[Starlink] Starlink terminal detector

Mon Dec 19 19:46:55 EST 2022

Greeting from Kyiv, where I'm sitting without electricity and proper 
internet connectivity. Thanks to dozens of Russian missiles and drone 
attacks very last night.

No one was forcing them to attack our country and destroy our cities and 
energy infrastructure. That's what they are doing right now, in the 
middle of the winter. They killed, raped, and kidnapped thousands of 
civilians. Recently discovered children torture rooms on liberated 
territories. It's pure terrorism.

So they have a really simple choice - do something with their crazy 
autocrat or come here as occupants and suffer in the mud and cold doing 
military crimes.

At the same time, we have no choice here in Ukraine. We must protect our 
lives and country. Sometimes it feels like we are solving their problem 
with their government. Sadly, it takes so many lives...
The main difference is that in Ukraine, no one is hunting for conscripts 
with the police. And are there different legal ways to avoid conscription.
We have a lot of military and civilian volunteers. Everyone is trying to 
do something to help and save the future.

Sorry for off-topic.

---

The Dishy is easy to camouflage. And there is no easy way to detect 
directional Ku band transmission. We made different kinds of measurements.
So it is up to WiFi. The solution is currently rolling out on Starlink 
routers.

On 12/20/22 01:34, Ulrich Speidel via Starlink wrote:
>
> Greetings from Hiroshima where, on August 6, 1945, at this time in the 
> morning, I would've had a couple of minutes left to live where I am 
> sitting and typing this now. Makes one think. Neither Russia nor 
> Ukraine respect the right to conscientious objection. Seeing my 
> colleagues at work who are from mixed Russian and Ukrainian families 
> makes it hit home daily what war means to them and their loved ones. 
> Having to worry about a top student of mine whose Russian parents' 
> business is affected by the war, and who may not be able to pay his 
> international student fees next year, and may have to return home to 
> face conscription and the meat grinder. He could be one of those who 
> we see gleeful YouTube videos of, having bombs dropped on them from 
> drones, with no shelter, wriggling in pain as they take their last 
> breath. Makes me forget the price tag of the missiles for the moment.
>
> That said, the Starlink WiFi router is of course only one RF source a 
> detector might want to zero in on, and as it's been pointed out it's 
> easily camouflaged or spoofed on the RF side of things. The satcom 
> signal off the Dishy is another, and it's not as easily spoofed. 
> However, Dishy will point itself where it can see most relay-capable 
> satellites, which in Ukraine will be in a western or northwestern 
> direction. Which means pointing the signal away from Russia and the 
> detectors in most cases. Russians are by and large clever folks (never 
> judge a people by its autocratic leaders) and are probably well aware 
> of this. So we can book that military blog entry under fog of war 
> misinformation.
>
> On 20/12/2022 5:07 am, Dave Taht via Starlink wrote:
>> On Mon, Dec 19, 2022 at 7:54 AM Eric via Starlink
>> <starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:
>> >
>> > Get a bunch of US$3 ESP8266 devices, set them up in AP mode with 
>> spoofed Starlink MACs and BSSIDs, power them with solar cells + old 
>> vape-pen batteries and spread them all over the place. There's 
>> nothing like causing the other side to shoot $50k missiles at a $15 
>> decoy.
>>
>> Well, the difference in amount of traffic generated by an idle AP vs
>> one in use would be large, and the interference
>> caused by simulating traffic on the other APs a pita, but narrow
>> channels and a bunch of APs does thin the herd.
>>
>> Meshy mode, at least adhoc, has fewer identifying signatures in the
>> packet header, making an "AP" less obvious.
>>
>> >
>> > ------- Original Message -------
>> > On Sunday, December 18th, 2022 at 20:49, David Lang via Starlink 
>> <starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:
>> >
>> >
>> > > and change the name of the starlink wifi so it doesn't stand out 
>> as much.
>> > >
>> > > David Lang
>> > >
>> > > On Mon, 19 Dec 2022, Oleg Kutkov via Starlink wrote:
>> > >
>> > > > From the beginning, the general rule is don't use Starlink WiFi. Or
>> > > > hide the router somewhere to reduce RF emissions.
>> > > >
>> > > > We have developed a set of rules and recommendations about 
>> using a PoE
>> > > > injector or bypassing the Starlink router.
>> > > > Unfortunately, a lot of people ignore safety.
>> > > >
>> > > > But there are some countermeasures on the way.
>> > > >
>> > > > On 12/19/22 05:03, Oleg Kutkov via Starlink wrote:
>> > > >
>> > > > > Actually, there is nothing special.
>> > > > >
>> > > > > You can capture WiFi beacons and get a BSSID with a good 
>> directional
>> > > > > antenna. 10 - 15 km it's not a problem.
>> > > > >
>> > > > > They are filtering Starlink router BSSID to figure out that 
>> somewhere
>> > > > > there is Starlink.
>> > > > > Starlink WiFi router uses Tibro corp. (74:24: prefix).
>> > > > > On 12/19/22 04:41, Dave Taht via Starlink wrote:
>> > > > >
>> > > > > > Starlink detector boasted about... 10km range.
>> > > >
>> > > > 
>> https://www.notebookcheck.net/Starlink-terminal-detection-radar-to-enter-testing-in-Ukraine-as-per-Russian-military-blogger.675439.0.html
>> > > >
>> > > > > > I would have figured on starlinks less further front, 
>> combined with
>> > > > > > non los radios and ptp wifi being viable. Targeting every wifi
>> > > > > > transmitter is a low percentage play, and adhoc modes for 
>> directional
>> > > > > > wifi with synthetic mac's harder to distinguish ...
>> > > > > >
>> > > > > > _______________________________________________
>> > > > > > Starlink mailing list
>> > > > > > Starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net
>> > > > > > https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/starlink
>> > >
>> > > _______________________________________________
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>>
>>
>>
>> -- 
>> This song goes out to all the folk that thought Stadia would work:
>> https://www.linkedin.com/posts/dtaht_the-mushroom-song-activity-6981366665607352320-FXtz
>> Dave Täht CEO, TekLibre, LLC
>> _______________________________________________
>> Starlink mailing list
>> Starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net
>> https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/starlink
> -- 
> ****************************************************************
> Dr. Ulrich Speidel
>
> School of Computer Science
>
> Room 303S.594 (City Campus)
>
> The University of Auckland
> u.speidel at auckland.ac.nz  
> http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~ulrich/
> ****************************************************************
>
>
>
>
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> Starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net
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-- 
Best regards,
Oleg Kutkov