LEO satellites, Starlink direct-to-cell, GPS spoofing, SATCOM links.
John R. MacDougall overpowered HBO's satellite broadcast feed with a 2,000-watt transmitter to protest unscrambling subscription fees, exposing commercial satellite uplink vulnerabilities.
An unknown pirate broadcaster overpowered the terrestrial microwave Studio-Transmitter Links (STL) of WGN-TV and PBS station WTTW in Chicago, broadcasting distorted Max Headroom audio and video into thousands of homes.
Underground syndicates commercialized "Clone King" EPROM modification kits, allowing widespread cellular subscription fraud and free international calls across North American carriers.
Attackers spoofed ICMP Echo Requests to IP directed-broadcast addresses — including Portuguese academic backbones FCCN/RCTS — producing 100x amplification floods that downed victims' uplinks.
Hackers breached T-Mobile's backend web customer-care interface, gaining unauthorized access to Danger cloud servers and publishing private celebrity phonebooks, SMS logs, and photos.
Cybercriminals abused SS7 roaming interfaces to intercept bank-issued SMS one-time passcodes (OTPs), draining accounts of customers at O2 Germany and Metro Bank UK.
Federal indictments exposed international cybercrime rings bribing retail store employees at AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile to execute unauthorized SIM swaps, stealing tens of millions of dollars in cryptocurrency.
Minutes before Russia's invasion on 24 February 2022, a wiper attack against Viasat's KA-SAT ground infrastructure took roughly 45,000 modems offline across Ukraine and Central Europe — the first major cyber-physical attack on a civilian satellite network during wartime.
Attackers executed an unauthorized SIM swap against the phone number tied to the US SEC official X account, broadcasting a fraudulent Bitcoin ETF approval that caused hundreds of millions in market swings.
SpaceX Starlink and T-Mobile rolled out commercial Direct-to-Cell satellite service, deploying LEO satellites equipped with onboard 3GPP eNodeB cellular base stations connecting standard unmodified LTE/5G smartphones from space.