Russia export controls and sanctions

TV was the most pirated industry between January and September 2021, with pirate websites being visited 67 billion times for TV content during that nine-month span, Akamai said Wednesday, citing Muso-provided data. Total visits to pirate sites during that span for TV, film, music, software and publishing content topped 132 billion, Akamai said. Many of the titles being pirated aren't generally available in the areas where visitors are coming from, it said. During that nine months, the U.S. was the biggest location for pirate site visits, at 13.5 billion, with Russia following at 7.2 billion, India (6.5 billion), China (5.9 billion) and Brazil (4.5 billion), Akamai said.

The commercial space universe is moving toward satellites operating in close proximity, such as for satellite servicing and inspections, but the technology and the policies to allow such work is lagging, space policy experts said at a Secure World Foundation/Center for Strategic International Studies webinar Wednesday. As space becomes more congested and more nations and private sectors are in space, "the more states worry" about close approaches in geostationary orbit (GEO) and low earth orbit, said Almudena Azcarate Ortega, U.N. Institute for Disarmament Research associate researcher-space security and weapons of mass destruction programs. Space "already suffers from a significant lack of trust" and approaches done without consent or transparency would increase that, she said.

The U.S. can help mitigate orbital debris by such things as investing in better cataloging of debris, mandatory beacons on satellites to enable better tracking, and pushing a moratorium on anti-satellite testing, said commercial space operator and other speakers at a White House Office of Science and Technology Policy event. Debris remediation was the topic of a similar session last week (see 2201130054). OSTP Space Policy Assistant Director Ezinne Uzo-Okoro said the feedback from the space community will help guide a plan to be issued this summer for agencies on policy actions and R&D the U.S. should prioritize for orbital debris.

DOJ’s inspector general highlighted “significant” concerns about the department’s intelligence gathering efforts for the discredited Steele dossier, the nominee to lead the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board told the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday. The dossier by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence agent linked to the Hillary Clinton campaign, alleged Trump-Russia-linked interference in the 2016 presidential election. The IG’s reports were “very convincing” and detailed 17 omissions or errors in the IC’s Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act applications, said Sharon Bradford Franklin during her confirmation hearing.

Some orbital altitudes are becoming increasingly dangerous because of growing amounts of orbital debris, Darren McKnight, senior technical fellow for orbital debris monitoring company LeoLabs, said Thursday in a University of Washington webinar. He said 780 km to 850 km is becoming a hotbed of debris generated by the U.S., China and Russia. He said 1400 km is also becoming problematic, compounded by atmospheric drag helping clear lower altitudes over time, but at 1400 km "it's there for centuries." The U.S. is "woefully behind the rest of the world" on the need for active debris remediation, with French, Japanese and European space agencies "way ahead," he said. "It's been seen as something we can worry about decades later. We need to worry about it now." Mega constellations "are really the victim" rather than the causes of increasing orbital debris concerns, McKnight said. He said operators like SpaceX and OneWeb are "operating very responsibly" and going beyond government regulatory requirements, though they still will likely face difficulties because of debris from old payloads and rocket bodies. Russia's anti-satellite missile demonstration in November (see 2111160063) raised the likelihood of a collision in some orbits by a factor of two, generating 500 to 2,000 trackable pieces of debris and probably ten times that in untraceable debris, he said. Technology has changed notably since 1997, when the 25-year guideline that's now become an international norm was established, he said. Electric propulsion systems would accommodate requiring satellites be deorbited one or five years after end of mission, though no nations have gone that route, he said. He said along with technical solutions to remediate debris, more preemptive efforts are needed to prevent debris generation, such as increased information sharing by satellite operators and inter-government trust.

Due to orbital debris generated by Russia's November anti-satellite weapon exercise "and other intentional activity by governments," SpaceX satellites have had to perform hundreds of avoidance maneuvers, it told the FCC in a status report last week. It said about 60 of its Starlink satellites were deorbited between June 1 and Dec. 1. It said it lost control of two satellites during that span, and components believed to be responsible for those failures have been removed from future designs. One of those incidents, on Oct. 22, came around the time China said a SpaceX satellite came perilously close to the China Space Station (see 2112270053).

Russia's launch of an anti-satellite missile last month (see 2111160063) was a demo -- not a test -- of its military capabilities, blogged Larry Press, a professor of information systems at California State University, Dominguez Hills, Sunday. The debris from the satellite's destruction won't have cataclysmic effects in orbit, "but it reflects a defiant, irrational attitude that threatens the space commons," he said.

Getting action on a terrestrial supplement or alternative to GPS requires more advocacy by the Department of Homeland Security about the danger of going without one, plus pilot programs testing various technologies rather than waiting to settle on one, said George Washington University Space Policy Institute Director Scott Pace Wednesday on a Resilient Navigation and Timing Foundation/Domestic Preparedness Journal webinar. The government doesn't know which tech approach will work but should experiment with different ones and “see who can move quickly,” he said. Pace said technologies ranging from UHF to 5G could be employed in a backup system, but market ability to turn out millions of receivers also has to be considered in deciding which to choose. Speakers criticized a lack of government action. "There's a lot of understanding of what the issues are, a lot of kvetching and hand-wringing," said former Department of Transportation Assistant Secretary Greg Winfree, now director of the Texas A&M Transportation Institute. Pace said lack of progress over the three previous presidential administrations shows a critical U.S. weakness in planning, budgeting and acquisition. “It's not a question of affordability [or] policy needs. We can't execute,” he said. Many speakers also said this week's anti-satellite missile test by Russia (see 2111160063) underlines the need to supplement GPS. The anti-satellite exercise was part technical test and part Moscow saber rattling, said Center for the National Interest Director of Studies George Beebe. He said U.S. reliance on GPS is one of the nation's key strategic weaknesses. Beyond such potential deliberate threats to GPS, it faces unintentional environmental ones such as interference from use of nearby spectrum, Pace said. "We need to be stewards of the entire noise floor," he said. Winfree said any GPS supplement or alternative needs to be shepherded by the federal government rather than left to the private sector. He likened it to the variety of electric car charging technologies and plugs in the market: “We would wind up with a Tower of Babel.”

The FBI’s decision to withhold the decryption key associated with the Kaseya cyberattack was made with a long-term plan of addressing Russian threats, despite the millions that businesses lost because of the decision, FBI Cyber Division Assistant Director Bryan Vorndran told the House Oversight Subcommittee Tuesday (see 2109210055). National Cyber Director Chris Inglis and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Executive Director Brandon Wales backed the decision.

"No one owns space. And no one should intentionally make it more difficult to use," FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington said Tuesday, condemning Russia's test Monday of an anti-satellite missile and the resulting orbital debris. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the test created more than 1,500 pieces of trackable orbital debris and will likely result in hundreds of thousands of smaller pieces.