you're at a proprietary software will

473
00:27:01,920 --> 00:27:05,080
Speaker 1: just never be figured out by an adversary. I think that, like,

474
00:27:05,440 --> 00:27:07,320
Speaker 1: there are tons and tons of people out there who

475
00:27:07,359 --> 00:27:09,399
Speaker 1: would love to hack satellites, who would love to do

476
00:27:09,520 --> 00:27:12,840
Speaker 1: research for free as basically a donation to the world

477
00:27:12,840 --> 00:27:15,160
Speaker 1: to make it more secure because they think hacking satellites

478
00:27:15,280 --> 00:27:17,399
Speaker 1: is cool. Don't think I'm the only person like that

479
00:27:17,440 --> 00:27:19,800
Speaker 1: out there. I've met other people like it. And if

480
00:27:19,800 --> 00:27:23,720
Speaker 1: the space industry gives people the opportunity to contribute within

481
00:27:23,760 --> 00:27:26,199
Speaker 1: the security research community, I think they'll be able to

482
00:27:26,240 --> 00:27:30,200
Speaker 1: make really big progress in securing these platforms. What concerns

483
00:27:30,200 --> 00:27:32,280
Speaker 1: you the most, like, what is the thing? As someone

484
00:27:32,320 --> 00:27:35,399
Speaker 1: who knows how vulnerable these systems can be, makes you

485
00:27:35,440 --> 00:27:39,199
Speaker 1: think this is the thing that makes me worry. For me,

486
00:27:39,320 --> 00:27:43,080
Speaker 1: it's the environment. So most of the repercussions of a

487
00:27:43,119 --> 00:27:46,680
Speaker 1: satellite compromise are like bad. They could be very bad,

488
00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:48,760
Speaker 1: like you could compromise GPS and it could lead to

489
00:27:48,800 --> 00:27:53,520
Speaker 1: like a terrestrial catastrophe. But however bad it is, eventually

490
00:27:53,560 --> 00:27:55,560
Speaker 1: we'll get over it. So I guess one of my

491
00:27:55,680 --> 00:28:00,400
Speaker 1: biggest concerns is less about the virtual effects of hacking satellites,

492
00:28:00,440 --> 00:28:03,480
Speaker 1: stealing data or disabling them, and more about the kinetic

493
00:28:03,520 --> 00:28:07,040
Speaker 1: and physical effects, because those can have a lasting effect

494
00:28:07,040 --> 00:28:09,919
Speaker 1: on the environment. So if a satellite is destroyed an

495
00:28:10,000 --> 00:28:13,560
Speaker 1: orbit in some way, that can have huge environmental repercussions.

496
00:28:13,560 --> 00:28:17,000
Speaker 1: If someone hacks a rocket and causes it to break

497
00:28:17,080 --> 00:28:20,199
Speaker 1: during a launch sequence, for example, then you end up

498
00:28:20,200 --> 00:28:23,080
Speaker 1: with pieces of space debris that are stuck in orbit

499
00:28:23,160 --> 00:28:27,200
Speaker 1: for centuries. They move at literally bullet like speeds, and

500
00:28:27,320 --> 00:28:30,040
Speaker 1: if they crash into other pieces of space debris or

501
00:28:30,720 --> 00:28:33,440
Speaker 1: into each other, they can generate basically to bre cascade

502
00:28:33,640 --> 00:28:36,000
Speaker 1: and block orbit for a long period of time and

503
00:28:36,040 --> 00:28:39,480
Speaker 1: have a lasting detrimental impact on our abilities a species

504
00:28:39,480 --> 00:28:42,240
Speaker 1: to make use of outer space. So when you look ahead,

505
00:28:42,400 --> 00:28:45,720
Speaker 1: do you think satellites become more secure or do you

506
00:28:45,720 --> 00:28:48,360
Speaker 1: think we go through a period of kind of chaos

507
00:28:48,360 --> 00:28:53,040
Speaker 1: and uncertainty before something gets done. I am cautiously optimistic

508
00:28:53,080 --> 00:28:56,200
Speaker 1: that satellites will become more secure. There is a really

509
00:28:56,240 --> 00:28:59,520
Speaker 1: great momentum around satellite security that's formed in the last

510
00:29:00,080 --> 00:29:02,800
Speaker 1: four or five years. We have Defcon, which is a

511
00:29:02,800 --> 00:29:06,040
Speaker 1: big hacker conference in Las Vegas every summer, and they

512
00:29:06,080 --> 00:29:09,320
Speaker 1: have a dedicated track within what they call the Aerospace

513
00:29:09,400 --> 00:29:12,920
Speaker 1: Village to just talk about space security. We have industry

514
00:29:12,920 --> 00:29:17,160
Speaker 1: advisory groups. There's a Space Information Sharing an Advisory Council

515
00:29:17,320 --> 00:29:20,800
Speaker 1: which is formed between like different space industry people to

516
00:29:20,800 --> 00:29:23,400
Speaker 1: talk about cyber threats. And we just have a lot

517
00:29:23,400 --> 00:29:26,360
Speaker 1: of momentum building around space security. And my hope is

518
00:29:26,360 --> 00:29:28,760
Speaker 1: that that momentum is coming at the right time because

519
00:29:29,040 --> 00:29:31,960
Speaker 1: the decisions we make in the next three or four years,

520
00:29:32,000 --> 00:29:34,040
Speaker 1: I think we'll have a big impact in what space

521
00:29:34,040 --> 00:29:37,200
Speaker 1: looks like for the next decade or so. James, is

522
00:29:37,200 --> 00:29:40,000
Speaker 1: there anything that we can do, just as you know,

523
00:29:40,160 --> 00:29:46,600
Speaker 1: people consumers of technology to protect ourselves. Definitely, So when

524
00:29:46,600 --> 00:29:49,440
Speaker 1: you're trying to protect your like satellite, internet signals or

525
00:29:49,440 --> 00:29:52,280
Speaker 1: really any traffic you send over the Internet. I think

526
00:29:52,320 --> 00:29:54,960
Speaker 1: it's important to recognize that once that message you're sending

527
00:29:55,040 --> 00:29:58,080
Speaker 1: leaves your house, you have basically no control over who

528
00:29:58,120 --> 00:30:00,320
Speaker 1: gets to touch it as the gets handed off. I think,

529
00:30:00,320 --> 00:30:02,080
Speaker 1: like you send a letter in the mail, you don't

530
00:30:02,120 --> 00:30:05,120
Speaker 1: know who the postal workers grabbing your letter at each stage.

531
00:30:05,120 --> 00:30:08,840
Speaker 1: Will be same thing with Internet traffic, and so using

532
00:30:09,160 --> 00:30:13,320
Speaker 1: end end encrypted protocols, whether that's using like an encrypted

533
00:30:13,360 --> 00:30:18,520
Speaker 1: chat application or using websites that use t TLS is

534
00:30:18,640 --> 00:30:22,600
Speaker 1: transport layer security. It's a protocol that's used to encrypt

535
00:30:22,720 --> 00:30:24,920
Speaker 1: general like Internet traffic that you would have when you

536
00:30:25,120 --> 00:30:28,040
Speaker 1: visit a website. You'll see it like little lock icon

537
00:30:28,120 --> 00:30:30,640
Speaker 1: in your browser when you're connected to a TLS website,

538
00:30:31,080 --> 00:30:35,120
Speaker 1: and it's like proven with math to be very secure

539
00:30:35,600 --> 00:30:38,280
Speaker 1: against adversaries who are trying to read the content you're sending.

540
00:30:38,560 --> 00:30:40,920
Speaker 1: That's a really great way to stop people like me,

541
00:30:41,400 --> 00:30:44,000
Speaker 1: because even if I got your packets off of a satellite,

542
00:30:44,000 --> 00:30:46,440
Speaker 1: because it happened to get sent that way, I wouldn't

543
00:30:46,440 --> 00:30:48,360
Speaker 1: be able to read the contents of them. I could

544
00:30:48,360 --> 00:30:50,360
Speaker 1: see the outside of the envelope, but if I opened

545
00:30:50,400 --> 00:30:52,760
Speaker 1: it up, it would just be garbage, nonsense, and so

546
00:30:53,280 --> 00:30:56,720
Speaker 1: whenever you can. Using an encrypted communications protocol defends you

547
00:30:56,760 --> 00:30:59,400
Speaker 1: against just a whole mix of attacks, whether it's satellite

548
00:30:59,400 --> 00:31:03,120
Speaker 1: attacks or any other kind of eavesdropping threat. James Pavoor,

549
00:31:03,480 --> 00:31:05,920
Speaker 1: thanks for speaking with me, No problem, great meeting you.

550
00:31:07,280 --> 00:31:09,080
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to us here at The Big Take.

551
00:31:09,200 --> 00:31:12,600
Speaker 1: It's the daily podcast from Bloomberg and iHeartRadio. For more

552
00:31:12,640 --> 00:31:16,560
Speaker 1: shows from my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

553
00:31:16,640 --> 00:31:19,360
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen, and we'd love to hear from you.

554
00:31:19,680 --> 00:31:23,000
Speaker 1: Email us questions or comments to Big Take at Bloomberg

555
00:31:23,000 --> 00:31:26,320
Speaker 1: dot net. The supervising producer of The Big Take is

556
00:31:26,440 --> 00:31:31,600
Speaker 1: Vicky Vigolina. Our senior producer is Katherine Fink. Rebecca Shassan

557
00:31:31,760 --> 00:31:36,320
Speaker 1: is our producer. Our associate producers Sam Gabauer. Phil de

558
00:31:36,400 --> 00:31:40,440
Speaker 1: Garcia is our engineer. Our original music was composed by

559
00:31:40,560 --> 00:31:44,600
Speaker 1: Leo Sidrin. I'm West Kasova. We'll be back tomorrow with

560
00:31:44,680 --> 00:31:45,600
Speaker 1: another Big Take