Since launching in Australia in 2021, Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite internet service has become an indispensable part of the national telecoms network.
More than 200,000 Australians in remote and regional areas rely on the company for their internet, while emergency services are embracing the technology.
Fire trucks and police cars around the country are being fitted with Starlink satellite dishes. Defence plans to install Starlink on 50 naval vessels.
State and federal departments and agencies have spent more than $50 million on Starlink hardware and services in the past three years, public tender websites show. The biggest contracts have all come in the last year.
“Starlink is a double-edged sword,” says Paul Budde, a telecommunications analyst.
“People who are on Starlink are finally getting a good internet service. But if Elon Musk gets angry with Australia for one reason or another, he could shut the whole thing down.”
Malcolm Davis, a defence strategy analyst at the Australia Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), which is partly funded by the Department of Defence, sees Starlink as a “positive”, but is worried the country could become too reliant on a single operator.
“[We could] become totally dependent on Starlink for internet services, whether civilian or defence.”
“In a crisis, he could deny us access.”
How Starlink conquered Australia
Australia is particularly suited to satellite internet.
Its large area and low population density means most of the country’s land mass has no mobile reception.
Mobile networks provide connectivity to 99.5 per cent of the population, but only 30 per cent of the land mass, says Luke Coleman, CEO of the Communications Alliance industry body.
“That last 0.05 per cent of population is 70 per cent of the land mass.”
A map showing the location of Starlink satellites in orbit around the Earth, including hundreds over Australia at any one time. (Supplied: Starlink Satellite and Coverage Map)
Starlink, which is a member of the Communications Alliance, launched in Australia in 2021.
It arrived to great expectation. The existing National Broadband Network’s SkyMuster satellite internet service used two satellites in geostationary orbit (GEO), some 35,000km above the Earth’s surface. Customers complained of slow speeds.
But Starlink’s satellites were in low-Earth orbit (LEO), or about 10 times closer to users, meaning signals have less distance to travel and the service can be faster.
“Starlink offered much lower latency and much higher [data] capacities,” Mr Coleman says.
“We are seeing people in regional Australia voting with their wallets and choosing to pay a premium for those services.”
Over three years, Starlink bled the NBN of hundreds of thousands of customers.
Governments have also signed up. The table below shows state and federal government contracts for Starlink hardware and services, typically via Starlink resellers.
This might not even be the full picture: there may be contracts that escaped our search, or other government spending on Starlink services buried in ongoing funding agreements.
The two largest contracts are among the most recent:
- The NSW Rural Fire Service paid $41 million to install Starlink on thousands of fire trucks and vehicles over the next three years, providing backup communications and location-finding, and allowing them to live stream video of fires from anywhere in the state. The total project will cost $69 million.
- WA Police paid $3 million to equip regional police cars with Starlink. The total project will cost $8.5 million.
A WA Police car with technology that allows officers to maintain communications no matter where they are in the state. (ABC Pilbara: Peter de Kruijff)
These are the start of a broader uptake of LEO satellite internet by emergency services, Mr Coleman says.
“For bushfire response these satellite technologies provide a step change,” he says.
“I think it’s something we’ll continue to see more of.”
Could Starlink be disconnected?
Mr Musk is the primary owner of the privately owned SpaceX, the parent company of Starlink. He can decide where Starlink operates.
When Russia invaded Ukraine and cut its internet connections, Ukraine turned to Starlink for everything from its hospitals to its military drone operators.
Ukrainian civilians using a Starlink satellite internet public hotspot, November 13, 2022.
(Getty: Metin Aktas/Anadolu Agency)
After being initially enthusiastic about Ukraine’s defence, Mr Musk abruptly cut connectivity in some frontline areas.
This was reportedly due to misgivings about the ongoing war, phone calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and an insult from a Ukrainian ambassador.
After a panicked response and a personal phone call, the Pentagon convinced Mr Musk to restore service.
Recent events have demonstrated Mr Musk’s willingness to intervene in global politics.
This year alone, he attacked a Brazilian Supreme Court judge online; attacked leftist Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro online; mocked UK prime minister Kier Starmer; blamed the UK’s riots on “mass migration” and spread far-right conspiracy theories; and dubbed the Australian government “fascists”.
He’s now “all in” on electing Donald Trump as US President, investing tens of millions of his own money in a pro-Trump campaigning organisation.
Donald Trump says he would put Mr Musk in charge of government “efficiency” if elected. (Reuters: Carlos Barria)
Dr Davis, from ASPI, says it’s important to distinguish between Mr Musk’s political views and his “engineering activities”.
That is, you can disagree with his politics but still like his products.
But he acknowledges the “vocal” tech mogul could use the companies he controls for political ends.
“That’s a challenge we have to address,” he says.
Paul Budde agrees.
“I find it a very dangerous situation.”
“[Access to the internet] is not just a nice service for customers, this is an essential service.
“We totally depend on a company we have no control over.”
“I would be surprised if the government just let this go with the knowledge they have a person in charge that’s totally unreliable.”
Does Starlink have a legal obligation to preserve internet access?
Australian law requires the operators of critical infrastructure to identify risks, including potentially the risk of an internet provider abruptly withdrawing its services.
Mobile network operators, for instance, have to have risk management plans for threats to their infrastructure, from cybersecurity to bushfires.
With satellite internet, it’s a bit more complicated.
There are differing opinions about which company is responsible for ensuring Starlink stays turned on.
Starlink resellers like Telstra and Optus don’t have a duty to identify infrastructure risks to Starlink’s service, as they don’t own the Starlink infrastructure, Mr Coleman says.
Starlink’s infrastructure is, of course, mostly in space.
A Starlink ground station in Boorowa, New South Wales, with the tops of radar domes peeking above the fence. (ABC News: Jack Snape)
But there is some on the ground. Starlink relies on a network of 20 ground stations that serve as intermediaries between the satellites and the internet’s fibre optic backbone, receiving data from satellites and routing it to the appropriate internet networks.
These ground stations were built by Vocus, owned by a Macquarie-run infrastructure fund.
“If Starlink is in a working commercial arrangement with an Australian operator to operate ground infrastructure that obligation ultimately rests with the infrastructure owner,” Mr Coleman says.
Vocus does not own or operate the Starlink ground stations.
Johanna Weaver, director of the Tech Policy Design Centre at the Australian National University, says the question of ownership does not matter.
Obligations and regulations in the Security of Critical infrastructure Act (2018) apply to organisations that operate critical infrastructure, not just those who own them, she says.
Therefore Starlink has a legal obligation to mitigate threats to Starlink internet access in Australia.
“Telecoms is an essential service and it’s right for Australians to expect government can ensure continuity of service,” Professor Weaver says.
The Department of Home Affairs told the ABC it “acknowledges Starlink’s role” in providing satellite-based internet services and that a legal framework imposed strict security obligations on telecommunications providers including satellite-based internet service providers.
“Starlink is a regulated entity under this framework, as a licensed telecommunications carrier,” a spokesperson said.
They added reforms to the Security of Critical Infrastructure Act (2018) introduced to Parliament on October 9 will include a risk management program obligation for telecommunications providers.
Are there alternatives to Starlink?
Starlink dominates LEO satellite internet, but alternatives are emerging.
Eutelsat OneWeb, based in London and owned by a French satellite operator, announced a LEO satellite internet service for some parts of Australia in March this year.
Unlike Starlink, it only sells to other businesses, rather than residential customers.
Amazon says its LEO satellite internet service, Project Kuiper, could be available in Australia after mid-2025.
A fourth company, Lynk, plans to introduce LEO satellite internet for mobile phones in Australia.
“The best solution to the issue of sovereignty is competition,” Mr Coleman says.
“This will be a fiercely competitive market in the next three to four years.”
Could Australia launch its own LEO satellite internet service?
This would solve the problem of sovereign risk, but there are major technical hurdles.
Because LEO satellites don’t orbit above a fixed spot but zoom around the Earth on low orbits, Australia would need to launch hundreds to ensure constant coverage over Australia.
Starlink, for instance, has more than 6,000 LEO satellites in orbit.
OneWeb has 648.
“A sovereign Australia satellite LEO network by definition needs to be global,” Mr Coleman says.
“These are immense capital investments … that’s of a scale we don’t really have in Australia.”
Then there’s the question of which company would launch the satellites.
The cheapest option is currently … Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
SpaceX is able to reuse its rockets, meaning each launch costs it less than its rivals. It dominates the global space launch industry, launching 525 of the 626 spacecraft sent up during the first quarter of 2024.
Other rocket companies may charge two to 10 times more, according to Matt Tetlow, founder of the Australian aerospace company Inovor.
“It can be extremely expensive,” he says.
“I don’t know how other rocket companies can compete with SpaceX because SpaceX’s technology is so good.
The HyImpulse SR75 rocket before a test launch in South Australia in May 2024. (Supplied: Australian Space Agency)
There is currently no Australian-based company that has launched a rocket into orbit.
This achievement may come soon, but the successful company would still have to compete with SpaceX
“I’m not prepared to pay more by a factor of 10 to launch on an Australian rocket,” Dr Tetlow says.
Despite the challenges, Dr Davis from ASPI wants Australia to develop its own space capabilities, including more Australian-owned telecommunications satellites.
“What I’m talking about is Australian rockets launching Australian satellites.”
These satellites would be used for specialised tasks such as Earth observation, bushfire monitoring, weather prediction, and missile attack early-warning, he says.
“Australia has been completely dependent on foreign providers of space capability for much of its history.
“We’ve been running this risk since the start of the Space Age.
“But it’s only now, having a highly vocal individual like Musk, that people see the risk in that.”
