6-minute read | 900 words
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Satellite hacking enters the AI era.
Host Maria Varmazis sits down with Alissa Knight, CEO and CAIO of Assail, to discuss satellite hacking and the growing role of AI in facilitating cyberattacks against space infrastructure. They explore how AI-powered attacks could impact satellite operations and why this emerging threat is forcing organizations to rethink their satellite defenses.
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AI opens a new frontier in satellite hacking.
This week on T-Minus: Space-Cyber Briefing: we dive deeper into satellite hacking efforts. As AI has continued to become more sophisticated and proliferated, these tools are being increasingly used by malicious hackers to target and exploit critical satellite infrastructure.
Does this newsletter spark questions for you? Write to us at space@n2k.com to guide how we’ll continue to explore the impacts that AI is having on space operations in future podcast episodes and newsletter issues.
The changing satellite threat landscape.
As with nearly every sector, AI is impacting how the space industry needs to operate, both acting as a tool that will enable significant advancement but also as something that acts as a major risk source. That risk can come from both how AI can behave unexpectedly within an organization or by an attacker using it to scale the scope and impact of their attacks.
As AI has continued to improve, malicious actors have increasingly looked to use the technology within their operations. AI platforms can allow attackers to identify vulnerabilities, analyze complex systems, and accelerate the development of attack techniques. For an industry that increasingly depends on interconnected satellite systems, ground infrastructure, and communications networks, these capabilities introduce additional cybersecurity risks.
The Ash Center from Harvard University published a report in 2025 discussing the impact that weaponized AI could have on national security and critical infrastructure. Within this article, Dr. Shlomit Wagman notes:
“By automating cyber reconnaissance and penetration testing, AI enables adversarial actors to execute highly adaptive, autonomous cyberattacks at speeds far beyond human capabilities. These attacks could potentially disable military communications, manipulate satellite systems,…posing direct threats to national security.”
These concerns are further compounded by the complexity of satellite infrastructure. Satellite operations depend on more than the spacecraft as interconnected ground stations, communications networks, command-and-control systems, and supporting software are needed on a daily basis. As AI capabilities develop, these existing vulnerabilities will continue to introduce new opportunities for malicious actors to exploit. Understanding how these capabilities are incorporated into cyber operations becomes increasingly important for the organizations responsible for securing space infrastructure.
The AI impact.
While the use of AI in cyberattacks is constantly evolving, there are some trends that have emerged regarding the more common ways AI is being used. Four of the more common ways attackers have looked to utilize AI has been to:
- Enhance reconnaissance
- Vulnerability discovery
- Exploit development
- Attack automation
Each of these methods enable attackers to gather information at scale, analyze it for vulnerabilities, develop exploits, and use agents to coordinate attacks without manual engagement.
For ground systems, AI-enabled attacks could allow for actors to compromise ground stations and mission control systems both before and after launches to disrupt timelines and services. Similarly, for in-orbit communications systems, AI platforms could assist when compromising communication links either disrupting or intercepting communications.
AI could also introduce additional risks to the software supply chains supporting satellite operations. As the space industry increasingly adopts interoperable systems and shared software components, vulnerabilities within an upstream supplier or software dependency could have consequences across multiple organizations and networks. Rather than remaining isolated within a single mission or system, a compromise could potentially introduce risks across a broader ecosystem of operators and providers.
As AI capabilities continue to advance, organizations responsible for satellites will need to increasingly account for how the technology will change the cyber threat landscape. While the technology offers opportunities to improve operations, it will provide malicious actors with additional capabilities to identify and exploit vulnerabilities. As reliance on satellite infrastructure continues to grow, organizations will need to ensure their defensive capabilities evolve alongside the technologies that could threaten them.
This week’s space-cyber headlines.
The news stories we’re reading and thinking about this week.
USSF, in partnership with Golden Dome for America, Expands Multi-Vendor Space Data Network Backbone with Mission Operations Center.
- Space Systems Command establishing a Space Data Network Mission Operations Center (MOC).
- With the MOC, Space Force is looking to bring together mission integration, network operations, and data transport management across its multi-vendor architecture.
Nov 5, 2026 | Source: Space Systems Command
Airbus to deliver IRIS, France’s next generation military Earth observation satellites.
- The French Defence Procurement Agency has awarded a contract for the IRIS program to Airbus and Thales Alenia Space.
- The contract covers the conception, manufacturing, and testing of two satellites and the control and user ground segments.
- Alain Faure, the Head of Space Systems at Airbus Defence and Space stated that “this programme strengthens the French supply chain in space-based optical imagery.”
Nov 8, 2026 | Source: Airbus
Grok Build coding agent leaks oodles of confidential info, some belonging to SpaceXSI.
- Grok Build exposed over 35,000 applications, potentially revealing confidential information, including business plans, employee records, medical examination results, customer data, and defense-related information.
- The exposure stemmed from a flaw in Grok’s link-sharing architecture which allowed researchers to discover application URLs by searching DNS records.
Nov 10, 2026 | Source: Ars Technica
