Entrepreneur Elon Musk has helped to keep Ukrainians online with shipments of Starlink satellite Internet service. Starlink is a unit of Musk’s space company, SpaceX. The service uses terminals that resemble TV dishes equipped with antennas and are usually mounted on roofs to access the Internet via satellite in rural or disconnected areas. When war broke out in Ukraine, the country faced threats of Russian cyberattacks and shelling that had the potential to take down the Internet, making it necessary to develop a backup plan. So the country’s minister of digital transformation, Mykhailo Fedorov, tweeted a direct plea to Musk urging him to send help. Musk replied just hours later: “Starlink service is now active in Ukraine. More terminals en route.” Ukraine has already received thousands of antennas from Musk’s companies and European allies, which has proved “very effective,” Fedorov said in an interview with The Washington Post Friday. “The quality of the link is excellent,” Fedorov said through a translator, using a Starlink connection from an undisclosed location. “We are using thousands, in the area of thousands, of terminals with new shipments arriving every other day.” The use of Starlink as a stopgap measure for citizens and the government to stay connected during an invasion is a major test of the relatively new technology, experts say, and could have widespread implications for the future of war. Internet has become an essential tool for communication, staying informed and even powering weapons.
