Satellite killers: What a war in space might look like - BBC

Around 03:00 on 24 February 2022, thousands of satellite modems across Ukraine and Central Europe went offline. A few hours later, Russia's invasion of Ukraine began.

"The first strike of the Russia-Ukraine war was not the tanks rolling into Ukraine, but a cyberattack against a commercial satellite system, which was later attributed to the Russian state," says Kari Bingen, director of the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in the US. "Why would they do that? They wanted to degrade the Ukrainian military and government's ability to communicate."

In modern warfare, the first shot may involve not a rifle or a missile, but a line of malicious code aimed at satellites in orbit on Earth.

During the Cold War, the US and Russia faced off against each other on land, in the air, under the sea and – also, largely unnoticed – in space. But now tensions are growing again in orbit, and this time, in the public eye. The stakes are high; a $626bn (£479bn) space economy could be at risk.

In early February, it was revealed that two Russian satellites have likely intercepted the communications of at least a dozen European ones since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Such interceptions may have allowed Russian intelligence services to read the sensitive data they transmit, or hypothetically, even to take control of the satellites.

Over the last few years Earth-based telescopes and orbital cameras have spotted two Russian satellites, Luch-1 and Luch-2, making a number of suspicious manoeuvres in orbit. In particular, they have been seen making close approaches to Europe's most important, if elderly, geostationary satellites. These include Intelsat 39, which orbits high enough above the Earth that it appears to be stationary above a single point on the Earth's surface. Such a lofty perch makes them ideal platforms for communication, navigation and military purposes. And a prized potential target for a would-be adversary.

Western countries are having to make plans to thwart such attacks if conflict with another power like Russia takes place.

"When one satellite is coming really close to another in space, it's a game of who's going to do the first manoeuvre, and then how the other satellite reacts to that," says Norbert Pouzin, senior orbital analyst at Aldoria, a French satellite tracking company

This dance has been compared to dogfights – aerial battles between fighter planes. Except they take place in space.

This recent behaviour seems to be an extension into space of Russia's hybrid warfare – conflict that involves non-military tactics, such as disrupting communications systems. Satellites are seen by Russia as the Achilles heel of the United States and its allies, as they have become so dependent on them. Disrupting them could cause massive damage to civilian and military infrastructure.

"This is not new behaviour by the Russians, whether it's in space or on Earth," says Juliana Suess, an expert in space warfare at the Royal United Services Institute. "We keep seeing this sort of testing of boundaries, whether it's drones entering Polish airspace or Russian satellites manoeuvring close to other communication satellites, whether they belong to Western governments or are commercial satellites. We've seen them do this for over 10 years."

From the Cold War onwards, counterspace weapons have been developed to destroy, disrupt or degrade satellites and space-based infrastructure to gain military advantage over an opponent. These range from cyber-weapons like the one used in this attack, through to jamming and spoofing a satellite's signals, to the more sci-fi-sounding weapons such as lasers, or electromagnetic pulses (EMP). These can be used to blind or destroy a satellite from the ground, air or even from another satellite that has manoeuvred close to its target.

Then there are kinetic weapons such as missiles launched from the ground or air, or dart-like objects fired from another spacecraft, which can also destroy a satellite.

"We are seeing cyber [attacks on satellites] on a routine basis; electronic warfare – jamming and spoofing – is prolific on the battlefield of Ukraine, and China has fielded an enormity of jammers in the region, embedded with their forces," says Bingen. "The Iranians have fielded jammers and frankly you can now buy a low-powered GPS jammer off eBay."