THIS ARTICLE IS republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license.
The US military recently launched a groundbreaking initiative to strengthen ties with the commercial space industry. The aim is to integrate commercial equipment into military space operations, including satellites and other hardware. This would enhance cybersecurity for military satellites.
As space becomes more important to the world’s critical infrastructure, the risk increases that hostile nation-states will deploy cyberattacks on important satellites and other space infrastructure. Targets would include not just spy satellites or military communications satellites, but commercial spacecraft too.
The US Department of Defense believes its new partnership, called Commercial Augmentation Space Reserve (CASR), would enhance US national security and the country’s competitive advantage in space. It would go some way beyond the relationship between government and private contractor that already exists.
In some cases, the commercial sector has advanced rapidly beyond government capabilities. This situation exists in numerous countries with a space capability and may apply in certain areas in the US too.
The governments of some nation-states are therefore confronted with a choice. They could utilize bespoke systems for protecting their satellites, even though these may be outdated, or they could use other commercial—and potentially more advanced—“off-the-shelf” components. However, the commercial hardware may be less well understood in terms of its vulnerabilities to cyberattacks.
Nevertheless, the US military believes that CASR will give it advanced strategic capabilities, and that potential risks can be minimized by actively avoiding overreliance on any single commercial entity.
The supply chain aims to transition the US military from a restricted pool of commercial suppliers to a broader spectrum of partners. However, there are risks with a bigger pool of commercial suppliers too. Some might be unable to meet the demands of military contracts, could run into financial instability, or encounter other pressures that hinder their ability to supply critical components.
New Priorities
In 2022 there was a cyberattack on the KA-Sat consumer satellite broadband service. It targeted the satellites delivering the broadband and disrupted the service.
There are many ways to attack another state’s satellites, such as anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons, which are often designed to physically destroy or disable the spacecraft. However, compared to ASATs, cyberattacks can be carried out in ways that are cheaper, quicker, and more difficult to trace.
Part of the critical need to prioritize cybersecurity as a result of this strategy is that the US is an attractive market for global players in space. This strategic shift by the US Department of Defense is therefore likely to encourage more global companies to participate.
Resilience to cyberattacks in the space industry has not always been a top priority. It is likely to take time for this to enter the thinking of major players in the space sector.
This historical lack of emphasis on cybersecurity in space highlights an obvious need. There are also inconsistencies and gaps regarding the basic cyber requirements for government and industry, which vary depending on the stance of each nation-state.
