* Thousands of new satellites due to be launched
* New risks make space ventures more expensive
* Space already a $330-billion industry
By Ari Rabinovitch
JERUSALEM, Oct 22 (Reuters) - Space, the 'final frontier',
is rapidly becoming an extra-terrestrial battleground for
corporate espionage and other types of cyber attack as hackers
seek to gain commercial advantage from rival networks operating
in the $330-billion space economy.
At the same time, a mounting threat from orbiting junk
hurtling through space and threatening spaceships and satellites
is pushing up the cost of commercial ventures and could be a
brake on future investment.
Industry-watchers say the many and varied challenges are
driving up costs that might soon become prohibitive. But if the
challenges are clear, hard solutions from the industry are few.
Three-quarters of investment in the space economy comes from
the booming commercial sector that is attracting companies like
Virgin Galactic, SpaceX, Facebook (O:FB) and Google (O:GOOGL), according to the
nonprofit Space Foundation.
The amount of data now being beamed between satellites
supporting commercial networks on earth is growing rapidly,
making them a ripe target for cyber attacks, said Luca del
Monte, a senior strategist at the European Space Agency, and one
of many experts who attended the annual International
Astronautical Congress last week in Israel.
Space presents a double opportunity for hackers - the
hardware up in orbit and the information it transmits.
Satellites were becoming "trophy attacks" for hackers, said
one space insurer.
Companies are increasingly having to arm themselves against
malware planted inside their hardware before it is sent up -
again something that drives up overheads.
With intense competition to get satellite networks up and
operational in space, companies are finding themselves shopping
in less reliable markets.
"To build so many satellites, you can no longer rely on the
usual supplier next door," del Monte said.
"There will be a big geographical extension, into Asia,
countries you don't control. So you need to examine each
component you get and make sure it has no bugs or a latent virus
that will activate in space," he said.
He speaks from experience. In one case, his agency received
microcircuits made of material whose composition, under the
microscope, was found to have been tampered with at a
fundamental level.
Had the attack not been detected, it would have interfered
with a random number generator in a way that would have helped
hackers to access the satellite, with worrying repercussions, he
said.
The space industry is also one of the most active
battlegrounds for corporate espionage, said Andrew Rogoyski,
vice president for cyber security at the Montreal-based CGI
Group GIBa.TO .
Increasing commercial interaction - between large and small
companies, governments and the private sector - means greater
exposure to risk.
"Space is primarily about intellectual property. It's
aspirational, very high-tech, very extreme technology that takes
a long time to develop," Rogoyski said.
"A cyber attack to steal from an industry rival can be a
huge time-saver," he said, predicting that cyber security will
increasingly take up big chunks from company budgets.
"VEIL" OF DEBRIS
Denis Bensoussan, head of the satellite department at
specialist insurer Beazley BEZG.L , says space investment is
becoming riskier.
There is now, on average, a 10 percent chance of some sort
of project failure, he said, usually at launch or during early
operations.
The average satellite costs around $250 million, which means
an insurance premium of $25 million. After building and launch
costs, that's the third-highest expense for satellite operators.
Current policies do not include the risk of data breach by
hackers, he said, but coverage is starting to be offered.
"Satellites are becoming trophy attacks for hackers. It's
increasingly a cause for concern," said Bensoussan.
Space debris - fragments from fuel tank explosions or other
space mishaps - is a more overt threat to operational satellites
and spaceships, however.
Half a million pieces of junk about the size of marbles,
along with 20,000 pieces larger than a ball, are whipping around
Earth at speeds 10 times faster than a bullet in what
computer-generated images show is a "veil" of dense clutter.
A crash between Russian and U.S. satellites in 2009 and a
Chinese anti-satellite missile test in 2007 added more than
5,000 pieces of debris alone, according to NASA.
A generally accepted rule is that new systems must be able
to reenter the atmosphere on their own for burn-up within 25
years of launch. But that costs money and there is no guarantee
the groups planning to send thousands of new satellites into
space will do so.
"If the debris risk gets worse, insurance conditions and
prices will get tougher and higher," Bensoussan said.
It's widely felt within the industry that a level of
stricter, more enforcible guidelines for manoeuvering in space
will have to be adopted, and this will open a huge new market.
"Space debris removal could become our core business," said
Gerrit Hausmann, a business development manager at Germany's OHB
System AG, a leading space company.
OHB OHB.SE is competing for a contract with Europe's space
agency to remove an eight-ton satellite from orbit during a 2021
mission by using a sort of tugboat with a robotic arm.
Other ideas put forward by numerous companies in recent
years include satellites armed with nets, harpoons, adhesive
walls, even tentacles that will either push the debris toward
Earth for burn-out or into an out-of-the-way "graveyard orbit".
(Editing by Richard Balmforth)