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U.S. Withholding Satellite Data

Posted by timothy on from the derives-from-a-mandate-from-the-masses dept.

plover writes "Because of Congressional legislation passed quietly in 2003, the Air Force Space Command will no longer distribute space surveillance data via NASA. There was supposed a three year transitional period where the data was to be made available via a NASA web site, but earlier this month their transitional server went down hard, and NASA has decided to not rebuild it. (It was scheduled to be shut down on 31 March 2005 anyway.) The only way to obtain satellite data now is by signing up with the official Space-Track website. Part of the agreement to obtaining data from their site is that you agree to not redistribute their data. Of course, amateurs are still free to redistribute their observations, including those of classified satellites."

19 of 274 comments (clear)

  1. Homeland Security? by mOoZik · · Score: 2, Interesting

    What reasons are cited for this development? Security?

    --
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    1. Re:Homeland Security? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting
      Security I suppose. It follows the withdrawal of publicly available flight safety information from the NGA.
      Announcement of Intent To Initiate the Process To Remove Aeronautical Information From Public Sale and Distribution
  2. Quietly passed by michaelhood · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Why isn't there some sort of community political watchdog site that informs us when things are "quietly passed"? Tell us about everything that's in the works, let us decide what we do and don't like.

    1. Re:Quietly passed by MagicDude · · Score: 2, Interesting

      If there is some group out there looking out for these sort of things, they probably didn't have the means of getting the word out. They were probably derided as a bunch of kooks by the media or any kind of outlet they tried to talk to. Getting information out is hard if you don't have the infrastructure to get people to listen to you.

      Here's an example of such a failure. In Hawaii, there is a tsunami monitering center, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, which moniters the west coast of the US, and pretty much all of the pacific basin for tsunami. I'll bet that after the massive seaquake, they knew what was coming. I'll also bet that there was no protocol for who they could contact to pass on this information. While they probably had a system for warning the continental US about dangers approaching the west coast, it doesn't seem like had a contact in the state department who could inform foreign governments about the information they had. With 2-3 hours notice, several thousand lives could have been saved in the affected regions. You can raise the point about not being able to help poor vilages who have no infrastructure and no ability to contact them, and that's a valid point. However, there were still thousands of casualities on resort beaches in tourist cities, places where communication infractructure wasn't a problem. The problem was that you had these group of people in Hawaii with lifesaving information who were likely shouting in the dark trying to get someone to listen to them, which is what likely happened to any watchdog group who may have known about this legislation.

    2. Re:Quietly passed by hairyfeet · · Score: 1, Interesting

      The problem is that it doesn't matter if you care or not.It has become so expensive to run that you get one rich white guy in bed with big business versus another rich white guy in bed with big business. The only way I could see it changing is if we made it more like jury duty.You are picked by a drawing made from a pool of voters.Extra weight would be given to those that have given back to the community (teachers,firemen,soldiers,etc) and we would get to choose from the five or so that had the best scores overall. You would get paid exactly the same as if you were working your normal job plus time and a half for serving then their wouldn't be any political careers and they couldn't sell out before they even left their home state. Until something changes I don't think after twenty years I'm going to vote anymore because I'm tired of choosing between corrupt rich guys.I thought bush sr vs dukakis was bad but dubya versus heinz was just the last straw. Besides,With the states switching to electronic voting how long do you think it will take before no matter which button you push you vote for "El Presidente" anyway?

      --
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    3. Re:Quietly passed by nuclear305 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      "Why isn't there some sort of community political watchdog site that informs us when things are "quietly passed"? Tell us about everything that's in the works, let us decide what we do and don't like."

      There are such watchdogs, however...to be frank, that's your job as a responsible voter to keep track of what your elected officials are doing since, you know, they are there to represent you.

      Saying that the government should take the time to inform everyone of whats going on because people are too lazy--or don't care--to pay attention is akin to wanting to change the channel on your TV but you don't feel like getting up to either find the remote or switch it manually.

    4. Re:Quietly passed by smchris · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Ah, a man who has obviously worked with government!

      Part of a job I had in the '70s required reviewing both our state and the federal legislative Registers. Be afraid. Be very afraid. If people only knew everything that gets proposed but doesn't pass committee, or if it passes committee, fails the vote (but isn't widely reported).

      Doesn't help that Congress seems especially corrupt at this moment in history. It isn't so much that the system is broken. It's working just fine for the special interests the way they want it to work.

    5. Re:Quietly passed by HeghmoH · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I personally like Heinlein's idea for a bicameral legislature. One house only passes bills, and requires a 2/3rds majority. The other house only repeals bills, and requires only 1/3rds of the vote to do so. It seems to me that this would be a nice division of responsibility and would ensure that the legal system didn't get too complicated.

      --
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    6. Re:Quietly passed by KevinIsOwn · · Score: 2, Interesting

      While the Congressmen themselves generally don't read the entire document, that's why Congressmen have staff. The staff read the entire thing and inform their boss of the contents. Most Congressmen will read a portion as well.
      The only notable exception to this is when legislation like the Patriot act was rammed through and only one Senator had time to read the whole thing.

    7. Re:Quietly passed by Dot.Com.CEO · · Score: 2, Interesting
      You are, in so many words, wrong.

      The system provides a mechanism for demonstrating your dissatisfaction. It is called the null or blank vote. It shows that you are interested in what is happening in your political system but no political force expresses your beliefs or supports your interests.

      Sitting on a couch on election day does not "break the system" and apatyh is not a valid criticism of the futility of the system.

      --
      Mother is the best bet and don't let Satan draw you too fast.
  3. How difficult is it to build ? by zymano · · Score: 4, Interesting

    How hard is it to build a spy/telescope satellite ?

    I found this site about building a miniature

    Miniature Space satellite

    A canadian cheapy.
    Canadian Satellite

    I think it would be cool if someone could put a cheap one in space from off the shelf telescope parts . Don't you think these prices for these orbitting telescopes are a bit farfetched ?

  4. This is going to help honestly... by FidelCatsro · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ""The only way to obtain satellite data now is by signing up with the official Space-Track website. Part of the agreement to obtaining data from their site is that you agree to not redistribute their data""

    Am i the only one thinking that people likely to abuse this information ,are not likely to care about breaking a contract.

    --
    The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
  5. Re:This is bullshit...No it's not by Billly+Gates · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The data is still free.

    Its the projections of the sattelites that are secret and should be. Why should we all care?

    A powerfull land based laser could take out a satelite and a trajectory is needed.

    Weather and other services are still available.

    --
    http://saveie6.com/
  6. Open ended by WillieT · · Score: 5, Interesting

    So I was reading through the "terms of use" and got to this line "... By continuing, you consent to your keystrokes and data content being monitored." The way it's stated is so ambiguous that it's scarry. Anyone else agree?

  7. Re:Spies. by fremsley471 · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Hubble is no good for looking at the Earth because it's too bright. It would flood and destroy the detectors!

    No. Hubble regularly looks at Earth for calibration purposes. See: http://www.stsci.edu/stsci/meetings/shst2/williams r.html

  8. Re:Spies. by FrostedWheat · · Score: 2, Interesting

    They made one exception to look at the moon once, but I believe they had to do some tricky things to manage that.

    I didn't know about the Hubble Moon pictures, nice one! Found them here: http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/ releases/1999/14/

  9. Re:Spies. by b00le · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I had always understood that Hubble itself was a derivative of the Keyhole KH-11 spy satellites - i.e. the satellite bus and basic telescope were an existing design (that's why it was so cheap...). The sensors would of course be quite different; Earth Observation satellites are more like scanners than cameras. Google KH-11 for more info., but don't blame me when your garden fills up with black helicopters.

    --
    Science fiction for grown-ups...
  10. Re:Spies. by hcdejong · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The Keyhole series of satellites are similar to Hubble. The KH-12 has "a resolution approaching ten centimeters".

  11. Re:How difficult is it to build ? by hcdejong · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Hubble cost something like $2B (?). Spy satellites like the Keyhole 12 are similar to Hubble, and would cost at least that much. This gives you 10-cm resolution.
    Sure, you could buy a simple telescope, duct tape a digital camera and a packet radio transmitter to it, and blast it into space.
    But building optics that won't break during launch, and can handle the temperature changes is another matter. Building an attitude control system (a cluster of miniature rocket engines, plus control system) is nontrivial, too. You'll need energy (solar panels, fuel tanks), also built to last in space.
    Off-the-shelf? No chance.