Frustration is growing in Papua New Guinea weeks after the government ordered Starlink to shut down operations in the country as businesses, health providers and communities struggle without access to internet services.
Starlink, owned by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, is a satellite internet company that provides internet to remote places. In mid-December, the National Information and Communications Technology Authority (Nicta) ordered the company to halt operations because it was not licensed in PNG.
“Starlink is currently not licensed to operate in Papua New Guinea, and until the legal process is completed, services cannot be allowed,” Nicta’s acting chief executive,Lume Polume, said.
Nicta is now waiting on the ombudsman or the courts in PNG to issue a directive over whether it will be granted a licence. No timing has been provided on when a directive will be issued.
Absolutely, vastly more important that the bureaucracy issue a licence than that people are allowed to use the internet.
Alternatively, time for a long pig BBQ with the bureaucracy invited, no?
Looks like the Bureaucrats didn’t get their ..Encouragement….
I know it may sound like a radical idea, but as no one is being adversely affected by Starlink operating, why don’t they allow Starlink to continue operating until the outcome of the ‘legal process’?
If at the end of said legal process it is decided a licence won’t be granted, Starlink can go away and the people of PNG can string up the bureaucrats.
Under the same doctrine as the postal workers striking at Christmas time. Leverage.
If Starlink were allowed to continue operations, then the people could ignore the bureaucrats and they would have no leverage to extract “encouragements” (bribes) to expedite the approvals.
Isn’t StarLink a setellite system? So, you don’t need permission from anybody on the ground, you just point at the sky and link up. It’s like saying they’ve shut down the moon “in Papua New Guinea”.
You need ground stations for the satellite to communicate with the wider internet. So you connect to the sat, it talks to ground station and that talks to Pornhub.
Now there is a project at Starlink for laser sat to sat Comms. So you don’t rely on ground stations so much. But I don’t know how advanced it is.
Interesting. Is there any particular technical reason why satellite comms from PNG couldn’t use Northern Oz base stations?
I don’t know.
Backhaul between Oz and PNG?
All spectrum is licensed on a country by country basis, including the satellite spectrum that Starlink uses. Most countries agree to go by the WRC recommendations and clear spectrum to be used for certain technologies.
PNG is at liberty to use that spectrum for domestic purpose and technically it could be a big safety problem.
In practice this is obviously how everyone above has described.
Ah, now that makes sense BiND. Thank you.
The problem with Starlink is that the satellites are already there to serve the lucrative US market and their bandwidth is underutilized in other parts of the world. As the customer pays for their own expensive terminal the only cost adding customers in these sort of areas is a very few ground stations and running the billing system. Anything they make is close to pure profit. This means that they can pitch the price way lower than what they charge in the US and undercut the domestic market. This “competition” means it stops the local internet infrastructure being developed.
No local internet infrastructure in remote areas is not an issue, but a massive problem when it’s being used everywhere for key purposes. The US could disable that key internet infrastructure with a few clicks on a keyboard and there would be nothing the local country could do.
Even when competing satellite internet providers are operating there, migrating between them is not the cheap and easy option available to countries that have invested in their own local fiber network that they control and switching ISP’s is trivial.
Yeah, but building physical Internet infrastructure in PNG? Have you looked at the map? Who’s going to pay for it (the Chinks, obvs.). How do you stop your workers being eaten?
“No local internet infrastructure in remote areas is not an issue, but a massive problem when it’s being used everywhere for key purposes. The US could disable that key internet infrastructure with a few clicks on a keyboard and there would be nothing the local country could do.”
If it’s for “key purposes” you aren’t using satellite. You use satellite for very low density, where it isn’t worth installing fibre or cell towers. If you want speed and reliability for important reasons, you pay for fibre.
It’s not about not allowing people to use the internet, it’s about people using the internet and having their use tracked and observed by their
servantsmasters.See Ireland for more.
‘Online abuse that undermines democratic stability’ is cute, you have to admit.
Or New Zealand, where the government ‘will continue to be your single source of truth. Unless you hear it from us, it is not the truth.’
(In NZ, they are currently prosecuting a whistleblower, Barry Young, for releasing publicly collected health data which suggested unfortunate things about the effects of the Covid ‘vaccines’; don’t worry, he only faces eight years in clink for allowing the public to see the data they pay for.)
Or the US, where – were it not for Musk buying Twitter, and allowing Taibbi and Shellenberger and others in to see how the US government was pressuring it to lie and censor on its behalf – none of this would be able to be talked about.
Even The Observer noticed that.
Or Australia, where Substack has bowed to pressure from the government to censor stuff the government doesn’t like.
Or the UK, where the same thing is happening.
I could obviously go on.
But remember: there is no Them, and no conspiracy.
This is just a bright idea that popped into an Irish/Kiwi/American/Australian/British head one morning.
I used to know a PNGer. Good bloke. We did not discuss the habits of his ancestors.
“Nicta’s acting chief executive,Lume Polume, said.”
Sounds like one of Kenneth Williams’ characters in “Round the Horn”.
“until the legal process is completed, services cannot be allowed”
A succinct expression of the bureaucratic mindset!
Just looked at PNG on Google Maps. Most of the country has no roads. NO ROADS.
They have ‘courts’ in PNG? They probably have more Japs holding out for Hirohito.