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International space law (starting with the Outer Space Treaty of 1967) says that nations are responsible for all spacecraft they launch, no matter whether the g
by mandevil 1y ago
International space law (starting with the Outer Space Treaty of 1967) says that nations are responsible for all spacecraft they launch, no matter whether the government or a non-governmental group launches them. So a server farm launched by a Danish company is governed by Danish law just the same as if they were on the ground- and exposed to the same ability to put someone into jail if they don't comply with a legal warrant etc.
This is true even if your company moves the actual launching to, say, a platform in international waters- you (either a corporation or an individual) are still regulated by your home country, and that country is responsible for your actions and has full enforcement rights over you. There is no area beyond legal control, space is not a magic "free from the government" area.
- reaperducer 1y agonations are responsible for all spacecraft they launch, no matter whether the government or a non-governmental group launches them. Nations come and go. In my lifetime, the world map has changed dozens of times. Incorporate in a country that doesn't look like it's going to be around very long. More than likely, the people running it will be happy to take your money.
- christina97 1y agoGenerally though, countries don’t disappear: they have a predecessor and a successor.
- reaperducer 1y agoA successor may take possession of the land, but that doesn't mean it will also take responsibility for the previous government's liabilities.
- afiori 1y agoThat is why international treaties come with implicit or explicit enforcement options
- mandevil 1y agoThat is not how international law works, you don't get to say "we are a new country and therefore not bound by treaties that earlier forms did." This principle was established when Nazis were convicted for war crimes at Nuremburg for violating treaties that their predecessor state the Weimar Republic signed, even after the Nazi's repudiated those treaties and claimed they were signed by an illegitimate state, and that they were a new Reich, not like the Wiemar Republic. Basically if territory changes hand to an existing state that state will obviously still have obligations, and if a new state is formed, then generally it is assumed to still carry the obligations of the previous state. There is no "one weird trick" to avoid international law. I assure you that the diplomats and lawyers 80 years ago thought of these possibilities. They saw what resulted from the Soviet and Nazi mutual POW slaughters, and set up international law so no one could ignore it.
- alephnerd 1y agoThose kinds of countries don't tend to be the kinds of countries with active space programs. And more critically - they have successor states. The Russian Federation is treated as the successor to the USSR in most cases (much to the chagrin of the rest of the CIS) and Serbia is treated as the successor to Yugoslavia (much to the chagrin of the rest)
- bigiain 1y agoWhile that's all true, it does hilariously increase the difficulty for the government showing up and seizing your server hardware...
- _carbyau_ 1y agoMaybe not so much... they'll just grab you. Obligatory XKCD. https://xkcd.com/538/ https://xkcd.com/538/ Unless you go up there with it and a literal lifetime supply? Although I guess if you don't take much it's still a lifetime supply...
- xyzzy123 1y agoThey don't need to do that if they go after your ground station operators. To escape the law you need to hide or protect something on earth (your ground station(s), downlinks). If you can hide or protect that infrastructure on earth, why bother putting the computers in space?
- mulmen 1y agoBecause you need an enormous amount of energy to run the servers. You may hide the downlinks but you still need power.
- notpushkin 1y agoWhat if you’re a stateless person? (Not an easy status to acquire these days, but any US citizen can just renounce their citizenship without getting a new one, for example.)
- ceejayoz 1y agoBeing stateless has an end result of "literally anyone can fuck with you" more than "no one can fuck with you".
- c22 1y agoWhat if you just launch it in secret and don't tell anybody?
- ceejayoz 1y agoUnless you invent some new launch method, a dozen or so countries will immediately know. Shortly afterwards, amateur astronomers will spot it. https://gizmodo.com/amateur-astronomer-catches-fleeting-glimpse-of-secret-spy-satellite-2000502890 https://gizmodo.com/amateur-astronomer-catches-fleeting-glim...
- c22 1y agoOh drat, I thought I'd found the answer.