COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado—The U.S. intelligence community asked certain commercial satellite companies for help in the earliest days of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and their imagery remains vital to countering Russia’s false claims, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence said Tuesday.
But the partnership raises new questions about what protections those firms might be owed if their actions make them a target.
“Early on, we also asked a few commercial companies….and those of you who helped know who you are, helped us to rapidly make available imagery like the buildup that was happening around Ukraine’s borders to help shed a light on what Russia was doing,” Stacey Dixon, principal deputy director of national intelligence, said at the Space Symposium on Tuesday. “This allowed others to independently interpret the images, piecing them together with other information, and tell the world what was about to happen.”
Commercial imagery firms have documented the invasion of Ukraine like no previous war. HawkEye 360 has tracked Russian counter-space activities such as jamming. Maxar has documented Russia’s troop buildup and brutality on the Ukrainian people—on Monday, exposing mass graves in Bucha.
Commercial satellite firms “can tell that story,” said Gen. James Dickinson, head of U.S. Space Command, told reporters Tuesday. “They have the capability to show, illustrate what is actually happening. When that happens, that allows the department, particularly U.S....
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