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United has released a tracker letting passengers enter their flight number and travel date to see whether their aircraft has Starlink satellite Wi-Fi, including real-time updates if planes are swapped. The airline says 635 of its mainline and United Express planes now carry Starlink, covering nearly half of daily departures, with installations continuing at 20 planes per week toward completion by end of 2027.
Ukrainian officials say Starlink/Starshield terminals moving above 100 mph stopped working this week, disrupting efforts to track and intercept Russian drones during intensified attacks on Kyiv. Elon Musk said any restrictions stem from the U.S. government, which he says owns and controls Starshield, pointing to the Pentagon and President Trump as the decision-makers rather than SpaceX.
Elon Musk responded to reports that SpaceX restricted Ukraine's access to Starshield, the military version of Starlink, by stating that Starshield systems are owned and controlled by the US government, with usage limits set by the Pentagon and the president. He distinguished this from the commercial Starlink service, which he said SpaceX controls but restricts to civilian or defensive use only. The statement follows earlier accusations from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that SpaceX was restricting access to the service.
Reports indicate that technology companies in Silicon Valley had already been increasing security measures against foreign spying before an arrest linked to OpenAI came to light. Separately, questions are being raised about restrictions placed on Ukraine's access to Starlink, and UBS is reportedly preparing for a significant strategic shift.
Apple's stock closing price pushed its market valuation past the $5 trillion threshold. Separately, Ukraine reported that new restrictions on Starlink access have disrupted its military operations, and OpenAI alleged that a former employee took confidential files to Apple.
Bulgarian PM Rumen Radev confirmed a fire damaged a Starlink satellite internet facility near Sofia last week, with opposition group Democratic Bulgaria saying 11 of 17 antennas were deliberately burned on October 9. Two German passport holders, aged 20 and 21, have been detained in connection with the suspected sabotage, and authorities are investigating possible links to recent arrests in Germany tied to an attack on a Starlink site in Poland.
Ukrainian officials say SpaceX has imposed new restrictions on Starlink satellite internet access that have interfered with military drone missions. The officials say they were given no advance notice before the changes took effect, and that several operations were disrupted as a result.
Ukrainian drone units reported Starlink terminal signal failures at speeds above 160 km/h starting Wednesday, disrupting frontline logistics and strike missions without prior notice, according to military personnel and senior officials. Kyiv also said it received no advance warning from allies of a Russian missile strike on energy facilities for a second consecutive day.
Ukrainian officials say SpaceX quietly imposed a speed limit on its military-grade Starshield satellite terminals, causing connectivity drops when mounted platforms exceed roughly 100 mph. Presidential adviser Serhiy Beskrestnov said no warning was given, and Ukraine's 7th Rapid Reaction Corps reported canceled missions after losing signal for 10-20 seconds at speeds as low as 110-120 km/h. Volunteer Serhiy Sternenko says the threshold is tightening further, with drops now occurring near 60-70 km/h.
Ukrainian officials say Starlink has quietly imposed a new restriction preventing connections to devices moving faster than 100mph, disrupting several military missions including drone strikes and defense against Russian drones. The reported change, detailed by defense adviser Serhii Beskrestnov and covered by Reuters and the Financial Times, follows recent public friction between Elon Musk and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy over Ukraine's strikes on Russian oil refineries.
Satlyt, a startup founded by former Google and SpaceX engineer Rama Afullo, has raised an $8 million seed round and is launching its satellite-based AI software on a SpaceX rocket this Thursday. The same launch carries the first prototype for Google's Project Suncatcher, its own orbital data center initiative. Satlyt doesn't build its own satellites; instead it makes software that lets AI models run across other companies' spacecraft, using fewer ground-based flight controllers.
Cloudflare data shows bot traffic from Yandex's network has collapsed to just 0.4% of its two-week peak following a third Ukrainian drone strike on the company's data centers. Earlier strikes hit a Sasovo facility housing two supercomputers and a larger campus in Kaluga, while Yandex Cloud's status page lists at least 84 services currently offline. NetBlocks reports Yandex Cloud traffic down to 30% and Yandex LLC traffic down to 63%.