Satellite Pirates

Due to a Chatham House report on the latest dangers of Satellite hacking uhf_satcom was on this weeks risky business talking about Satellite pirates and exploit possibilities on the birds.

Not the Satellite Pirates of the 90s trying to access free TV and not arrgg Pirates out at sea(though maybe), but people taking advantage of the great accessible repeater in the sky.

A terrestrial repeater takes in a signal on an input frequency and rebroadcasts it on an output frequency. The repeater normally has better antennas system and is situation in a physical position to give the best area coverage.

A satellite repeater does the same thing, from its vantage point in space it can cover a much larger area. There are amateur radio satellites that provide this functionality, but from low earth orbit.

The pirates on Risky Business are probably using a satellite in geostationary orbit and taking advantage of it being a dumb pipe pointing back at earth.

Reading: TLE Files