Starlink Hacked?

The article says this hack only affects a single device that the person needs physical access to the device to perform this hack. The rest of the Starlink system is completely unaffected. So, not particularly earth-shattering.
 
Shoganai said:
The article says this hack only affects a single device that the person needs physical access to the device to perform this hack. The rest of the Starlink system is completely unaffected. So, not particularly earth-shattering.
Click to expand...
If they didn't bury that fact in the article then they wouldn't be able to generate the internet rage that drives clicks, though.
 
Lakados said:
So apparently the Starlink satellites have a hardware flaw that researchers were able to exploit using a Raspberry Pi...
Something something, this is why we can't have nice things!
Click to expand...
This is the nature of satellites. Years ago people would buy special satellite boxes that when programmed with custom firmware, would give the person access total access to all channels for free. I probably didn't do this myself. ;) My point is you have a system in the sky that the only real protection is encryption and security. So unless you have the best security in the world, I can see some people getting free internet.
 
DukenukemX said:
This is the nature of satellites. Years ago people would buy special satellite boxes that when programmed with custom firmware, would give the person access total access to all channels for free. I probably didn't do this myself. ;) My point is you have a system in the sky that the only real protection is encryption and security. So unless you have the best security in the world, I can see some people getting free internet.
Click to expand...

my grandparents had this in miami in the 90s with a big ass sat dish on the roof that took forever when moving (i forget specifically cause so long ago and i was so young, but iirc, there were like 'ranges' or 'levels' you had to move the sat to, and then when there in that range/level you had a bunch of channels in that range you could flip through, if nothing on any of those channels, move the dish to the next range of channels)

i saw so much stuff i wasn't supposed to...
 
Those giant C-Band satellites I think were still in use (They were popular in rural areas for obvious reasons, no Cable there) back in the 80's up until fairly recently (maybe) if you still used descramblers or something...dunno, I began to stop watching
cable TV in the 90's....the more channels they added the more everything became compartmentalized and I dunno, but I liked the old TV stations that were local and all they did was run syndicated crap, it at least made it interesting....not JUST CARTOONS ALL THE TIME or ALL COMEDY ALL THE TIME or ALL DRAMA blah lah...........it was refreshing to see a couple of hours of cartoons followed by some re-run shows from the 70's followed by movies all on the same channel......

Cable going to hundreds of channels and networks having their own channels destroyed all of that. Indie stations are where you got your MOVIE BIZARRE or Svenghoulie type of local shows, it was fun if you were a kid back then.
COMMANDER USA and Night Flight shaped my youth ;)

Any of you Cable Kids from the 80's ever have a dial cable box (not the pushbutton kind) where you did the note-card trick?

Damned if that stuff didn't actually work. Never learned how it worked, but it worked.
 
Last edited:
staknhalo said:
my grandparents had this in miami in the 90s with a big ass sat dish on the roof that took forever when moving (i forget specifically cause so long ago and i was so young, but iirc, there were like 'ranges' or 'levels' you had to move the sat to, and then when there in that range/level you had a bunch of channels in that range you could flip through, if nothing on any of those channels, move the dish to the next range of channels)

i saw so much stuff i wasn't supposed to...
Click to expand...

A lot of C-band stuff was just not protected at all other than you needed a huge dish and had to point it at different things. There was some encryption, complete with exploit boxes, etc, but not that much because a lot of people didn't have room for the dishes. The big thing was the Ku-band cable on a stick (directv, dish network) stuff... don't need to move the dish around and you have a bunch of channels, more if you hack the smart card.
 
DukenukemX said:
This is the nature of satellites. Years ago people would buy special satellite boxes that when programmed with custom firmware, would give the person access total access to all channels for free. I probably didn't do this myself. ;) My point is you have a system in the sky that the only real protection is encryption and security. So unless you have the best security in the world, I can see some people getting free internet.
Click to expand...
My brother was big into custom satellite boxes. It became too troublesome to keep up with.
 
yup, clickbait.
"As the attack requires physical access to the user terminal, it emphasizes that it is only affecting a single device and not the entire system that was compromised due to the glitching process. Starlink’s overall system, which includes a wide range of systems, is not affected by this issue."
 
vegeta535 said:
My brother was big into custom satellite boxes. It became too troublesome to keep up with.
Click to expand...
The problem was that the firmware would break almost like a week later and it needed updating, which wasn't always available immediately. Eventually the firmware creators would be sued to hell and back from Disk Network and DirectTV, moving the whole thing more underground. In this day in age if you want to watch a movie or TV show, it's much easier just to get it online than with satellite. I do see Starlink having security issues where people will get free internet because there's a lot of smart but poor people who would do it.
 
staknhalo said:
my grandparents had this in miami in the 90s with a big ass sat dish on the roof that took forever when moving (i forget specifically cause so long ago and i was so young, but iirc, there were like 'ranges' or 'levels' you had to move the sat to, and then when there in that range/level you had a bunch of channels in that range you could flip through, if nothing on any of those channels, move the dish to the next range of channels)

i saw so much stuff i wasn't supposed to...
Click to expand...
So did your grandma.
 
HeadRusch said:
Those giant C-Band satellites I think were still in use (They were popular in rural areas for obvious reasons, no Cable there) back in the 80's up until fairly recently (maybe) if you still used descramblers or something...dunno, I began to stop watching
cable TV in the 90's....the more channels they added the more everything became compartmentalized and I dunno, but I liked the old TV stations that were local and all they did was run syndicated crap, it at least made it interesting....not JUST CARTOONS ALL THE TIME or ALL COMEDY ALL THE TIME or ALL DRAMA blah lah...........it was refreshing to see a couple of hours of cartoons followed by some re-run shows from the 70's followed by movies all on the same channel......

Cable going to hundreds of channels and networks having their own channels destroyed all of that. Indie stations are where you got your MOVIE BIZARRE or Svenghoulie type of local shows, it was fun if you were a kid back then.
COMMANDER USA and Night Flight shaped my youth ;)

Any of you Cable Kids from the 80's ever have a dial cable box (not the pushbutton kind) where you did the note-card trick?

Damned if that stuff didn't actually work. Never learned how it worked, but it worked.
Click to expand...
i remember the dial cable boxes but never heard of the note card trick.. what was that?
 
the trick with my old analogue cable boxes (but the boxes were digital?) back in the day was you entered whatever channel (take a guess), and immediately start tapping 0 repeatedly

it kept the box from locking in whether you were subscribed or not as it was still in the 'tuning' phase I guess, and so you got slightly scrambled but 'perfectly watchable' signal as long as you kept tapping 0

news spread around the neighborhood very quickly
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top