Starlink was hacked with just $25.

August 16, 2022

Security researcher Lennert Wouters hacked the SpaceX-operated Starlink satellite internet system using a homemade circuit board that cost $25 to develop. He physically disassembled the satellite dish and attached his modchip to it, consisting of a Raspberry Pi, flash memory, electronic switches, and a voltage regulator. After connecting to the Starlink dish, the tool launched a bug-injection attack to temporarily short out the system, which allowed Starlink's defenses to be bypassed so that Wouters could infiltrate blocked parts of the system. Wouters' attack causes the first bootloader to fail - a ROM bootloader that is flashed into the system-on-a-chip and cannot be upgraded. He then deployed the patched firmware to later bootloaders, all of which gave him root access and full control of the plate. SpaceX called Wauters' study "technically impressive."