When you think of cameras on the International Space Station being used to capture images of the Earth below, you typically think of stunning visuals of the Northern Lights or incredible pics from the blizzard that hammered the eastern United States this past weekend.
However, a new report published Monday by the New York Times indicates that the cameras on the ISS could have another, possibly more sinister use: as for-hire surveillance equipment which countries can use to keep tabs on their borders and their neighboring nations from outer space.
According to the story, emails recently released by the European Commission indicated that one Canadian firm suggested that the European Union begin using Theia and Iris, the cameras on the orbiting research facility, to help their border agency keep tabs on political boundaries.
That company, UrtheCast (pronounced “Earth cast”) currently has a deal with the space station’s primary Russian contractor, the Times said, and helps Moscow’s space agency operate Theia and Iris. In an email, the firm told the EU’s border agency, Frontex, that their cameras would provide “an unprecedented capability for an integrated persistent space surveillance.”
The EU declined the offer, but UrtheCast has other clients
While UrtheCast’s pitch was just one of several sent to Frontex over the last few years, including one involving a “floating frontier surveillance platform” and another involving algorithms which could be used to predict border crossings, it is the only one that would use instruments on a space station that was explicitly created for “peaceful purposes” back in 1998, the Times said.
In making its proposal, UrtheCast told Frontex that the cameras would also offer “extraction of situation awareness at certain regions, facilities or events” and could “provide reliable evidences on certain events without intruding” on the airspace of neighboring countries using airplanes or drones. An EU agency spokesman said that the offer, which was made in 2013, was declined.
UrtheCast executive, Jeff Rath, declined to comment on the matter, telling the newspaper, “We don’t talk about our customers.” However, he did say that they would “sell to governments” and businesses, as well as nongovernmental organizations. For example, video from the ISS cameras has been used in commercials from both Heineken and Pepsi, and securities filings revealed that UrtheCast has signed a five-year, $65 million deal with a undisclosed customer.
A recent filing, obtained by the Times, also stated that “many government customers” needed satellite imagery “to supervise and manage, among other things, resources, animal migrations and national borders,” and that a plethora of customers were using the company’s services “to track environmental changes, natural disasters and human conflicts.”
NASA spokesman Daniel Huot told the publication via email that the US space agency “did not have any involvement with the UrtheCast payload,” which was “pitched to and flown by” Russia and was under the auspices of Roscosmos. Russian space officials did not respond to the paper’s requests for comment.
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Feature Image: Expedition 46 flight engineer Tim Peake of the European Space Agency (ESA) shared this stunning nighttime photograph with his social media followers on Jan. 25, 2016, writing, “Beautiful night pass over Italy, Alps and Mediterranean.” (Credit: ESA/NASA)
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