Researchers say one common satellite radio can give attackers a path into the whole spacecraft
Planta's Nullcon talk chained an authentication bypass on GomSpace's AX100 into persistent radio control, then a pivot over the spacecraft bus.
By Ryan Merket · Published
Primary source: X · @IntCyberDigest
Why it matters
Standardised radios helped small satellites get cheap and fast to orbit. SatBleed shows the other side of that reuse: a configuration or firmware weakness in one common communications module can become a fleet-level question, especially when that module sits between the ground link and the spacecraft's internal bus.
Ulysse Planta, a PhD student at the CISPA Helmholtz Center for Information Security, closed the first day of Nullcon Berlin on November 5th with a claim satellite operators will not enjoy: a widely reused commercial radio can be taken over persistently, then used as a route into the rest of the spacecraft. Nullcon lists Planta as a CISPA PhD student and the talk as "Owning the Uplink: An Excursion into COTS Satellite Hardware". The conference ran November 5th to November 6th, 2026 in Berlin.…
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