An amateur satellite tracker accidentally discovered a subset of classified military SpaceX satellites that are transmitting data on the wrong radio frequency. According to NPR, Canadian Scott Tilley found the mysterious signal while working on his hobby of monitoring satellites at home, when he inadvertently set his system to scan for radio frequencies that usually didn’t have traffic. To his surprise, he saw a signal emanating from space in the 2025-2110 MHz band, which satellites use to receive data from ground stations.
It is somewhat unusual, as this should’ve been empty, so Tilley recorded the transmissions for a few minutes. “It was just a clumsy move at the keyboard. I was resetting some stuff and then all of a sudden I’m looking at the wrong antenna, the wrong band,” Tilley told NPR. “[It] should have nothing there. I got a hold of my mouse and hit the record button and let it record for a few minutes.” He then compared his data to a satellite tracking database maintained by other amateurs and enthusiasts, which allowed him to identify the offending satellites. “Bang, up came an unusual identification that I wasn’t expecting at all. Starshield.”
Starshield is SpaceX’s classified satellite constellation, used primarily by the U.S. military for Earth observation and communications. It currently has over 200 satellites as part of the network, operated by the National Reconnaissance Office. Tilley says that he’s detected the unusual signal from 170 Starshield satellites, all within the same frequency range.
The 2025 to 2110 MHz spectrum is typically quiet because it’s reserved by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) for satellite uplinks, which are usually conducted in short bursts, rather than the reverse. Because of this, SpaceX’s use of this frequency for sending data back to Earth can potentially cause interference with other nearby satellites — whether commercial, scientific, or even military — causing them to become unresponsive to commands. “SpaceX is smart and savvy,” Tilley said to the publication, and it’s likely that the company just went to “do it and ask forgiveness later.”
It’s unlikely that SpaceX’s circumvention of global standards has caused a significant disruption, as no other satellite operator has complained so far. Still, Tilley said that he published his findings on the open-access research repository Zenodo.org so that different operators are aware of this potential interference.
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