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China could do the same thing if they wanted. That isn't a good excuse to violate national airspace. Maybe they want to intercept cell phone data.
by moose_man 4y ago
China could do the same thing if they wanted. That isn't a good excuse to violate national airspace. Maybe they want to intercept cell phone data.
- blindriver 4y agoThey have Huawei equipment is almost every cell tower installation to do that already.
- moose_man 4y agoMaybe some of the poorer networks have residual 3G equipment, but in general, the US has been cracking down on Huawei for a decade. They don't have a huge presence in the US.
- Arubis 4y agoWhat’s the service life on such equipment? Sales of new Huawei telecom equip have been banned outright in the US for a couple months. https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/us-fcc-bans-equipment-sales-imports-zte-huawei-over-national-security-risk-2022-11-25/ https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/us-fcc-bans-e...
- PeterisP 4y agoDecades. Some hardware failure happens, but it's not that frequent, if it's like previous generations of cell technology, most of it will run until the operator chooses to shut down that particular service e.g. switching to a newer generation and freeing up the spectrum for it.
- Aloha 4y agoEven with Huawei equipment fieled (which there isnt much left, Cricket and Clearwire were the largest incumbents for it, and those networks are gone) the BTS does not have network access to phone home, they're walled off with very very very non-routable IP's (as in stuff used on the pubic internet) - there are too many layers of access control for what was being alleged to work in a practical sense.
- dilyevsky 4y agoNot in the us/europe they don’t
- ChuckNorris89 4y agoYes they do, in Eastern Europe.
- dilyevsky 4y agoI meant europe that is still reachable by plane
- ChuckNorris89 4y agoHuh? What's stopping anyone to reach Romania by plane? Or Bulgaria? Or Hungary? Or Slovakia? Or was it a joke I'm not American enough to understand?
- dilyevsky 4y agoThought you meant russia/belarus. Didn’t know they put them in bolgaria and co tho considering how low they go in price it makes sense
- ChuckNorris89 4y agoEastern Europe is not just ex-USSR countries, and even there you can still travel by plane. Only Russia, Ukraine and Belarus have closed airspace.
- georgeg23 4y agoAnd try to compete with Starship? US can always launch more and for these LEO constellations it's all about numbers.
- moose_man 4y agoThey have their own space station dude. They also have tons of satellites, including LEO satellites. China is not some poor country.
- throw_nbvc1234 4y agoIf you don't have a large enough LEO constellation you will have sporadic and predictable coverage. This is especially true if you want global coverage to monitor a military like the USA with a global presence.
- htag 4y ago1. Wouldn't these balloons provide even more sporadic coverage? They seem to be detectable. 2. These gaps would be measured in minutes, and are zero when you considered the combined coverage of all none-nato countries. Anything that we don't want seen is done under cover.
- throw_nbvc1234 4y ago2. If you can scramble a jet within mins, that may be all you need. If you consider that LEO internet projects like SpaceX and Kuiper are targeting 5-10k sats to cover the earth i don't think it's a given that "all non-nato countries" have enough to provide constant coverage, especially if you go back 5-10 years. That probably won't be true in another 5-10 years. 1. Some reports say that they've only been detected recently; referencing multiple undetected occurrences during the Trump presidency; o they've been working for X years already. If they're undetected, they can view into gaps referenced above. If this program has been going on for 5-10 years undetected then it still could have been of value to China/Russia/Whoever owns them.
- 4y ago
- Johnny555 4y agoMaybe they want to intercept cell phone data. If they wanted low key interception of civilian terrestrial radio signals, seems like it would be better to just rent a Uhaul or RV, load it up with radio gear, and drive it across the country.
- hatsunearu 4y agosounds slow and illegal, whereas orbital collection is basically maintenance free and basically legal
- dx034 4y agoAs long as you are in airspace and not in space (and those balloons weren't), it's not legal to violate airspace and wiretap signals without permission. So U-Haul wouldn't be much different. And the balloon was very slow as well, at least a truck you can drive and park exactly where you need it.
- hatsunearu 4y agoI think you misread my comment.
- w4ffl35 4y agothey could just make TikTok and get everyone addicted to using it
- georgeg23 4y agoLow Earth Orbit satellites of the US are 100% intercepting global cell phone data and geo locating their source. Plenty of companies are even building direct cell phone service from satellite to the ground, including SpaceX.