Tech billionaire and CEO Tesla Elon Musk’s company rejected a report by the Federal Aviation Administration highlighting dangers posed by the Starlink satellite constellation to humans on Earth, calling it “inaccurate” while urging the regulators to “improvise”.
Elon Musk’s company said in a letter Tuesday that the report relied “on a deeply flawed analysis that falsely characterises reentry disposal risks associated with Starlink.”
The letter read: “To be clear, SpaceX’s satellites are designed and built to fully demise during atmospheric reentry during disposal at end of life, and they do so.”
The Aerospace Corporation — the non-profit group that contributed to the report — was also accused of not accounting for the analysis of SpaceX pertaining to the satellite disposal.
The report was submitted to the members of Congress on October 5 by the FAA, painting a bleak picture of the dangers posed by the constellation of Musk’s Starlink satellite.
It suggested: “By 2035 if the expected large constellation growth is realised and debris from Starlink satellites survive reentry … one person on the planet would be expected to be injured or killed every two years.”
According to the report’s estimation, the probability of an aircraft suffering an accident with falling space debris could be 0.0007 per year by 2035.
SpaceX explained in its report that 325 satellites were deorbited since February 2020, and no debris has been found.
In a statement issued Tuesday afternoon, the Aerospace Corporation said, “Our technical team is in communication with SpaceX and others to review and update the data.”
“It was approached by the FAA more than two years ago to do an independent assessment of collective risks associated with satellite re-entry, based upon the projection of all planned operators under US regulation in 2021,” it stated in a statement.
“The data included existing and planned constellations through 2035. The greatest percentage of satellites were those in Low Earth Orbit.”
Starlink risks
It was acknowledged by the FAA that Starlink satellites fully burn up in the atmosphere when they fall back to Earth at the end of service, posing no risk.
However, the Aerospace Corporation noted that “with the thousands of satellites expected to reenter, even a small amount of debris can impose a significant risk over time.”
SpaceX while rejecting the report regarded the assessment based on “egregious errors, omissions and incorrect assumptions.”
SpaceX also criticised the report for focusing “only on Starlink, disregarding other satellite systems like Amazon’s Project Kuiper, OneWeb, or any of the LEO systems being developed and deployed by China.”
The report noted that by 2035, Elon Musk’s satellites will account for “85% of the expected risk to people on the ground and aviation.”
Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif was visited in Islamabad by a four-person Google delegation led by Mr. Scott Beaumont, President of the APAC area.
Pakistan’s digital economy is about to undergo a revolutionary change, according to the prime minister, who greeted the team. Speaking on the government’s intentions to reach the goal of US$ 25 billion in exports over the next five years, the prime minister revealed that funding will be used for youth training, IT infrastructure upgrades, and regulatory environment enhancements. Pakistan’s economy is being fully digitalised, he remarked. In his attempts, he stressed the need of working together with a tech behemoth like Google.
The Prime Minister praised Google for pioneering projects that have dramatically enhanced the lives of thousands of Pakistanis in recent years, as well as for its involvement in propelling the country’s digital economy closer to reality. Noting with satisfaction that Google has helped Pakistani young land about a million jobs in 2023 alone, the Prime Minister emphasised that this is a testament to both Google’s dedication to upskilling and empowering Pakistan’s youth and Pakistan’s potential in the digital marketplace.
Informing the Prime Minister of its future involvement intentions, Mr. Scott stated that Google has made the decision to support the government’s youth skill-training initiatives and to expand its investment footprint in Pakistan. He went on to say that for a values-driven digital firm like Google, the growing economy and the sizeable youth population are crucial for optimising the economic benefits of technology. He restated that Pakistan’s IT industry will undergo a revolution when five lac Chromebooks are produced there by 2026.
Android users now have the ability to install or update many apps or games at once in the Play Store thanks to a feature introduced by tech giant Google.
Even if Android users downloaded or tried to update several apps or games at once, the prior capability would only process one app at a time.
In the Google Play Store, users can now download or manually update up to three apps or games at once, according to a GSMArena report.
with order to assist Android users with updating or installing multiple apps at once, Google is reportedly already starting to roll out the new feature in a few select locations, including India.
The feature will process three apps at once while sending the fourth to pending when customers install or manually update programs.
When configuring new phones or recovering from a backup, this feature is said to save a tonne of time.
It should be mentioned that Apple has long since permitted customers to download and install up to three iOS apps at once from the App Store.
According to GSMArena, the function is really available on a few cell phones in some regions, even though Google has not formally confirmed when it will appear or whether it will work with any particular handset.
Google started releasing a new AI-powered feature for Android phones a few weeks ago that locks users out of their data to prevent hackers from accessing it.
According to a Forbes story, cellphones running Android 10 or later will soon be able to use the function, which incorporates artificial intelligence.
The anti-theft feature known as “theft detection lock” is currently being rolled out to certain users, according to Mishaal Rahman, who frequently updates his followers on the most recent OS changes on X.
A restricted group of customers who registered for the beta program in Brazil are now receiving theft detection locks, according to Rahman’s post.
Rehman claims that Google Play Services will be used to provide the AI-powered feature to all Android 10 devices.