4 ms·

I wonder if other countries will (or have) ban Starlink for censorship reasons. Or frankly, lack of censorship control. So much of our governance, if not all,

I wonder if other countries will (or have) ban Starlink for censorship reasons. Or frankly, lack of censorship control. So much of our governance, if not all, is based on geographic sovereignty, and satellites can supersede that. I hope we finally get more global governance to deal with more and more global issues.

Tijdreiziger 3y ago
I remember reading that Starlink routes traffic via base stations in the subscriber’s own country, in order not to anger regulators. If you think about it it makes sense; otherwise governments could just ban the sale of Starlink equipment for violating the law.
- fnordpiglet 3y ago
  Frankly it would be easier to enforce at the payments layer. Governments have a lot greater control over their financial system than the movement of physical goods (see war on drugs where drugs move freely despite massive interdiction efforts but money is done through currency as integrated financial products are easily monitored and controlled)
- pcl 3y ago
  Telcos do pretty much the same -- US SIMs in China receive different Great Firewall treatment than Chinese SIMs, and I've seen some Chinese SIMs / phones on some cell networks in the US get routed back through the Great Firewall. Which is IMO pretty disgusting on the part of the US telcos, but sorta functionally the same as what you say Starlink does.
  - Scoundreller 3y ago
    Can be seen as a positive or a negative: You can still access your home country’s Netflix/streaming content. Log into websites that might geo-block (Homedepot.com blocks Europe…), log into work without security admins losing their mind about a “suspicious foreign access”. Downside is that ads won’t localize into a language you don’t understand. I love it when that happens when travelling.
  - Tijdreiziger 3y ago
    Actually with mobile roaming, I believe the implementation is that everything just gets tunneled back to your home carrier; so I think it is not so much the case that US carriers are deliberately discriminating Chinese traffic.
  - mcv 3y ago
    It doesn't have to be "disgusting on the part of the US telcos" to route Chinese SIMs through the Chinese Firewall if the other side of that agreement is that non-Chinese SIMs in China get to bypass that firewall. Because ultimately, that means more ways to bypass that firewall. Chinese people in the US could but a US SIM to avoid the firewall. They could even take it home. But routing Chinese SIMs through the firewall is only acceptable if the reverse is also true: letting non-Chinese SIMs in China bypass it. Otherwise it's just more censorship.
- capableweb 3y ago
  Seems unlikely that Starlink would put a base station on Saint Helena just to be able to serve some percentage of ~4000 population. Most likely the base station is somewhere else.
  - Symbiote 3y ago
    I've no idea of the numbers, but it's possible they'd one one somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic — either St Helena or Ascension — for traffic from aircraft and ships.
    - alwa 3y ago
      Indeed, they recently announced a deal with OneWeb [0] as the first under their new Ground Station Policy [1]. From the incredibly slick (for SH) promo site [2], it looks like at least some contingent of Saints are really excited about the possibilities here. [0] https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/2023/news/lease-signed-with-oneweb-for-ground-station-on-st-helena/ https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/2023/news/lease-signed-with-o... [1] https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/2020/news/satellite-ground-station-policy-published/ https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/2020/news/satellite-ground-st... [2] https://www.earthstation.sh/ https://www.earthstation.sh/
  - yencabulator 3y ago
    I wouldn't expect Starlink to serve remote ocean areas until after they have their space lasers working well and can transport the traffic to a continent.
    - Symbiote 3y ago
      They already do provide service to ships. Base stations on remote islands are a routine thing to construct. The British Empire built the first global telegraph network using their island colonies, and some of these routes are still used for Internet cables. Ascension Island for example.
    - rlt 3y ago
      They have global coverage, including oceans: https://www.starlink.com/maritime https://www.starlink.com/maritime https://support.starlink.com/?topic=9eb841b3-2e43-a6fb-ecc7-ea58fb5600b5 https://support.starlink.com/?topic=9eb841b3-2e43-a6fb-ecc7-...

Tijdreiziger 3y ago

I remember reading that Starlink routes traffic via base stations in the subscriber’s own country, in order not to anger regulators. If you think about it it makes sense; otherwise governments could just ban the sale of Starlink equipment for violating the law.

fnordpiglet 3y ago
Frankly it would be easier to enforce at the payments layer. Governments have a lot greater control over their financial system than the movement of physical goods (see war on drugs where drugs move freely despite massive interdiction efforts but money is done through currency as integrated financial products are easily monitored and controlled)
pcl 3y ago
Telcos do pretty much the same -- US SIMs in China receive different Great Firewall treatment than Chinese SIMs, and I've seen some Chinese SIMs / phones on some cell networks in the US get routed back through the Great Firewall. Which is IMO pretty disgusting on the part of the US telcos, but sorta functionally the same as what you say Starlink does.
- Scoundreller 3y ago
  Can be seen as a positive or a negative: You can still access your home country’s Netflix/streaming content. Log into websites that might geo-block (Homedepot.com blocks Europe…), log into work without security admins losing their mind about a “suspicious foreign access”. Downside is that ads won’t localize into a language you don’t understand. I love it when that happens when travelling.
- Tijdreiziger 3y ago
  Actually with mobile roaming, I believe the implementation is that everything just gets tunneled back to your home carrier; so I think it is not so much the case that US carriers are deliberately discriminating Chinese traffic.
- mcv 3y ago
  It doesn't have to be "disgusting on the part of the US telcos" to route Chinese SIMs through the Chinese Firewall if the other side of that agreement is that non-Chinese SIMs in China get to bypass that firewall. Because ultimately, that means more ways to bypass that firewall. Chinese people in the US could but a US SIM to avoid the firewall. They could even take it home. But routing Chinese SIMs through the firewall is only acceptable if the reverse is also true: letting non-Chinese SIMs in China bypass it. Otherwise it's just more censorship.
capableweb 3y ago
Seems unlikely that Starlink would put a base station on Saint Helena just to be able to serve some percentage of ~4000 population. Most likely the base station is somewhere else.
- Symbiote 3y ago
  I've no idea of the numbers, but it's possible they'd one one somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic — either St Helena or Ascension — for traffic from aircraft and ships.
  - alwa 3y ago
    Indeed, they recently announced a deal with OneWeb [0] as the first under their new Ground Station Policy [1]. From the incredibly slick (for SH) promo site [2], it looks like at least some contingent of Saints are really excited about the possibilities here. [0] https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/2023/news/lease-signed-with-oneweb-for-ground-station-on-st-helena/ https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/2023/news/lease-signed-with-o... [1] https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/2020/news/satellite-ground-station-policy-published/ https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/2020/news/satellite-ground-st... [2] https://www.earthstation.sh/ https://www.earthstation.sh/
- yencabulator 3y ago
  I wouldn't expect Starlink to serve remote ocean areas until after they have their space lasers working well and can transport the traffic to a continent.
  - Symbiote 3y ago
    They already do provide service to ships. Base stations on remote islands are a routine thing to construct. The British Empire built the first global telegraph network using their island colonies, and some of these routes are still used for Internet cables. Ascension Island for example.
  - rlt 3y ago
    They have global coverage, including oceans: https://www.starlink.com/maritime https://www.starlink.com/maritime https://support.starlink.com/?topic=9eb841b3-2e43-a6fb-ecc7-ea58fb5600b5 https://support.starlink.com/?topic=9eb841b3-2e43-a6fb-ecc7-...