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I don't think it's fair to call it an ethical failure. The mission was classified; presumably they asked their lawyers what they could say, and their lawyers to

I don't think it's fair to call it an ethical failure. The mission was classified; presumably they asked their lawyers what they could say, and their lawyers told them not to say anything.

samstave 9y ago
I agree with this. I really wonder what Zuma was capable of?
- londons_explore 9y ago
  It was designed to have a very large unfoldable directional antenna to be able to transmit and receive signals in the 500Mhz - 5Ghz range, despite atmospheric attenuation. I would guess the goal was to be able to passively listen to wifi and LTE signals in hostile countries without hardware on the ground. The antenna was sensitive to shocks when folded, hence the modification of the payload adapter to avoid them.
  - jstanley 9y ago
    What?? You mean I can't pick up my wifi from the end of the garden, but there's a chance the US government is listening in from space? Is that seriously possible?
    - sitharus 9y ago
      While I can’t comment on if it would be possible from orbit, there are two components to receiving a radio signal - transmitter strength and antenna gain. These work together to provide a signal clear enough to be amplified in to something usable. In a modern portable device the antenna is quite small and often close to other electronics, so the gain is not great. You can buy dedicated hardware that can receive over much greater distances. Additionally device antennas are omnidirectional, so they pick up noise from every direction but the signal from only one. A directional antenna has much greater gain as it excludes most of the noise.
      - dullgiulio 9y ago
        But isn't both WiFi and LTE encrypted?
        sitharus 9y ago
        Yes, but you can obtain other info without the keys, such as SSID locations. Personally I’m doubtful, unless the satellite was in geostationary orbit then it wouldn’t have that long over each location. I guess if it was in a Molniya-type orbit, but that would take it quite high. Guess we’ll never know.
        patcheudor 9y ago
        It depends. Both WiFi and LTE can be attacked via evil-twin attacks where a base station pretends to be the legitimate one. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evil_twin_(wireless_networks) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evil_twin_(wireless_networks) and: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4392401-4G-LTE-attacks-paper.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4392401-4G-LTE-attac...
        paranoidrobot 9y ago
        Given how frequently we discover major flaws in the implementation of TLS, despite how well that is scrutinised. It's not unreasonable to believe there would similarly be major flaws in the implementation of 3G/LTE security that could be exploited.
    - yetihehe 9y ago
      Yep, https://www.cnet.com/news/new-wi-fi-distance-record-382-kilometers/ https://www.cnet.com/news/new-wi-fi-distance-record-382-kilo... . If you have big enough antena and state of the art amplifiers, 500km is not unbelievable and that is high enough to orbit a satellite (for example ISS is at about 405km now). Plus, you have only about 100km of atmosphere (I might be wrong here).
      - jacquesm 9y ago
        It's not that simple, those point-to-point links are done with both highly directional antennae at both ends. You'd need to deal with Doppler (the satellite is moving pretty quickly, and likely in a relatively complex path relative to the transmitter), attenuation because of rainfall and other atmospheric effects, polarization, non-directional transmitter antenna and the effect of likely having 1000's of transmitters of roughly the same kind in the footprint of the satellite antenna. It isn't impossible, but 'Yep' is a bit of a shortcut, and if they pull this off it would be quite the technological feat. It also would mean that if this is possible that you wouldn't need anything special to implement SpaceX's vision of ubiquitous internet using LEO satellites, the antenna tech for that is quite exotic and requires a roof mounted structure, something that almost no WiFi transmitter has. So those WiFi distance records are not at all on the same level as picking up a single WiFi signal from space, the one requires cooperation on both sides, the other has to do everything on one end (but obviously with a larger budget and some really clever people behind it). If you've ever done such a long haul WiFi link then you'll know how hard it is to line up the dishes and how easy it is to lose the connection due to wind, vibration or water in the atmosphere.
        jjoonathan 9y ago
        They've got billions of dollars to dump into a ginormous phased array with nearly perfect acoustic isolation, no gravity or kids tripping over wires to mess up an absurdly long baseline, custom software stack, custom steering loop, and probably even custom silicon. I'd expect them to do substantially better than some dudes in the desert with glorified cookware. Especially when it comes to the steering loop, because if there's one thing phased arrays are really, really good at, that's it.
    - wernercd 9y ago
      Not picking up wifi in garden... could be akin to "I can't see the ground clearing while in a 747... so what can they really see from orbit?" https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/8qx54b/googles-satellites-could-soon-see-your-face-from-space https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/8qx54b/googles-sa... Considering you can "legally" see "manholes and mailboxes" from orbit? What could we see if not "limited" by laws? Whats visible now considering that article was 2014... Grab your tin-foil hats.
    - dboreham 9y ago
      Yes. Space isn't that far away and with a big enough antenna... Note that satellite phones and so on (tv) work like this in reverse. USG has been listening to EM signals from space (elint) since the space age began.
    - bsder 9y ago
      Big antennas can pick up really small signals. Deep space network video where they talk about the fact that Voyager I/II is NOT the toughest signal to grab (apparently Mars Exploration Rover is due to small antennas): https://youtu.be/1rCrfQUcXDI?t=188 https://youtu.be/1rCrfQUcXDI?t=188 That being said, I doubt you could pick up WiFi and dig it out of the noise at space distances. However, you probably can relay signal intelligence from a drone or a human who is using a specific modulation known to the satellite.
    - jacquesm 9y ago
      Not an expert. But reasonably knowledgeable about what you could do with antenna tech and while this is possible in theory if there is only one transmitter in all of the Earth-side footprint of where that antenna points I highly doubt you could recover all the signals of all the individual WiFi transmitters in that footprint which is what would be necessary to pull a single data stream out of the mess. Even so, if you're in a rural area and your next door neighbour is a mile away or so with the right antenna this might very well be possible. Keep in mind that antenna gain is the rough equivalent of increased transmitter power, so a very good antenna can offset a lack of power at the transmitter site.
  - jimrandomh 9y ago
    That is awfully specific for a pseudonymous uncited post about a spy satellite. I don't think people should believe you.
    - taneq 9y ago
      Agreed. In future when posting detailed technical information about classified military operations, please do so from a verified account and provide sources and reference material. ;)
    - techdragon 9y ago
      I’d say its specific because its a sensible extrapolation based on existing declassified information combined with the small amount of leaked information that has trickled out over the years. While reading about the possible conspiracy that the failure did not happen and it was to cover the launch of a stealth satellite, this was basically the satellite payload I pictured. Based on its role as a high orbit SIGINT satellite it would have a huge antenna, huge antennas are fragile buggers to launch, thus the fancy custom payload adapter.
  - greglindahl 9y ago
    Source?
walls 9y ago
Then they went into a briefing and told reporters they needed to ask SpaceX what happened. That's not cool.
- emeraldd 9y ago
  It's entirely possible they didn't officially have the telemetry to answer any questions until speaking with SpaceX. They also have a responsibility to their own investors and business to get the answers right the first time.
  - duncan_bayne 9y ago
    Then they shouldn't have blamed SpaceX.
    - greglindahl 9y ago
      It's unknown who blamed SpaceX; it could have been the Senator from Alabama's staff.
natch 9y ago
I think the HN crowd already knows the mission was classified. But as we saw certain aspects of the launch were allowed to be mentioned. For example, SpaceX made a statement afterward about what they knew. This aspect was not classified. Lawyers don't just tell you what you can and cannot say. They also sometimes tell you what you should and should not say for PR purposes or to manipulate a situation. There's plenty of room here to call this an ethical failure.
caconym_ 9y ago
It's certainly possible, but I'm not sure I'd "presume" it. NG certainly had a motivation to cover up a failure they were responsible for, whether or not they were legally required to stay quiet.

I don't think it's fair to call it an ethical failure. The mission was classified; presumably they asked their lawyers what they could say, and their lawyers told them not to say anything.

samstave 9y ago

I agree with this. I really wonder what Zuma was capable of?

londons_explore 9y ago
It was designed to have a very large unfoldable directional antenna to be able to transmit and receive signals in the 500Mhz - 5Ghz range, despite atmospheric attenuation. I would guess the goal was to be able to passively listen to wifi and LTE signals in hostile countries without hardware on the ground. The antenna was sensitive to shocks when folded, hence the modification of the payload adapter to avoid them.
- jstanley 9y ago
  What?? You mean I can't pick up my wifi from the end of the garden, but there's a chance the US government is listening in from space? Is that seriously possible?
  - sitharus 9y ago
    While I can’t comment on if it would be possible from orbit, there are two components to receiving a radio signal - transmitter strength and antenna gain. These work together to provide a signal clear enough to be amplified in to something usable. In a modern portable device the antenna is quite small and often close to other electronics, so the gain is not great. You can buy dedicated hardware that can receive over much greater distances. Additionally device antennas are omnidirectional, so they pick up noise from every direction but the signal from only one. A directional antenna has much greater gain as it excludes most of the noise.
    - dullgiulio 9y ago
      But isn't both WiFi and LTE encrypted?
      - sitharus 9y ago
        Yes, but you can obtain other info without the keys, such as SSID locations. Personally I’m doubtful, unless the satellite was in geostationary orbit then it wouldn’t have that long over each location. I guess if it was in a Molniya-type orbit, but that would take it quite high. Guess we’ll never know.
      - patcheudor 9y ago
        It depends. Both WiFi and LTE can be attacked via evil-twin attacks where a base station pretends to be the legitimate one. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evil_twin_(wireless_networks) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evil_twin_(wireless_networks) and: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4392401-4G-LTE-attacks-paper.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4392401-4G-LTE-attac...
      - paranoidrobot 9y ago
        Given how frequently we discover major flaws in the implementation of TLS, despite how well that is scrutinised. It's not unreasonable to believe there would similarly be major flaws in the implementation of 3G/LTE security that could be exploited.
  - yetihehe 9y ago
    Yep, https://www.cnet.com/news/new-wi-fi-distance-record-382-kilometers/ https://www.cnet.com/news/new-wi-fi-distance-record-382-kilo... . If you have big enough antena and state of the art amplifiers, 500km is not unbelievable and that is high enough to orbit a satellite (for example ISS is at about 405km now). Plus, you have only about 100km of atmosphere (I might be wrong here).
    - jacquesm 9y ago
      It's not that simple, those point-to-point links are done with both highly directional antennae at both ends. You'd need to deal with Doppler (the satellite is moving pretty quickly, and likely in a relatively complex path relative to the transmitter), attenuation because of rainfall and other atmospheric effects, polarization, non-directional transmitter antenna and the effect of likely having 1000's of transmitters of roughly the same kind in the footprint of the satellite antenna. It isn't impossible, but 'Yep' is a bit of a shortcut, and if they pull this off it would be quite the technological feat. It also would mean that if this is possible that you wouldn't need anything special to implement SpaceX's vision of ubiquitous internet using LEO satellites, the antenna tech for that is quite exotic and requires a roof mounted structure, something that almost no WiFi transmitter has. So those WiFi distance records are not at all on the same level as picking up a single WiFi signal from space, the one requires cooperation on both sides, the other has to do everything on one end (but obviously with a larger budget and some really clever people behind it). If you've ever done such a long haul WiFi link then you'll know how hard it is to line up the dishes and how easy it is to lose the connection due to wind, vibration or water in the atmosphere.
      - jjoonathan 9y ago
        They've got billions of dollars to dump into a ginormous phased array with nearly perfect acoustic isolation, no gravity or kids tripping over wires to mess up an absurdly long baseline, custom software stack, custom steering loop, and probably even custom silicon. I'd expect them to do substantially better than some dudes in the desert with glorified cookware. Especially when it comes to the steering loop, because if there's one thing phased arrays are really, really good at, that's it.
  - wernercd 9y ago
    Not picking up wifi in garden... could be akin to "I can't see the ground clearing while in a 747... so what can they really see from orbit?" https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/8qx54b/googles-satellites-could-soon-see-your-face-from-space https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/8qx54b/googles-sa... Considering you can "legally" see "manholes and mailboxes" from orbit? What could we see if not "limited" by laws? Whats visible now considering that article was 2014... Grab your tin-foil hats.
  - dboreham 9y ago
    Yes. Space isn't that far away and with a big enough antenna... Note that satellite phones and so on (tv) work like this in reverse. USG has been listening to EM signals from space (elint) since the space age began.
  - bsder 9y ago
    Big antennas can pick up really small signals. Deep space network video where they talk about the fact that Voyager I/II is NOT the toughest signal to grab (apparently Mars Exploration Rover is due to small antennas): https://youtu.be/1rCrfQUcXDI?t=188 https://youtu.be/1rCrfQUcXDI?t=188 That being said, I doubt you could pick up WiFi and dig it out of the noise at space distances. However, you probably can relay signal intelligence from a drone or a human who is using a specific modulation known to the satellite.
  - jacquesm 9y ago
    Not an expert. But reasonably knowledgeable about what you could do with antenna tech and while this is possible in theory if there is only one transmitter in all of the Earth-side footprint of where that antenna points I highly doubt you could recover all the signals of all the individual WiFi transmitters in that footprint which is what would be necessary to pull a single data stream out of the mess. Even so, if you're in a rural area and your next door neighbour is a mile away or so with the right antenna this might very well be possible. Keep in mind that antenna gain is the rough equivalent of increased transmitter power, so a very good antenna can offset a lack of power at the transmitter site.
- jimrandomh 9y ago
  That is awfully specific for a pseudonymous uncited post about a spy satellite. I don't think people should believe you.
  - taneq 9y ago
    Agreed. In future when posting detailed technical information about classified military operations, please do so from a verified account and provide sources and reference material. ;)
  - techdragon 9y ago
    I’d say its specific because its a sensible extrapolation based on existing declassified information combined with the small amount of leaked information that has trickled out over the years. While reading about the possible conspiracy that the failure did not happen and it was to cover the launch of a stealth satellite, this was basically the satellite payload I pictured. Based on its role as a high orbit SIGINT satellite it would have a huge antenna, huge antennas are fragile buggers to launch, thus the fancy custom payload adapter.
- greglindahl 9y ago
  Source?

walls 9y ago

Then they went into a briefing and told reporters they needed to ask SpaceX what happened. That's not cool.

emeraldd 9y ago
It's entirely possible they didn't officially have the telemetry to answer any questions until speaking with SpaceX. They also have a responsibility to their own investors and business to get the answers right the first time.
- duncan_bayne 9y ago
  Then they shouldn't have blamed SpaceX.
  - greglindahl 9y ago
    It's unknown who blamed SpaceX; it could have been the Senator from Alabama's staff.

natch 9y ago

I think the HN crowd already knows the mission was classified. But as we saw certain aspects of the launch were allowed to be mentioned. For example, SpaceX made a statement afterward about what they knew. This aspect was not classified. Lawyers don't just tell you what you can and cannot say. They also sometimes tell you what you should and should not say for PR purposes or to manipulate a situation. There's plenty of room here to call this an ethical failure.

caconym_ 9y ago

It's certainly possible, but I'm not sure I'd "presume" it. NG certainly had a motivation to cover up a failure they were responsible for, whether or not they were legally required to stay quiet.