While it’s unlikely that satellite internet technology, such as Elon Musk’s Starlink, will be able to connect Iranian protesters, Musk has already received a PR boost with a simple two-word tweet.
Elon Musk has once again claimed that his business interests can resolve a high-profile crisis, this time suggesting that Starlink satellite internet can help ease Iran’s digital crackdown during ongoing anti-government protests. Although Musk’s announcement was met with enthusiasm by Iranian dissidents and their supporters worldwide, experts caution that Starlink is far from a censorship solution. The impetus for Musk’s move came after Iran disrupted the country’s internet access in response to mass protests, and US Secretary of State Blinken’s announcement that the US was easing technology export restrictions to counter Iranian state censorship efforts. Responding to these developments, Musk quickly tweeted: “Activating Starlink…”
Musk’s tweet caused a sensation, with venture capitalist and Musk supporter Shervin Pishevar suggesting that Musk deserved the Nobel Peace Prize. The idea of Starlink providing uncensored internet access to millions during a time of political turmoil in the Middle East was a significant PR win for Musk. However, the reality of Starlink’s capabilities is far from this idealistic vision. In Iran, the notion of a wealthy American businessman providing internet access to the country is hindered by the laws of physics. To access Starlink, users need a special dish to send and receive internet data, which may not be feasible for protesters on the ground in Iran.
Despite Musk’s claims, it would be incredibly challenging to smuggle a meaningful quantity of Starlink hardware into Iran. This is especially true now that the Iranian government is aware of the plan thanks to Musk’s tweet. As Todd Humphreys, an engineering professor at the University of Texas at Austin, points out, “I don’t think it’s a practical solution because of the challenge of smuggling in the ground terminals.” Humphreys’ research focuses on satellite communication, and he notes that the issue of getting the necessary equipment into the country poses a significant obstacle to Starlink’s effectiveness in Iran.
THE IDEA IS not without precedent. In Ukraine, after the Russian invasion disrupted internet access, the deployment of Musk’s satellite dishes earned him international press adulation and a bevy of lucrative government contracts. In Ukraine, though, Starlink was welcomed by a profoundly pro-American government desperate for technological aid from the West. U.S. government agencies were able to ship the requisite hardware with the full logistical cooperation of the Ukrainian government.
This is not, to say the very least, the case in Iran, where the government is unlikely to condone the import of a technology explicitly meant to undermine its own power. While Musk’s claim that Starlink’s orbiting satellites are activated over Iran may be true, the notion that censorship-free internet connectivity is something that can be flipped on like a light switch is certainly not. Without dishes on the ground to communicate with the satellites, it’s a meaningless step: technologically tantamount to giving a speech to an empty room.
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Humphreys, who has previously done consulting work for Starlink, explained that because of the specialized nature of Starlink hardware, it’s doubtful Iranians could craft a DIY alterative. “It’s not like you can build a homebrew receiver,” he said. “It’s a very complicated signal structure with a very wideband signal. Even a research organization would have a hard time.”
Musk is famously uninterested in the constraints imposed by reality, but he seems to acknowledge the problem to some degree. In a September 25 tweet, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace fellow Karim Sadjadpour wrote, “I spoke w/ @elonmusk about Starlink in Iran, he gave me permission to share this: ‘Starlink is now activated in Iran. It requires the use of terminals in-country, which I suspect the [Iranian] government will not support, but if anyone can get terminals into Iran, they will work.’”
Implausibility hasn’t stopped Musk’s fans, either. One tweet from a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council purporting to document a Starlink dish already successfully secreted into Iran turned out to be a photo from 2020, belonging to an Idaho man who happened to have a Persian rug.
The fandom — and the starpower it’s attached to — might be the point here. Given the obstacles, Musk’s Starlink aspirations may be best understood in the context of his past spectacular, spectacularly unfulfilled claims, rather than something akin to Starlink’s rapid adoption in Ukraine. Musk’s penchant for internet virality has become a key component of his business operations. He has repeatedly made bold pronouncements, typically on Twitter, that a technology he happens to manufacture is the key to cracking some global crisis. Whether it’s Thai children stuck in a waterlogged cave, the Covid-19 pandemic, or faltering American transit infrastructure, Musk has repeatedly offered technological solutions that are either plainly implausible, botched in execution, or a mixture of both.
IT’S NOT JUST the lack of dishes in Iranian homes. Musk’s plan is further complicated by Starlink’s reliance on ground stations: communications facilities that allow the SpaceX satellites to plug into earthbound internet infrastructure from orbit. While upgraded Starlink satellites may no longer need these ground stations in the near future, the network of today still largely requires them to service a country as vast as Iran, said Humphreys, the University of Texas professor. Again, Iran is unlikely to approve the construction within its borders of satellite installations owned by an American defense contractor.
Humphreys suggested that ground stations built in a neighboring country could provide some level of connection, albeit at reduced speed, but that still doesn’t get over the hump of every Iranian who wants to get online needing a $550 kit with “Starlink” emblazoned on the box. While Humphreys added that he was hopeful that a slow trickle of Starlinks terminals could aid Iranian dissidents over time, he said, “I don’t think in the short term this will have an impact on the unrest in Iran.”
Alp Toker, director of the internet monitoring and censorship watchdog group NetBlocks, noted that many Iranians already watch banned satellite television channels through contraband dishes, meaning the smuggling of Starlink dishes is doable in theory. While he praised the idea of bringing Starlink to Iran as “credible and worthwhile” in the long term, the difficulty in sourcing Starlink’s specialized equipment means that accessing Musk’s satellites remains “a solution for the few,” not a counter to population-scale censorship.
While future versions of the Starlink system might be able to communicate with more accessible devices like handheld phones, Toker said, “As far as we know this isn’t possible with the current generation of kit, and it won’t be until then that Starlink or similar platforms could simply ‘switch on’ internet in a country in the sense that most people understand.”
Despite Iran’s culture of bootleg satellite TV, experts warn that a Starlink connection could put Iranians at risk. Rose Croshier, a policy fellow at the Center for Global Development, cautions that a Starlink terminal, which both receives and transmits data, would still be easily detectable by Iranian authorities, unlike passive TV dishes. She notes that positioning a Starlink terminal in a crowd of illegal satellite dishes would not provide anonymity, potentially putting users at risk of government retaliation.
The plan to bring Starlink to Iran faces additional obstacles due to regulations from the International Telecommunication Union, which both the US and Iran are members of. This is because satellite connections are subject to regulation, and US-based entities, including Starlink, require regulatory approval from the FCC and ITU. According to a 2021 paper by the Asia Development Bank on satellite internet usage, regulatory approval in each country of operation is also necessary for service provision to customers. Even if Starlink could provide internet to Iranians meaningfully, the company would face consequences from the International Telecommunications Union if it did so without Iranian approval. The likelihood of such approval is low. Mahsa Alimardani, a senior Middle East researcher at Article19, has tweeted that Starlink would face these consequences, further complicating its efforts to bring internet to Iran.
Sanctions against Iran also pose a significant obstacle to Starlink’s efforts to bring internet access to the country. While US Secretary of State Blinken announced a relaxation of tech exports, trade restrictions with Iran remain in place. Brian O’Toole, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and an expert on global sanctions, explained that there are human rights-related sanctions on Iranian actors in the IT space under a sanctions authority called GHRAVITY that further complicate Starlink’s efforts. Even with relaxed rules, Starlink would still need a special license to operate in Iran, which O’Toole doubts would be granted. He added that, from his point of view, much of Starlink’s efforts in this area appear not to be realistically achievable.
While Starlink or a competitor may one day provide unfettered internet access to Iran and other countries struggling with online censorship, for now, the realities on the ground far exceed the PR value of a two-word tweet. Despite the challenges, efforts to bring internet access to these countries remain crucial to support their citizens’ basic human rights and access to information.