| ID | Name | Description | D3FEND | |
| CM0008 | Security Testing Results | Penetration testing, vulnerability scanning, fuzzing, code analysis, adversarial testing, and other security assessment activities are essential for validating the security posture of space systems. However, the artifacts generated by these activities are themselves sensitive mission information requiring protection. Security testing artifacts may include final reports, raw scanner output, working notes, exploit code, proof-of-concept scripts, packet captures, RF recordings, screenshots, logs, memory or core dumps, test credentials, command sequences, telemetry mappings, architecture diagrams, test configurations, remediation records, and copies of software or data collected during testing. Security testing artifacts may reveal exploitable weaknesses, attack paths, security-control gaps, spacecraft and ground-system interfaces, command and telemetry behavior, link characteristics, safety interlocks, test accounts, and system-specific vulnerability conditions. Detailed evidence identifying an exploitable weakness, affected interface, and validated attack method may provide an adversary with much of the information needed to reproduce an attack. Security testing results shall be categorized, marked, handled, stored, transmitted, shared, retained, and disposed of according to their information classification, CUI category, proprietary restrictions, contractual requirements, and mission sensitivity. Protection shall address both unauthorized disclosure and unauthorized modification, because alteration or deletion of test results could conceal vulnerabilities, misrepresent remediation status, or undermine security decisions. Access shall be limited by role and need to know throughout the artifact lifecycle, beginning when the data is generated and continuing through authorized disposition. | D3-AI D3-AVE | |
| CM0020 | Threat modeling | Threat modeling is a structured analytical process that identifies, enumerates, and prioritizes potential threats to a system by systematically examining assets, trust boundaries, data flows, and adversary capabilities relative to the system's architecture. Applied in combination with attack surface analysis and vulnerability analysis, threat modeling produces an integrated picture of where the system is most exposed and what the consequences of successful exploitation would be. Analysis should draw on findings from similar systems, components, or services where applicable, leveraging documented threat experience from comparable missions or architectures to avoid re-learning known lessons. The outputs of threat modeling must directly inform design decisions throughout the development process, with attack surface reduction treated as a design objective rather than a post-development hardening activity: interfaces, services, protocols, and code paths that are not necessary to mission function should be eliminated or constrained before they become embedded in the architecture. Threat model artifacts should be treated as living documents, updated as the system design evolves and as new threat intelligence becomes available. | D3-AI D3-AVE D3-SWI D3-HCI D3-NM D3-LLM D3-ALLM D3-PLLM D3-PLM D3-APLM D3-PPLM D3-SYSM D3-DEM D3-SVCDM D3-SYSDM | |
| CM0022 | Criticality Analysis | Criticality analysis is a structured engineering process that identifies the mission functions, system components, and data flows whose compromise, degradation, or loss would most severely impact mission success, crew safety, or operational continuity. The outputs of this analysis directly drive security investment prioritization: components and functions assessed as most critical receive the most rigorous design-phase protections, supply chain scrutiny, and operational security controls, while lower-criticality elements are protected proportionately. Criticality analysis findings should inform the application of complementary security design principles, including network and functional segmentation and least-privilege access control, to isolate critical components from less-trusted system elements and reduce the consequence of compromise elsewhere in the system. Supply chain protection resources and oversight rigor should be explicitly allocated in proportion to component criticality, ensuring that the most mission-essential hardware and software receive the most intensive sourcing controls, provenance verification, and supplier oversight. Criticality analysis must be initiated early in the system design process and updated as the architecture evolves, threat intelligence changes, or operational experience reveals previously unrecognized dependencies. | D3-AVE D3-OSM D3-IDA D3-SJA D3-AI D3-DI D3-SWI D3-NNI D3-HCI D3-NM D3-PLM D3-AM D3-SYSM D3-SVCDM D3-SYSDM D3-SYSVA D3-OAM D3-ORA | |
| CM0041 | User Training | Human factors represent one of the most consistently exploited attack vectors against space mission systems; adversaries routinely use spear phishing, social engineering, and other user-interaction techniques to gain initial access to mission networks, development environments, and operational infrastructure. User training reduces this attack surface by building personnel awareness of adversary techniques and the behaviors required to recognize and resist them. Training must be role-differentiated: general security awareness training is required for all personnel with access to mission systems, while personnel with assigned security roles and responsibilities require additional role-based training commensurate with the specific duties and access rights they hold. Training must be completed before a user is granted access to mission systems or authorized to perform assigned security duties; updated when system changes introduce new threats, procedures, or access controls that alter the security context in which personnel operate; and refreshed at least annually, or more frequently if the mission's security policy specifies a shorter interval. Training program effectiveness should be measurable, with completion records maintained and knowledge validation incorporated to confirm that training objectives are being achieved rather than simply delivered. | D3-OAM D3-ORA | |
| CM0052 | Insider Threat Protection | Insider threats represent a distinct and particularly difficult risk category for space mission security, as individuals with authorized access to mission systems, facilities, and commanding infrastructure can cause significant damage without needing to overcome the external access controls that defend against outside adversaries. An insider threat program establishes the organizational, procedural, and technical controls necessary to deter, detect, and respond to malicious or negligent actions by personnel with legitimate access, including attempts by insiders to masquerade as other authorized individuals to access commanding functions or sensitive mission infrastructure under a false identity. The program must address both the technical controls that limit what any individual can do with their authorized access and the procedural and behavioral controls that create accountability, reduce opportunity, and enable early detection of concerning patterns. Effective insider threat protection requires integration across personnel security, access management, monitoring, and incident response functions, treating the insider threat as an ongoing operational risk to be managed continuously rather than a problem solved by initial personnel vetting alone. | D3-OAM D3-AM D3-OM D3-CH D3-SPP D3-MFA D3-UAP D3-UBA | |
| CM0054 | Two-Person Rule | The two-person rule (TPR) requires that all access to and actions within systems possessing command-level authority over the spacecraft be conducted in the continuous presence of two separately authorized individuals, neither of whom alone can complete the access or action. This control reduces the opportunity for unauthorized, coerced, erroneous, or malicious commanding by requiring two independently authorized individuals to participate in the protected access or action. Its effectiveness depends on individual attribution, independent review, resistance to credential sharing or account misuse, and protection against collusion or bypass of the enforcement mechanism. The TPR requires two distinct, appropriately authorized individuals to participate in the same protected access or action. Participation may be physically co-located, remotely performed through authenticated technical controls, or implemented through a combination of physical and logical mechanisms, as defined by mission policy. The second individual must independently review and approve the specific access or action before it is completed. Under CM0054, the two-person rule applies to access and actions involving systems with command-level access to the spacecraft to include reprograming the flight computer/flight software. If the mission tailors the rule to selected commanding functions, the retained scope, excluded access and actions, compensating controls, and associated risk acceptance must be explicitly documented and approved. | D3-OAM D3-AM D3-ODM D3-OM D3-MFA | |
| CM0074 | Distributed Constellations | A distributed constellation architecture deploys mission capability across multiple spacecraft nodes operating collectively, such that the end user is not dependent on any single satellite to derive the intended capability. This architectural approach directly complicates adversary counterspace planning by multiplying the number of assets that must be successfully degraded or destroyed to achieve mission denial effects equivalent to those achievable against a concentrated, single-node architecture. The resilience benefit depends on how much mission capability remains available following the loss or degradation of specified nodes. A constellation that can satisfy defined minimum mission requirements through multiple combinations of surviving nodes generally requires an adversary to affect more assets or shared dependencies to achieve mission denial. GPS exemplifies this principle: a receiver generally uses signals from at least four healthy satellites with suitable geometry to determine three-dimensional position and time. Loss of one satellite does not ordinarily eliminate the service where sufficient healthy satellites remain visible; resilience to ground-system failures depends separately on the redundancy and distribution of the control segment. Distribution is a mission architecture decision that must be made early in the program lifecycle, as it fundamentally shapes spacecraft design, ground system architecture, launch strategy, and operational concepts. | D3-AI D3-NNI D3-SYSM D3-DEM D3-SVCDM D3-SYSVA | |
| CM0075 | Proliferated Constellations | Proliferated satellite constellations increase mission resilience by deploying a larger number of functionally equivalent satellites in similar orbits, expanding overall constellation capacity and raising the number of assets an adversary must successfully attack to achieve meaningful mission degradation. Unlike distribution, in which multiple satellites or payloads work together to provide a complete capability, proliferation increases the number of systems performing the same or substantially equivalent mission. Its resilience benefit is primarily derived from additional capacity and reduced dependence on any individual satellite rather than from architectural diversity. Proliferation also supports resilience through on-orbit spare maintenance, in which additional satellites are held in reserve or parked in accessible orbits to replace operational assets without requiring new launches. The cost implications of proliferation are significant and architecture-dependent. Designs optimized for repeatable production may achieve lower unit costs through learning and economies of scale, but those savings depend on design stability, production quantity, supplier capacity, and the amount of non-recurring change between production lots. The choice to proliferate must be made as a mission architecture decision early in the program, as it determines the spacecraft design philosophy, production strategy, launch architecture, and ground system scalability requirements. | D3-AI D3-NNI D3-SYSM D3-DEM D3-SVCDM D3-SYSVA | |
| CM0076 | Diversified Architectures | A diversified mission architecture provides a capability through multiple systems, platforms, payloads, orbital regimes, or domains to reduce the mission impact of losing any individual element and increase the range of adversary capabilities required to achieve mission denial. Diversification differs from proliferation in that it employs heterogeneous systems, potentially across different orbits, domains, operators, and technologies, rather than deploying more units of the same design. This heterogeneity imposes asymmetric costs on adversaries: attacking systems across different orbital regimes requires different physical and electronic capabilities for each regime, and kinetic attacks on space assets in diverse orbits carry differentiated collateral debris consequences that increase the political and economic cost of a broad attack campaign. Domain diversification, extending mission capability delivery across space, airborne, and terrestrial layers, further reduces adversary incentive by ensuring that defeating the space layer alone does not deny the end user the underlying capability. Diversification can preserve minimum mission capability following the loss of individual elements when the remaining systems provide sufficient coverage, capacity, interoperability, and operational availability to compensate for the loss. | D3-AI D3-NNI D3-SYSM D3-DEM D3-SVCDM D3-SYSVA | |
| CM0077 | Space Domain Awareness | Space domain awareness (SDA) enables mission owners to detect and characterize objects, behaviors, environmental conditions, and anomalous events that may affect their space systems. When correlated with other intelligence and mission data, SDA can also support assessment of possible threats and attribution. SDA encompasses the tracking and cataloging of space objects, prediction of future object positions, monitoring of the space environment and space weather, and characterization of the capabilities and behaviors of on-orbit objects. SDA data must provide the accuracy, timeliness, coverage, and characterization needed for the mission’s defined decisions. Publicly available data may support general awareness but may be insufficient for time-sensitive conjunction, proximity, or threat assessment; appropriate government, commercial, partner, or owner-operator data should be obtained where required. SDA is generated by a diverse sensor architecture spanning terrestrial optical, infrared, and radar systems and space-based sensors including inspector satellites capable of close-approach observation. The SDA landscape is increasingly populated by national space agencies, military programs, allied partners, commercial providers, and amateur tracking communities, making the space environment progressively more transparent and creating opportunities for mission owners to leverage diverse data sources to build a more complete operational picture. | D3-APLM D3-PM D3-HCI D3-SYSM | |
| CM0079 | Maneuverability | Spacecraft maneuverability provides an active physical defense capability against kinetic and certain directed energy threats by enabling the satellite to relocate from a predicted intercept trajectory when a threat is detected with sufficient warning time. Against unguided projectiles, maneuvering out of the predicted impact trajectory can be effective, requiring only sufficient delta-v and warning time to execute a displacement maneuver before impact. Against guided threats, including direct-ascent anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons and co-orbital ASAT platforms equipped with onboard sensors, maneuverability is significantly more constrained in its effectiveness; evasion requires displacing the satellite beyond the seeker or sensor acquisition range of the guided warhead, which demands larger delta-v margins and more precise threat characterization than unguided intercept scenarios. The effectiveness of maneuverability as a countermeasure is therefore strongly dependent on the warning time provided by space domain awareness (SDA) capabilities, the propulsion capacity of the spacecraft, the fidelity of threat trajectory characterization, and whether the threat employs passive or active terminal guidance. Maneuverability also provides operational flexibility for avoiding predictable orbital slots that adversaries may have targeted in advance, complicating targeting planning even in the absence of an active threat event. | ||
| CM0080 | Stealth Technology | Spacecraft stealth encompasses design and operational techniques that reduce a satellite's detectability and trackability by adversary space surveillance systems, increasing the cost and difficulty of adversary targeting, tracking, and characterization efforts. Design-based approaches include reducing physical size to decrease radar cross-section (RCS), applying radar-absorbing coatings, using radar-deflecting geometric shapes, and controlling the emission or reflection of radar, optical, and infrared (IR) energy to minimize the observable signatures that surveillance sensors rely upon. Operational stealth techniques include optimizing maneuver profiles to avoid detection by known ground-based or space-based tracking sensors, executing maneuvers at unexpected times or with trajectories that complicate orbit determination, and employing active measures such as radar jamming or spoofing to degrade tracking accuracy. These approaches collectively raise the adversary's intelligence collection burden, degrade the accuracy of targeting solutions, and reduce the predictability of the spacecraft's future position, complicating the planning and execution of both kinetic and directed energy counterspace attacks. Stealth is a design philosophy and operational discipline that must be balanced against mission functional requirements, as size reductions and coating applications that reduce observability may affect payload capacity, thermal management, and power generation. | D3-PH | |
| CM0081 | Defensive Jamming and Spoofing | Defensive jamming and spoofing are active electronic countermeasures that may disrupt or deceive the terminal guidance sensors of an incoming kinetic anti-satellite weapon. When combined with evasive maneuvering, these measures may reduce the accuracy of the threat’s targeting solution and lower the probability of a successful intercept. Effectiveness depends on timely threat detection, knowledge of the relevant sensor characteristics, available transmit power and geometry, and the threat’s ability to recognize or overcome the countermeasure. Development, testing, and employment of these capabilities must occur only under applicable governmental authorization, spectrum authority, rules of engagement, and information-protection requirements. The design must limit unintended interference and account for effects on friendly, civil, and safety-related radio services. | D3-DO | |
| CM0084 | Physical Seizure | Physical seizure capability employs spacecraft equipped with docking, manipulation, or proximity maneuvering systems to counter space-based threats and mitigate post-attack effects through direct physical interaction with other on-orbit objects. Primary applications include seizing or neutralizing a threatening satellite actively attacking or endangering other spacecraft, capturing a satellite that has been disabled or hijacked and is being operated for hostile purposes, and collecting and disposing of harmful orbital debris resulting from a kinetic attack. The effectiveness of a physical seizure system is fundamentally constrained by propellant and time: a seizure asset stored in a particular orbital regime cannot efficiently reach objects in significantly different orbits due to the delta-v required for large orbital plane changes or altitude transfers, making geostationary Earth orbit (GEO) assets poorly positioned to respond to threats in low Earth orbit (LEO) and vice versa. This constraint drives a basing trade between pre-positioned on-orbit assets and ground-based responsive-launch assets. On-orbit assets may provide shorter response times but remain limited by their current orbit, propellant reserves, and readiness state. Ground-based assets may be launched closer to the required orbital plane and altitude but remain constrained by launch readiness, vehicle performance, launch-site geometry, and the time required to reach and rendezvous with the target. | D3-AM | |
| CM0085 | Electromagnetic Shielding | Spacecraft electronics are vulnerable to natural ionizing particle radiation and intentional electromagnetic threats such as high-power microwave and electromagnetic pulse effects. Both may cause transient upset or permanent damage, but they act through different physical mechanisms and require distinct protections. Conductive enclosures and associated electromagnetic protection reduce fields and induced transients from HPM or EMP, while particle-radiation shielding reduces the dose or particle environment reaching susceptible components. The spacecraft design must address particle-radiation protection and HPM or EMP protection as coordinated but separately verified requirements. Enclosure materials, geometry, penetrations, bonding, and component placement should be evaluated together so that protection against one environment does not create unacceptable mass, thermal, electrical, or secondary-radiation effects in another. Shielding is primarily a design- and integration-phase hardware control and generally cannot be increased after launch. It must be combined with component hardness assurance and electrical protection measures sufficient to meet the mission’s residual susceptibility requirements. | D3-PH D3-RFS | |
| CM0086 | Filtering and Shuttering | Optical filters and shutters are passive and active protective mechanisms for remote sensing spacecraft sensors against laser dazzling and blinding attacks that exploit the same optical pathways used for legitimate mission collection. Optical filters selectively attenuate light outside the sensor's design wavelength bands, blocking laser energy at wavelengths that fall outside the mission's collection bands while preserving sensitivity to legitimate return signals; however, filters provide no protection against lasers operating at the same wavelengths the sensor is designed to detect, as filtering those wavelengths would simultaneously block the sensor from its intended mission function. Shutters provide complementary broadband protection by blocking or diverting light from the protected detector path when an exposure threshold or other anomaly criterion is met. Protection depends on the threat-detection latency, decision time, shutter actuation time, optical leakage, and duration of the incident illumination. A shutter may limit exposure from sustained or repeated illumination, but it must not be assumed to prevent damage from a short pulse that deposits damaging energy before closure. Together, filters and shutters provide layered protection: filters continuously attenuate selected wavelengths, while shutters can limit additional exposure from threats that cannot be sufficiently rejected by filtering. The fundamental tradeoff of shuttering is that it trades temporary collection interruption for sensor preservation, making the shutter activation threshold a critical design parameter that must balance sensor protection against mission data continuity requirements. Sustainment activities are limited because the filter and shutter hardware is generally fixed after launch, but operational monitoring, calibration assessment, mechanism exercising, threshold configuration control, and post-event analysis remain applicable. | D3-PH | |
| CM0087 | Defensive Dazzling/Blinding | Defensive dazzling and blinding employs directed laser energy to degrade or defeat the optical or infrared (IR) sensors of adversary systems, providing an active countermeasure against kinetic anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons and adversary reconnaissance platforms in the space domain. Against kinetic ASAT threats, laser energy directed toward the terminal guidance sensor of an incoming weapon may temporarily saturate, disrupt, or damage the sensor and reduce the accuracy of terminal guidance. When coordinated with evasive maneuvering, this capability may reduce the probability of a successful intercept. Effectiveness depends on timely threat detection, target-sensor characteristics, engagement geometry, laser performance, pointing accuracy, dwell time, and the threat’s ability to maintain or recover guidance. Against adversary inspector satellites or SDA collection platforms, defensive dazzling may temporarily degrade or deny optical or infrared collection of the protected spacecraft. Permanent sensor damage is a materially different effect that requires separate authorization, targeting criteria, and escalation analysis. Dazzling generally produces temporary sensor degradation, while blinding produces permanent sensor damage. Both effects carry legal, policy, safety, and escalation implications, but their legal characterization depends on the target, circumstances, intended effect, actual consequences, and applicable national and international authorities. Employment authorities and prohibited target or effect categories must be established before the capability is operationally relied upon. | ||
| CM0056 | Data Backup | A mission's ability to recover from a cyber incident, hardware failure, or adversary action depends directly on the availability of verified, uncorrupted backups of critical data that are stored independently from the primary systems those backups are intended to restore. Data backup procedures must be defined within a broader disaster recovery plan that specifies what data is backed up, at what frequency, through what process, and under what conditions restoration will be initiated. At least one recoverable backup copy must be stored outside the primary system’s administrative and failure domains and protected so that compromise of ordinary production systems, credentials, or management services does not provide the ability to modify or destroy that copy. Separation may use offline media, physically separate infrastructure, isolated storage systems, separate cloud accounts or security domains, immutable retention controls, or an approved combination of these mechanisms. Backup storage must be protected against the methods adversaries commonly use to target recovery capability, including ransomware that encrypts or deletes backup repositories, credential attacks against backup management systems, and physical access to backup media. Backup integrity must be verifiable, as a backup that has been silently corrupted or tampered with provides no recovery capability when needed. | D3-AI D3-DI D3-SYSM D3-DEM | |
| CM0070 | Alternate Communications Paths | Establishing alternate communications paths for spacecraft and ground system operations reduces the likelihood that a single adversarial event, physical disruption, or technical failure will deny all mission communications. Reliance on a single communications pathway creates a single point of failure that adversaries can exploit through jamming, denial of service against ground infrastructure, physical disruption of a ground station, or compromise of network connectivity, any of which could result in complete loss of commanding and telemetry capability. Alternate paths must be assessed end to end for shared failure modes and operational dependencies. Differences in frequency, ground station, relay service, or network provider provide meaningful resilience only when the paths do not remain dependent on the same critical spacecraft, ground, management, or service infrastructure. The selection and configuration of alternate paths must be governed by the mission's concept of operations (CONOPS), which defines the conditions under which each path is used, the priority and switchover procedures between paths, and the minimum communications capability that must be maintained to satisfy mission safety and operational continuity requirements. | D3-NM D3-NTPM | |
| CM0006 | Cloaking Safe-mode | Safe-mode entry represents a high-risk transition point at which a spacecraft enters a reduced-capability state to preserve vehicle safety and support anomaly recovery. This transition must not create a less secure command, telemetry, or onboard processing environment. To the extent permitted by mission safety and recovery requirements, the spacecraft should avoid unnecessary or uniquely identifying changes in transmission characteristics, beacon content, communication cadence, and externally observable behavior that would allow an adversary to reliably identify and exploit the safe-mode state. Safe-mode shall preserve the mission-defined minimum security posture for every communication path and command mechanism that remains active. This posture should include authentication, data integrity, anti-replay protection, command authorization, command validation, cryptographic key protection, security-relevant logging, and encryption where confidentiality is required. The spacecraft shall not enter a crypto-bypass or unauthenticated command state solely because safe-mode has been activated. The safe-mode software and configuration baseline shall explicitly define the security controls, command dictionaries, alternate receivers, contingency communication paths, rate and size limits, command counters, time tag requirements, interlocks, logging functions, and monitoring capabilities that remain active during safe-mode. These protections shall be designed and verified as part of the safe-mode baseline rather than treated as discretionary functions that may be removed without security impact analysis. | D3-PH | |
| CM0032 | On-board Intrusion Detection & Prevention | An on-board intrusion detection and prevention system (IDS/IPS) monitors mission-critical spacecraft components and systems, generates and stores audit records, and supports mission-approved responses to detected threats. Depending on the mission architecture, threat, and availability of ground support, responses may be autonomous, ground-directed, or a combination of both. The system should address both known attack patterns and previously unseen anomalous behavior through complementary signature-based and behavior- or anomaly-based detection methods. Machine learning or adaptive technologies may be used when their performance, resource consumption, and failure behavior have been validated for the mission environment. Detection and response coverage should address applicable adversary activities across the attack lifecycle, including initial access, execution, persistence, defense evasion, and exfiltration. The on-board IDS/IPS must be integrated with the spacecraft's traditional fault management system to provide a unified approach to anomaly response, ensuring that cyber-triggered responses are compatible with fault management logic and do not produce unintended effects or fratricide against the spacecraft's own systems; countermeasures that are incompatible with fault management are considered unsafe and must not be executed autonomously. The response hierarchy must prioritize vehicle safety and continued mission operations. Advanced containment or deception responses may be considered when they can be executed without unacceptable mission risk. The system should preserve evidence that supports post-event analysis, threat characterization, and potential attribution by authorized ground support. | D3-FA D3-DA D3-FCR D3-FH D3-ID D3-IRA D3-HD D3-IAA D3-FHRA D3-NTA D3-PMAD D3-RTSD D3-ANAA D3-CA D3-CSPP D3-ISVA D3-PM D3-SDM D3-SFA D3-SFV D3-SICA D3-USICA D3-FBA D3-FEMC D3-FV D3-OSM D3-PFV D3-EHB D3-IDA D3-MBT D3-SBV D3-PA D3-PSMD D3-PSA D3-SEA D3-SSC D3-SCA D3-FAPA D3-IBCA D3-PCSV D3-FCA D3-PLA D3-UBA D3-RAPA D3-SDA D3-UDTA D3-UGLPA D3-ANET D3-AZET D3-JFAPA D3-LAM D3-NI D3-RRID D3-NTF D3-ITF D3-OTF D3-EI D3-EAL D3-EDL D3-HBPI D3-IOPR D3-KBPI D3-MAC D3-SCF | |
| CM0042 | Robust Fault Management | The fault management system is a high-privilege, autonomous spacecraft function that adversaries may attempt to exploit as an attack vector, triggering protective responses that place the spacecraft in a degraded or more vulnerable operational state. Attack scenarios include manipulating sensor, state, or telemetry information to induce onboard or ground-directed safing actions; creating false fault conditions through sensor spoofing or proximity operations; exploiting safe-mode configurations that reduce security protections; and inducing autonomous maneuver responses through crafted fault indications. Robust fault management requires that safing procedures and autonomous responses be designed with explicit security analysis confirming that each protective action does not introduce a more exploitable system state than the fault condition it responds to. The integrity and authenticity of sensor data, state information, commands, and telemetry used by onboard or ground-based fault management functions must be protected to prevent falsified inputs from triggering unintended responses. Every fault response, including mode transitions, actuator commands, and communication reconfigurations, must be evaluated against the question of whether an adversary could deliberately induce that response and whether the resulting system state provides the adversary with meaningful advantage. | D3-AH D3-EHPV D3-PSEP D3-PH D3-SCP | |
| CM0044 | Cyber-safe Mode | Cyber-safe mode is a dedicated, configuration-controlled spacecraft operating state entered autonomously or by authorized ground command when mission-defined conditions indicate a credible threat to platform integrity. In this state, nonessential functions are shut down or isolated and the spacecraft operates from an integrity-protected, validated software and configuration baseline. Unlike traditional safe mode, which addresses hardware faults and operational anomalies, cyber-safe mode is specifically designed to respond to cyber threats, providing a secure recovery baseline from which the spacecraft can reconstitute compromised functions. Authentication and encryption must remain enabled within cyber-safe mode, ensuring that the reduced operational state does not degrade the security posture of the vehicle. The cyber-safe mode software and configuration must be stored onboard using hardware-based protections that prevent modification by nominal flight software, ordinary commands, and other untrusted execution paths. Where baseline updates are permitted, they must use a separately authorized and integrity-verified maintenance process that preserves a recoverable trusted version. Following entry into cyber-safe mode, the spacecraft must be capable of reconstituting firmware and software functions to pre-attack capability levels, either autonomously through self-healing mechanisms or with ground assistance, and must be capable of replanning operations based on whatever equipment remains available after the cyber event. The primary recovery objective is restoration of full mission capability; where that is not achievable, the spacecraft should attain the maximum reduced mission capability available given the post-attack system state. | D3-PH D3-EI D3-NI D3-BA | |
| CM0043 | Backdoor Commands | All commands capable of being executed on the spacecraft must be known, documented, and accounted for by the mission and spacecraft owner; the existence of undisclosed or undocumented commands, whether introduced by developers, component suppliers, or subsystem vendors, represents an unacceptable and unmanageable risk to mission integrity. Commands capable of adversely affecting mission success if misused must be identified through deliberate analysis and protected by mission-defined authorization and execution controls commensurate with their consequences. Commands that bypass normal operational safeguards require additional justification and restrictions appropriate to their emergency or contingency purpose. Backdoor, residual, hardware-level, test, diagnostic, or override commands that bypass normal operational pathways or safeguards should be retained only where mission-approved emergency or contingency access requires them. Their inclusion must be explicitly justified, and their commanding authority must be appropriately restricted. Hazardous commands required for normal mission operations are not prohibited by this countermeasure but must be governed by approved authorization, prerequisite, sequencing, and safety controls. Any command capability introduced by a subsystem supplier or component vendor that was not explicitly requested or authorized by the mission owner must be identified, evaluated, and either removed or brought under formal mission command governance before launch. | D3-OAM D3-AM D3-PH D3-CCSA D3-LAM D3-CE | |
| CM0045 | Error Detection and Correcting Memory | Error detection and correcting (EDAC) memory provides a foundational defense against radiation-induced corruption in spacecraft onboard memory. The selected EDAC scheme must detect and correct error patterns within its designed capability and identify errors that exceed that capability. Common single-error-correction, double-error-detection schemes correct single-bit errors and detect double-bit errors, but other schemes may provide different correction and detection capabilities. The EDAC scheme must be integrated with both the fault management system and the spacecraft's cyber-protection mechanisms, enabling coordinated responses to uncorrectable multi-bit errors that go beyond time-delayed ground monitoring of EDAC telemetry. This integration is security-relevant because multi-bit memory errors, whether radiation-induced or adversarially induced through deliberate fault injection, can corrupt flight software, configuration data, or security-critical parameters in ways that create exploitable system states if not detected and responded to promptly and autonomously. The spacecraft must use the selected EDAC architecture to detect and correct errors during memory access and, where applicable, perform periodic memory scrubbing to detect and remove latent correctable errors. The implementation must identify the affected memory address or region for detected uncorrectable errors involving two or more bits, to the extent supported by the memory architecture, with higher-order detection or correction provided where required by mission risk. Detection of an uncorrectable error must trigger a timely onboard fault-management or cyber-protection response that prevents continued use or propagation of suspect data and autonomously minimizes adverse effects without waiting for ground detection. Subsequent diagnosis and recovery may be autonomous, ground-directed, or combined according to mission requirements. | D3-HCI D3-MBT | |
| CM0048 | Resilient Position, Navigation, and Timing | Where compatible authentication services are available, GNSS receivers used for spacecraft position, navigation, and timing (PNT) must authenticate the navigation information and its asserted GNSS system source before treating that information as trusted. Navigation-message authentication must not be treated as complete protection against spoofing because it may not authenticate the ranging signal or prevent all replay, meaconing, or signal-manipulation scenarios. Authenticated GNSS information should therefore be combined with PNT integrity monitoring and alternate navigation or timing sources appropriate to mission risk. The spacecraft must maintain a fault-tolerant authoritative time architecture capable of maintaining time within mission-defined accuracy and uncertainty limits when the primary source is degraded, rejected, or unavailable. The architecture should support the time-dependent cryptographic controls, command sequencing, telemetry correlation, fault-management logic, and other functions that rely on synchronized time. Each onboard processor must synchronize its internal clock to the authoritative time source whenever the measured time difference exceeds a threshold defined in the flight software (FSW), preventing clock drift from accumulating to levels that corrupt time-dependent functions. Where SpaceWire is used to distribute time, the spacecraft must implement the mission-defined synchronization protocol and achieve the accuracy required by the functions that consume that time. An accuracy of approximately one microsecond should be applied where required by the mission architecture and verified for the applicable SpaceWire nodes and operational configurations. | D3-MH D3-MAN | |
| CM0072 | Protocol Update / Refactoring | Communication and data exchange protocols governing spacecraft, ground system, and inter-system interfaces may contain specification-level vulnerabilities that cannot be resolved through implementation hardening alone, requiring updates to or refactoring of the protocol itself to eliminate the underlying weakness. Protocol vulnerabilities may arise from design flaws in the original specification, from advances in adversarial capability that render previously adequate security assumptions insufficient, or from emerging threats such as quantum computing that threaten the cryptographic primitives upon which protocol security depends. Protocol update or refactoring encompasses the deliberate modification of the rules, formats, and procedures governing system communications to address known vulnerabilities, improve security properties, or maintain adequate protection against the evolving threat environment over the mission's operational lifetime. Because space system protocols are often tightly coupled to hardware interfaces, flight software implementations, and ground system processing pipelines, protocol changes carry significant integration risk and must be managed through rigorous engineering change processes; this complexity makes proactive protocol security assessment and planned update capability more cost-effective than reactive refactoring under operational urgency. | D3-NM D3-NVA D3-AI D3-AVE D3-SYSM D3-SYSVA D3-OAM D3-ORA D3-PMAD | |
| CM0029 | TRANSEC | Transmission security (TRANSEC) is the component of communications security (COMSEC) concerned with protecting the characteristics of the transmission itself, as distinct from protecting the content of the information being communicated. TRANSEC controls reduce the likelihood, effectiveness, or operational impact of transmission interception, signal disruption, communications deception, and exploitation of transmission characteristics within the defined threat model. Applicable TRANSEC techniques include jam-resistant waveforms that increase resistance to jamming and communications deception, spread spectrum and frequency hopping techniques that reduce signal predictability and improve resistance to interception and disruption, low probability of intercept and low probability of detection (LPI/LPD) signal designs that reduce transmission observability, and transmission scheduling or pattern discipline that limits the intelligence value of traffic analysis. TRANSEC requirements should be applied to mission communication links according to link criticality (e.g., TT&C, crosslinks), threat exposure, and operational consequence. TRANSEC must be treated as a distinct layer of protection complementary to, but not a substitute for, cryptographic protection of information content. | D3-MH D3-MAN D3-MENCR D3-NTA D3-DNSTA D3-ISVA D3-NTCD D3-RTA D3-PMAD D3-FC D3-CSPP D3-ANAA D3-RPA D3-IPCTA D3-NTCD D3-NTPM D3-TAAN | |
| ID | Name | Description | |
|---|---|---|---|
| REC-0003 | Gather Spacecraft Communications Information | Threat actors assemble a detailed picture of the mission’s RF and networking posture across TT&C and payload links. Useful elements include frequency bands and allocations, emission designators, modulation/coding, data rates, polarization sense, Doppler profiles, timing and ranging schemes, link budgets, and expected Eb/N0 margins. They also seek antenna characteristics, beacon structures, and whether transponders are bent-pipe or regenerative. On the ground, they track station locations, apertures, auto-track behavior, front-end filters/LNAs, and handover rules, plus whether services traverse SLE, SDN, or commercial cloud backbones. Even small details, polarization sense, roll-off factors, or beacon cadence, shrink the search space for interception, spoofing, or denial. The outcome is a lab-replicable demod/decode chain and a calendar of advantageous windows. | |
| REC-0003.01 | Communications Equipment | Adversaries inventory space and ground RF equipment to infer capabilities, limits, and attack surfaces. On the spacecraft, they seek antenna type and geometry, placement and boresight constraints, polarization, RF front-end chains, transponder type, translation factors, gain control, saturation points, and protective features. On the ground, they collect dish size/aperture efficiency, feed/polarizer configuration, tracking modes, diversity sites, and backend modem settings. Beacon frequency/structure, telemetry signal type, symbol rates, and framing reveal demodulator parameters and help an actor build compatible SDR pipelines. Knowledge of power budgets and AGC behavior enables strategies to push hardware into non-linear regimes, causing self-inflicted denial or intermodulation. Equipment location and mounting inform visibility and interference opportunities. | |
| REC-0003.02 | Commanding Details | Threat actors study how commands are formed, authorized, scheduled, and delivered. High-value details include the telecommand protocol (e.g., CCSDS TC), framing and CRC/MAC fields, authentication scheme (keys, counters, anti-replay windows), command dictionary/database formats, critical-command interlocks and enable codes, rate and size limits, timetag handling, command queue semantics, and the roles of scripts or procedures that batch actions. They also collect rules governing “valid commanding periods”: line-of-sight windows, station handovers, maintenance modes, safing states, timeouts, and when rapid-response commanding is permitted. With this, an adversary can craft syntactically valid traffic, time injections to coincide with reduced monitoring, or induce desynchronization (e.g., counter resets, stale timetags). | |
| REC-0003.03 | Mission-Specific Channel Scanning | Beyond TT&C, many missions expose additional RF or network surfaces: high-rate payload downlinks (e.g., X/Ka-band), user terminals, inter-satellite crosslinks, and hosted-payload channels that may be operated by different organizations. Adversaries scan spectrum and public telemetry repositories for these mission-specific channels, characterizing carrier plans, burst structures, access schemes (TDMA/FDMA/CDMA), addressing, and gateway locations. For commercial services, they enumerate forward/return links, user terminal waveforms, and provisioning backends that could be impersonated or jammed selectively. In hosted-payload or rideshare contexts, differences in configuration control and key management present opportunities for pivoting between enclaves. | |
| REC-0003.04 | Valid Credentials | Adversaries seek any credential that would let them authenticate as a legitimate actor in space, ground, or supporting cloud networks. Targets include TT&C authentication keys and counters, link-encryption keys, PN codes or spreading sequences, modem and gateway accounts, mission control mission control user and service accounts, station control credentials, VPN and identity-provider tokens, SLE/CSP service credentials, maintenance backdoor accounts, and automation secrets embedded in scripts or CI/CD pipelines. Acquisition paths include spear-phishing, supply-chain compromise, credential reuse across dev/test/ops, logs and core dumps, misconfigured repositories, contractor laptops, and improperly sanitized training data. Because some missions authenticate uplink without encrypting it, possession of valid keys or counters may be sufficient to issue accepted commands from outside official channels. | |
| REC-0005 | Eavesdropping | Adversaries seek to capture mission communications across terrestrial networks and RF/optical links to reconstruct protocols, extract telemetry, and derive operational rhythms. Collection is most often passive, but may be semi-passive or actively elicited, where the adversary transmits probes or crafted exchanges to provoke identifiable responses from the target rather than waiting to observe them. On networks, packet captures, logs, and flow data from ground stations, mission control, and cloud backends can expose service boundaries, authentication patterns, and automation. In the RF domain, wideband recordings, spectrograms, and demodulation of TT&C and payload links, spanning VHF/UHF through S/L/X/Ka and, increasingly, optical, enable identification of modulation/coding, framing, and beacon structures. Even when links are encrypted, metadata such as carrier plans, symbol rates, polarization, and cadence can support traffic analysis, timing attacks, or selective interference. Community capture networks and open repositories amplify the reach of a modest adversary. | |
| REC-0005.01 | Uplink Intercept Eavesdropping | Uplink reconnaissance focuses on capturing the command path from ground to spacecraft to learn telecommand framing, authentication fields, timing, and anti-replay behavior. Valuable artifacts include emission designators, symbol rates, polarization sense, Doppler profiles, and any preambles or ranging tones that gate command acceptance. Even if payload and TT&C share spectrum, their authentication postures often differ, knowledge an adversary can exploit. Partial captures, console screenshots, or training recordings reduce the effort needed to build an SDR pipeline that “looks right” on the air. Where missions authenticate without encrypting the uplink, traffic analysis can reveal command cadence and maintenance windows. | |
| REC-0005.02 | Downlink Intercept | Downlink collection aims to harvest housekeeping telemetry, event logs, ephemerides, payload data, and operator annotations that reveal system state and procedures. Even when payload content is encrypted, ancillary channels (beacons, health/status, low-rate engineering downlink) can disclose mode transitions, battery and thermal margins, safing events, and next-pass predictions. Community ground networks and public dashboards may inadvertently provide stitched datasets that make trend analysis trivial. Captured framing and coding parameters also help an adversary build testbeds and refine timing for later actions. | |
| REC-0005.03 | Proximity Operations | In proximity scenarios, an adversary platform (or co-located payload) attempts to observe emissions and intra-vehicle traffic at close range, RF side-channels, optical/lasercom leakage, and, in extreme cases, electromagnetic emanations consistent with TEMPEST/EMSEC concerns. Physical proximity can expose harmonics, intermodulation products, local oscillators, and bus activity that are undetectable from the ground, enabling reconstruction of timing, command acceptance windows, or even limited protocol content. In hosted-payload or rideshare contexts, a poorly segregated data path may permit passive observation of TT&C gateways, crosslinks, or payload buses. | |
| REC-0005.04 | Active Scanning (RF/Optical) | Active scanning moves beyond passive collection: an adversary transmits or injects probes intended to elicit identifiable responses that reveal frequencies, protocols, or device behavior. Examples include stimulating auto-track or auto-reply beacons, provoking ranging responses, tickling access schemes (TDMA/FDMA bursts), or sending benign-looking frames to observe AGC, saturation, or error counters. Optical/lasercom analogs include alignment pings or modulation patterns that solicit acquisition messages. The objective is RF “banner grabbing”, learning enough to build compatible demod/decoder chains or to map control surfaces, without necessarily breaching authentication. Because scans can resemble normal acquisition attempts, they may blend into the noise floor of operations. | |
| REC-0007 | Monitor for Safe-Mode Indicators | Adversaries watch for telltale signs that the spacecraft has entered a safed or survival configuration, typically sun-pointing or torque-limited attitude, reduced payload activity, conservative power/thermal setpoints, and low-rate engineering downlink. Indicators include specific mode bits or beacon fields, changes in modulation/coding and cadence, distinctive event packets (e.g., wheel unload aborts, brownout recovery), elevated heater duty, altered load-shed states, and operator behaviors such as emergency DSN requests, longer ground passes, or public anomaly notices. This reconnaissance helps time later actions to coincide with periods of reduced bandwidth, altered monitoring, or maintenance command availability. It may also reveal how safing affects authentication (e.g., whether rapid-response paths or recovery consoles differ from nominal). | |
| REC-0008 | Gather Supply Chain Information | Threat actors map the end-to-end pathway by which hardware, software, data, and people move from design through AIT, launch, and on-orbit sustainment. They catalog manufacturers and lots, test and calibration houses, logistics routes and waypoints, integrator touchpoints, key certificates and tooling, update and key-loading procedures, and who holds custody at each handoff. They correlate this with procurement artifacts, SBOMs, BOMs, and service contracts to locate where trust is assumed rather than verified. Particular attention falls on exceptions, engineering builds, rework tickets, advance replacements, depot repairs, and urgent field updates, because controls are frequently relaxed there. The result is a prioritized list of choke points (board fabrication, FPGA bitstream signing, image repositories, CI/CD runners, cloud artifact stores, freight forwarders) where compromise yields outsized effect. | |
| REC-0008.03 | Known Vulnerabilities | Adversaries correlate discovered component and software versions with public and private vulnerability sources to assemble a ready exploit catalog. Inputs include CPE/CVE mappings, vendor advisories, CWE-class weaknesses common to selected RTOS/middleware, FPGA IP core errata, cryptographic library issues, and hardware stepping errata that interact with thermal/power regimes. They mine leaked documents, demo code, bug trackers, and community forums; pivot from ground assets to flight by following shared libraries and tooling; and watch for lag between disclosure and patch deployment. Even when a vulnerability seems “ground-only,” it may expose build systems or update paths that ultimately control flight artifacts. | |
| RD-0001 | Acquire Infrastructure | Adversaries assemble the people, platforms, and plumbing they will later use to observe, reach, or impersonate mission components. Infrastructure spans RF and optical ground assets (antennas, modems, timing sources, front-ends), compute and storage (on-prem and cloud), network presence (leased ASNs/IP space, VPS fleets, CDN relays), identity fabric (burner accounts, domains, certificates), and fabrication/test environments for hardware and software. They favor assets that are inexpensive, deniable, and geographically diverse, mixing self-hosted gear with commercial services and compromised third-party systems. To support spacecraft operations, they may build SDR-based labs that replicate waveforms and framing, stage command/telemetry tooling behind traffic mixers, and pre-position data pipelines for collection and analysis. The objective is persistence and flexibility: the ability to pivot between reconnaissance, delivery, and command with minimal attribution risk. | |
| RD-0001.03 | Spacecraft | A well-resourced actor may field their own spacecraft or hosted payload to gain proximity, visibility, or RF leverage. Small satellites can be launched into nearby planes or phasing orbits to observe emissions, perform spectrum measurements, or test spoofing and denial techniques at short range. Hosted payloads on commercial buses provide co-location without full spacecraft development. Proximity also enables on-orbit relay, crosslink probing, or attempts to exploit weak segmentation between payload and bus on rideshares. Regulatory and tracking regimes complicate overt misuse, but shell companies, benign-seeming mission declarations, or flags of convenience can mask intent. | |
| RD-0002 | Compromise Infrastructure | Rather than purchasing or renting assets, adversaries compromise existing infrastructure, mission-owned, third-party, or shared, to obtain ready-made reach into space, ground, or cloud environments with the benefit of plausible attribution. Targets range from physical RF chains and timing sources to mission control servers, automation/scheduling systems, SLE/CSP gateways, identity providers, and cloud data paths. Initial access often comes via stolen credentials, spear-phishing of operators and vendors, exposed remote-support paths, misconfigured multi-tenant platforms, or lateral movement from enterprise IT into operations enclaves. Once resident, actors can pre-position tools, modify configurations, suppress logging, and impersonate legitimate stations or operators to support later Execution, Exfiltration, or Denial. | |
| RD-0002.03 | 3rd-Party Spacecraft | By compromising another operator’s spacecraft, or a hosted payload, an adversary can gain proximity, sensing, and relay capabilities that are costly to build from scratch and difficult to attribute. With control of an on-orbit asset, the actor may conduct local spectrum measurement and traffic analysis, attempt selective interference or spoofing at short range, or probe crosslinks and gateways where payload networks bridge to buses. In rideshare or hosted-payload contexts, weak segmentation and shared ground paths can provide insight into neighboring missions. More aggressive scenarios include remote proximity operations (RPO) to achieve advantageous geometry; however, physical grappling, docking, or exposure of debug/test interfaces is highly specialized and rare, with significant safety, legal, and tracking implications. Realistic attacker goals emphasize adjacency for RF leverage, covert relay, or data theft rather than mechanical capture. | |
| RD-0005 | Obtain Non-Cyber Capabilities | Adversaries may pursue non-cyber counterspace means to create access, leverage, or effects that complement cyber operations. These capabilities span kinetic physical (e.g., direct-ascent or co-orbital interceptors and attacks on ground segments), non-kinetic physical (e.g., lasers, high-power microwave/EMP), and electronic warfare (jamming and spoofing). Each class differs in required resources, detectability, attribution, and the permanence of effects, from reversible interference to irreversible destruction. A pragmatic actor mixes methods: electronic attack to mask or distract, directed energy to blind sensors or upset electronics, and, at the top end, kinetic capabilities to hold assets at risk. Resource development may involve acquisition, partnering, or covert access to such systems; rehearsals are often framed as testing or calibration. | |
| RD-0005.01 | Launch Services | Rather than “owning a pad,” a realistic path is purchasing launch services (rideshare, hosted payload) to place inspection or relay assets where they confer RF, optical, or proximity advantage. Launch providers deliver integration, testing, and scheduling; an actor can use benign mission covers to field small satellites that measure local spectrum, perform on-orbit characterization of target emissions, or support later rendezvous and proximity operations. The resource being developed is access to vantage points, not just spaceflight hardware. | |
| RD-0005.02 | Non-Kinetic Physical ASAT | Non-kinetic physical ASATs damage or degrade without contact, typically via directed energy or intense electromagnetic effects. Ground- or space-based lasers can dazzle or blind optical sensors; high-power microwave or related electromagnetic systems can disrupt or permanently damage susceptible electronics; some concepts aim to generate broader electromagnetic effects. These attacks propagate at light speed, can be tuned for reversible or lasting impact, and may leave limited forensic residue, complicating verification and attribution. Actors who obtain or partner for such systems can pair them with cyber operations (e.g., blind a star tracker while injecting misleading commands) to amplify effect. | |
| RD-0005.03 | Kinetic Physical ASAT | Kinetic capabilities physically strike space or ground elements. In space, direct-ascent systems launch from Earth to intercept a satellite on orbit; co-orbital systems maneuver in space to approach and impact a target. On the ground, kinetic attacks can target stations or support infrastructure. These actions are generally easier to detect and attribute and often produce persistent, hazardous debris in orbit, especially at higher altitudes, making them strategically escalatory. Actors developing or accessing such capabilities gain credible coercive power but at significant political and operational cost. | |
| RD-0005.04 | Electronic ASAT | Electronic ASAT attacks target the communications lifelines of space systems rather than their structures: jamming raises the noise floor to deny service; spoofing crafts believable but false signals (navigation, timing, or control). These effects are usually transient and can be difficult to attribute quickly, yet they are operationally useful and comparatively inexpensive. Actors may obtain portable or fixed jammers, high-gain antennas with agile waveforms, and specialized signal-processing toolchains; from orbit, a nearby asset can deliver highly selective interference. | |
| IA-0001 | Compromise Supply Chain | Adversaries achieve first execution before the spacecraft ever flies by inserting malicious code, data, or configuration during manufacturing, integration, or delivery. Targets include software sources and dependencies, build systems and compilers, firmware/bitstreams for MCUs and FPGAs, configuration tables, test vectors, and off-the-shelf avionics. Inserted artifacts are designed to appear legitimate, propagate through normal processes, and activate under routine procedures or specific modes (e.g., safing, maintenance). Common insertion points align with where trust is assumed, vendor updates, mirrors and registries, CI/CD runners, programming stations, and “golden image” repositories. The result is pre-positioned access that blends with baseline behavior, often with delayed or conditional triggers and strong deniability. | |
| IA-0001.02 | Software Supply Chain | Here the manipulation targets software delivered to flight or ground systems: altering source before build, swapping signed binaries at distribution edges, subverting update metadata, or using stolen signing keys to issue malicious patches. Space-specific vectors include mission control applications, schedulers, gateway services, flight tables and configuration packages, and firmware loads during I&T or LEOP. Adversaries craft payloads that pass superficial validation, trigger under particular operating modes, or reintroduce known weaknesses through version rollback. “Data payloads” such as malformed tables, ephemerides, or calibration products can double as exploits when parsers are permissive. The objective is to ride the normal promotion pipeline so the implant arrives pre-trusted and executes as part of routine operations. | |
| IA-0001.03 | Hardware Supply Chain | Adversaries alter boards, modules, or programmable logic prior to delivery to create latent access or reliability sabotage. Tactics include inserting hardware Trojans in ASIC/FPGA designs, modifying bitstreams or disabling security fuses, leaving debug interfaces (JTAG/SWD/UART) active, substituting near-spec counterfeits, or embedding parts that fail after specific environmental or temporal conditions (“time-bomb” components). Other avenues target programming stations and “golden” images so entire lots inherit the same weakness. Microcontroller boot configurations, peripheral EEPROMs, and supervisory controllers are common leverage points because small changes there can reshape trust boundaries across the bus. The effect is a platform that behaves nominally through acceptance test yet enables covert control, targeted degradation, or delayed failure once on orbit. | |
| IA-0003 | Crosslink via Compromised Neighbor | Where spacecraft exchange data over inter-satellite links (RF or optical), a compromise on one vehicle can become a bridgehead to others. Threat actors exploit crosslink trust: shared routing, time distribution, service discovery, or gateway functions that forward commands and data between vehicles and ground. With knowledge of crosslink framing, addressing, and authentication semantics, an adversary can craft traffic that appears to originate from a trusted neighbor, injecting control messages, malformed service advertisements, or payload tasking that propagates across the mesh. In tightly coupled constellations, crosslinks may terminate on gateways that also touch the C&DH or payload buses, providing additional pivot opportunities. Because crosslink traffic is expected and often high volume, attacker activity can be timed to blend with synchronization intervals, ranging exchanges, or scheduled data relays. | |
| IA-0004 | Secondary/Backup Communication Channel | Adversaries pursue alternative paths to the spacecraft that differ from the primary TT&C in configuration, monitoring, or authentication. Examples include backup MOC/ground networks, contingency TT&C chains, maintenance or recovery consoles, low-rate emergency beacons, and secondary receivers or antennas on the vehicle. These channels exist to preserve commandability during outages, safing, or maintenance; they may use different vendors, legacy settings, or simplified procedures. Initial access typically pairs reconnaissance of failover rules with actions that steer operations onto the backup path, natural events, induced denial on the primary, or simple patience until scheduled tests and handovers occur. Once traffic flows over the alternate path, the attacker leverages its distinct procedures, dictionaries, or rate/size limits to introduce commands or data that would be harder to inject on the primary. | |
| IA-0004.01 | Ground Station | Threat actors may target the backup ground segment, standby MOC sites, alternate commercial stations, or contingency chains held in reserve. Threat actors establish presence on the backup path (operator accounts, scheduler/orchestration, modem profiles, antenna control) and then exploit moments when operations shift: planned exercises, maintenance at the primary site, weather diversions, or failover during anomalies. They may also shape conditions so traffic is re-routed, e.g., by saturating the primary’s RF front end or consuming its schedules, without revealing their involvement. Once on the backup, prepositioned procedures, macros, or configuration sets allow command injection, manipulation of pass timelines, or quiet collection of downlink telemetry. | |
| IA-0005 | Rendezvous & Proximity Operations | Adversaries may execute a sequence of orbital maneuvers to co-orbit and approach a target closely enough for local sensing, signaling, or physical interaction. Proximity yields advantages that are difficult to achieve from Earth: high signal-to-noise for interception, narrowly targeted interference or spoofing, observation of attitude/thermal behavior, and, if interfaces exist, opportunities for mechanical mating. The approach typically unfolds through phasing, far-field rendezvous, relative navigation (e.g., vision, lidar, crosslink cues), and closed-loop final approach. At close distances, an attacker can monitor side channels, stimulate acquisition beacons, test crosslinks, or prepare for contact operations such as capture or docking. Contact itself is not the endpoint: mating and grappling expose data and power umbilicals, standardized payload ports, service and checkout connectors, and device programming interfaces that are unreachable by any other means. | |
| IA-0005.01 | Compromise Emanations | With a local vantage point, an adversary analyzes unintentional emissions to infer sensitive information. Crypto modules, command decoders, and main bus controllers can emit patterns correlated with key use, counter updates, or command parsing. Close-range sampling enables coherent averaging, directional sensing, and correlation against known command/telemetry sequences to separate signal from noise. If the emanations are information-bearing (e.g., side-channel leakage of keys, counters, or protocol state), they can be used to reconstruct authentication material, predict anti-replay windows, or derive decoder settings, providing a basis for initial access via crafted traffic. | |
| IA-0005.02 | Docked Vehicle / OSAM | Docking, berthing, or service capture during on-orbit servicing, assembly, and manufacturing (OSAM) creates a high-trust bridge between vehicles. Threat actors exploit this moment, either by pre-positioning code on a servicing vehicle or by manipulating ground updates to it, so that, once docked, lateral movement occurs across the mechanical/electrical interface. Interfaces may expose power and data umbilicals, standardized payload ports, or gateways into the target’s C&DH or payload networks (e.g., SpaceWire, Ethernet, 1553). Service tools that push firmware, load tables, transfer files, or share time/ephemeris become conduits for staged procedures or implants that execute under maintenance authority. Malware can be timed to activation triggers such as “link up,” “maintenance mode entered,” or specific device enumerations that only appear when docked. Because OSAM operations are scheduled and well-documented, the adversary can align preparation with published timelines, ensuring that the first point of execution coincides with the brief window when cross-vehicle trust is intentionally elevated. | |
| IA-0005.03 | Proximity Grappling | In this variant, the attacker employs a capture mechanism (robotic arm, grappling fixture, magnetic or mechanical coupler) to establish physical contact without full docking. Once grappled, covers can be manipulated, temporary umbilicals attached, or exposed test points engaged; if design provisions exist (service ports, checkout connectors, external debug pads), these become direct pathways to device programming interfaces (e.g., JTAG/SWD/UART), mass-storage access, or maintenance command sets. Grappling also enables precise attitude control relative to the target, allowing contact-based sensors to read buses inductively or capacitively, or to inject signals onto harness segments reachable from the exterior. Initial access arises when a maintenance or debug path, normally latent in flight, is electrically or logically completed by the grappled connection, allowing authentication-bypassing actions such as boot-mode strapping, image replacement, or scripted command ingress. The operation demands accurate geometry, approach constraints, and fixture knowledge, but yields a transient, high-privilege bridge tailored for short, decisive actions that leave minimal on-orbit RF signature. | |
| IA-0006 | Compromise Hosted Payload | Adversaries target hosted payloads as an alternate doorway into the host spacecraft. Hosted payloads often expose their own command sets, file services, and telemetry paths, sometimes via the host’s TT&C chain, sometimes through a parallel ground infrastructure under different operational control. Initial access arises when an attacker obtains the ability to issue payload commands, upload files, or alter memory/register state on the hosted unit. Because data and control must traverse an interface to the host bus (power, time, housekeeping, data routing, gateway processors), the payload–host boundary can also carry management functions: mode transitions, table loads, firmware updates, and cross-strapped links that appear only in maintenance or contingency modes. With knowledge of the interface specification and command dictionaries, a threat actor can activate rarely used modes, inject crafted data products, or trigger gateway behaviors that extend influence beyond the payload itself. In multi-tenant or commercial hosting arrangements, differences in keying, procedures, or scheduling between the payload operator and the bus operator provide additional opportunity for a first foothold that looks like routine payload commanding. | |
| IA-0007 | Compromise Ground System | Compromising the ground segment gives an adversary the most direct path to first execution against a spacecraft. Ground systems encompass operator workstations and mission control mission control software, scheduling/orchestration services, front-end processors and modems, antenna control, key-loading tools and HSMs, data gateways (SLE/CSP), identity providers, and cloud-hosted mission services. Once inside, a threat actor can prepare on-orbit updates, craft and queue valid telecommands, replay captured traffic within acceptance windows, or manipulate authentication material and counters to pass checks. The same foothold enables deep reconnaissance: enumerating mission networks and enclaves, discovering which satellites are operated from a site, mapping logical topology between MOC and stations, identifying in-band “birds” reachable from a given aperture, and learning pass plans, dictionaries, and automation hooks. From there, initial access to the spacecraft is a matter of timing and presentation, injecting commands, procedures, or update packages that align with expected operations so the first execution event appears indistinguishable from normal activity. | |
| IA-0007.01 | Compromise On-Orbit Update | Adversaries may target the pipeline that produces and transmits updates to an on-orbit vehicle. Manipulation points include source repositories and configuration tables, build and packaging steps that generate images or differential patches, staging areas on ground servers, update metadata (versions, counters, manifests), and the transmission process itself. Spacecraft updates span flight software patches, FPGA bitstreams, bootloader or device firmware loads, and operational data products such as command tables, ephemerides, and calibration files, each with distinct formats, framing, and acceptance rules. An attacker positioned in the ground system can substitute or modify an artifact, alter its timing and timetags to match pass windows, and queue it through the same procedures operators use for nominal maintenance. Activation can be immediate or deferred: implants may lie dormant until a specific mode, safing entry, or table index is referenced. | |
| IA-0007.02 | Malicious Commanding via Valid GS | Adversaries may use a compromised, mission-owned ground system to transmit legitimate-looking commands to the target spacecraft. Because the ground equipment is already configured for the mission, correct waveforms, framing, dictionaries, and scheduling, the attacker’s traffic blends with routine operations. Initial access unfolds by inserting commands or procedures into existing timelines, modifying rate/size limits or command queues, or invoking maintenance dictionaries and rapid-response workflows that accept broader command sets. Pre-positioned scripts can chain actions across multiple passes and stations, while telemetry routing provides immediate feedback to refine follow-on steps. Exfiltration can be embedded in standard downlink channels or forwarded through gateways as ordinary mission data. The distinguishing feature is that command origin appears valid, transmitted from approved apertures using expected parameters, so the first execution event is not a protocol anomaly but a misuse of legitimate command authority obtained through the compromised ground system. | |
| IA-0008 | Rogue External Entity | Adversaries obtain a foothold by interacting with the spacecraft from platforms outside the authorized ground architecture. A “rogue external entity” is any actor-controlled transmitter, platform, or node, ground, maritime, airborne, or space-based. Most interact by radiating or exchanging traffic using mission-compatible waveforms, framing, or crosslink protocols. Others carry no mission-compatible capability at all, and instead apply interference, directed energy, or physical proximity to shape the conditions under which access becomes possible. The technique exploits the fact that many vehicles must remain commandable and discoverable over wide areas and across multiple modalities. Using public ephemerides, pass predictions, and knowledge of acquisition procedures, the actor times transmissions to line-of-sight windows, handovers, or maintenance periods. Initial access stems from presenting traffic that the spacecraft will parse or prioritize, such as syntactically valid telecommands, crafted ranging/acquisition exchanges, crosslink service advertisements, or payload/user-channel messages that bridge into the command/data path, or, for entities operating by effect rather than by protocol, from the contingency behavior those effects induce. | |
| IA-0008.01 | Rogue Ground Station | Adversaries may field their own ground system, transportable or fixed, to transmit and receive mission-compatible signals. A typical setup couples steerable apertures and GPS-disciplined timing with SDR/modems configured for the target’s bands, modulation/coding, framing, and beacon structure. Using pass schedules and Doppler/polarization predictions, the actor crafts over-the-air traffic that appears valid at the RF and protocol layers. | |
| IA-0008.02 | Rogue Spacecraft | Adversaries may employ their own satellite or hosted payload to achieve proximity and a privileged RF geometry. After phasing into the appropriate plane or drift orbit, the rogue vehicle operates as a local peer: emitting narrow-beam or crosslink-compatible signals, relaying user-channel traffic that the target will honor, or advertising services that appear to originate from a trusted neighbor. Close range reduces path loss and allows highly selective interactions, e.g., targeted spoofing of acquisition exchanges, presentation of crafted routing/time distribution messages, or injection of payload tasking that rides established inter-satellite protocols. The rogue platform can also perform spectrum and protocol reconnaissance in situ, refining message formats and timing before attempting first execution. | |
| IA-0008.03 | ASAT/Counterspace Weapon | Adversaries leverage counterspace platforms to create conditions under which initial execution becomes possible or to impose effects directly. Electronic warfare systems can jam or spoof links so that the target shifts to contingency channels or accepts crafted navigation/control signals; directed-energy systems can dazzle sensors or upset electronics, shaping mode transitions and autonomy responses; kinetic or contact-capable systems can enable mechanical interaction that exposes maintenance or debug paths. In each case, the counterspace asset is an external actor-controlled node that interacts with the spacecraft outside authorized ground pathways. Initial access may be the immediate result of accepted spoofed traffic, or it may be secondary, arising when the target enters states with broader command acceptance, alternative receivers, or service interfaces that the adversary can then exploit. | |
| IA-0009 | Trusted Relationship | Adversaries obtain first execution by riding connections that the mission already trusts, formal interconnections with partners, vendors, and user communities. Once a third party is compromised, the actor inherits that entity’s approved routes into mission enclaves: VPNs and jump hosts into ground networks, API keys into cloud tenants, automated file drops that feed command or update pipelines, and collaboration spaces where procedures and dictionaries circulate. Because traffic, credentials, and artifacts originate from known counterparts, the initial execution event can appear as a routine payload task, scheduled procedure, or software update promoted through established processes. | |
| IA-0009.01 | Mission Collaborator (academia, international, etc.) | Missions frequently depend on distributed teams, instrument builders at universities, science operations centers, and international partners, connected by data portals, shared repositories, and federated credentials. A compromise of a collaborator yields access to telescience networks, analysis pipelines, instrument commanding tools, and file exchanges that deliver ephemerides, calibration products, procedures, or configuration tables into mission workflows. Partners may operate their own ground elements or payload gateways under delegated authority, creating additional entry points whose authentication and logging differ from the prime’s. Initial access emerges when attacker-modified artifacts or commands traverse these sanctioned paths: a revised calibration script uploaded through a science portal, a configuration table promoted by a cross-org CI job, or a payload task submitted via a collaboration queue and forwarded by the prime as routine work. Variations in process rigor, identity proofing, and toolchains across institutions amplify the attacker’s options while preserving the appearance of legitimate partner activity. | |
| IA-0009.02 | Vendor | Vendors that design, integrate, or support mission systems often hold elevated, persistent routes into operations: remote administration of ground software and modems, access to identity providers and license servers, control of cloud-hosted services, and authority to deliver firmware, bitstreams, or patches. Attackers who compromise a vendor’s enterprise or build environment can assume these roles, issuing commands through approved consoles, queuing updates in provider-operated portals, or invoking maintenance procedures that the mission expects the vendor to perform. Some vendor pathways terminate directly on RF equipment or key-management infrastructure; others ride cross-account cloud roles or managed SaaS backends that handle mission data and scheduling. | |
| IA-0009.03 | User Segment | The “user segment” encompasses end users and their equipment that interact with mission services, SATCOM terminals, customer ground gateways, tasking portals, and downstream processing pipelines for delivered data. Where these environments interconnect with mission cores, a compromised user domain becomes a springboard. Attackers can inject malformed tasking requests that propagate into payload scheduling, craft user-plane messages that traverse gateways into control or management planes, or seed data products that flow back to mission processing systems and automation. In broadband constellations and hosted services, user terminals may share infrastructure with TT&C or provider management networks, creating opportunities to pivot from customer equipment into provider-run nodes that the spacecraft trusts. | |
| IA-0010 | Unauthorized Access During Safe-Mode | Adversaries time their first execution to coincide with safe-mode, when the vehicle prioritizes survival and recovery. In many designs, safe-mode reconfigures attitude, reduces payload activity, lowers data rates, and enables contingency dictionaries or maintenance procedures that are dormant in nominal operations. Authentication, rate/size limits, command interlocks, and anti-replay handling may differ; some implementations reset counters, relax timetag screening, accept broader command sets, or activate alternate receivers and beacons to improve commandability. Ground behavior also shifts: extended passes, emergency scheduling, and atypical station use create predictable windows. An attacker who understands these patterns can present syntactically valid traffic that aligns with safe-mode expectations, maintenance loads, recovery scripts, table edits, or reboot/patch sequences, so the first accepted action appears consistent with fault recovery rather than intrusion. | |
| IA-0011 | Auxiliary Device Compromise | Adversaries abuse peripherals and removable media that the spacecraft (or its support equipment) ingests during development, I&T, or on-orbit operations. Small satellites and hosted payloads frequently expose standard interfaces, USB, UART, Ethernet, SpaceWire, CAN, or mount removable storage for loading ephemerides, tables, configuration bundles, or firmware. A tainted device can masquerade as a trusted class (mass-storage, CDC/HID) or present crafted files that trigger auto-ingest workflows, file watchers, or maintenance utilities. Malware may be staged by modifying the peripheral’s firmware, seeding the images written by lab formatting tools, or swapping media during handling. Once connected, the device can deliver binaries, scripts, or malformed data products that execute under existing procedures. Because these interactions often occur during hurried timelines (checkouts, rehearsals, contingency maintenance), the initial execution blends with legitimate peripheral use while traversing a path already privileged to reach flight software or controllers. | |
| IA-0012 | Assembly, Test, and Launch Operation Compromise | Assembly, Test, and Launch Operation (ATLO) concentrates people, tools, and authority while components first exchange real traffic across flight interfaces. Test controllers, EGSE, simulators, flatsats, loaders, and data recorders connect to the same buses and command paths that will exist on orbit. Threat actors exploit this density and dynamism: compromised laptops or transient cyber assets push images and tables; lab networks bridge otherwise separate enclaves; vendor support accounts move software between staging and flight hardware; and “golden” artifacts created or modified in ATLO propagate into the as-flown baseline. Malware can traverse shared storage and scripting environments, ride update/checklist execution, or piggyback on protocol translators and gateways used to stimulate subsystems. Because ATLO often introduces late firmware loads, key/counter initialization, configuration freezes, and full-system rehearsals, a single well-placed change can yield first execution on multiple devices and persist into LEOP. | |
| IA-0013 | Compromise Host Spacecraft | The inverse of "IA-0006: Compromise Hosted Payload", this technique describes adversaries that are targeting a hosted payload, the host space vehicle (SV) can serve as an initial access vector to compromise the payload through vulnerabilities in the SV's onboard systems, communication interfaces, or software. If the SV's command and control systems are exploited, an attacker could gain unauthorized access to the vehicle's internal network. Once inside, the attacker may laterally move to the hosted payload, particularly if it shares data buses, processors, or communication links with the vehicle. | |
| EX-0001 | Replay | Replay is the re-transmission of previously captured traffic, over RF links, crosslinks, or internal buses, to elicit the same processing and effects a second time. Adversaries first observe and record authentic exchanges (telecommands, ranging/acquisition frames, housekeeping telemetry acknowledgments, bus messages), then resend them within acceptance conditions that the system recognizes, matching link geometry, timetags, counters, or mode states. The aim can be functional (re-triggering an action such as a mode change), observational (fingerprinting how the vehicle reacts at different states), or disruptive (saturating queues and bandwidth to crowd out legitimate traffic). Because replays preserve valid syntax and often valid context, they can blend with normal operations, especially during periods with reduced monitoring or when counters and windows reset (e.g., handovers, safing entries). On encrypted links, metadata replays (acquisition beacons, schedule requests) may still yield informative responses. | |
| EX-0001.01 | Command Packets | Threat actors may resend authentic-looking telecommands that were previously accepted by the spacecraft. Captures may include whole command PDUs with framing, CRC/MAC, counters, and timetags intact, or they may be reconstructed from operator tooling and procedure logs. When timing, counters, and mode preconditions align, the replayed packet can cause the same effect: toggling relays, initiating safing or recovery scripts, adjusting tables, commanding momentum dumps, or scheduling delta-v events. Even when outright execution fails, repeated “near-miss” injections can map acceptance windows, rate/size limits, and interlocks by observing the spacecraft’s acknowledgments and state changes. At scale, streams of valid-but-stale commands can congest command queues, delay legitimate activity, or trigger nuisance FDIR responses. | |
| EX-0001.02 | Bus Traffic Replay | Instead of the RF path, the attacker targets internal command/data handling by injecting or retransmitting messages on the spacecraft bus (e.g., 1553, SpaceWire, custom). Because many subsystems act on the latest message or on message rate rather than on uniqueness, a flood of historical yet well-formed frames can consume bandwidth, starve critical publishers, or cause subsystems to perform the same action repeatedly. Secondary effects include stale sensor values being re-consumed, watchdog timers being reset at incorrect intervals, and autonomy rules misclassifying the situation due to out-of-order but valid-looking events. On time-triggered or scheduled buses, replaying at precise offsets can collide with or supersede legitimate messages, steering system state without changing software. The goal is to harness the bus’s determinism, repeating prior internal stimuli to recreate prior effects or to induce resource exhaustion. | |
| EX-0002 | Position, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Geofencing | Malware or implanted procedures execute only when the spacecraft’s state meets geometric and temporal criteria. Triggers can be defined in orbital elements, inertial or Earth-fixed coordinates, relative geometry, lighting conditions, or time references. The code monitors on-board navigation solutions, ephemerides, or propagated TLEs and arms itself when thresholds are met (e.g., “only fire over region X,” “only activate during LEOP,” or “only run within N seconds of a scheduled downlink.”) Geofencing reduces exposure and aids deniability: triggers are rare, aligned with mission cadence, and hard to reproduce on the ground. More elaborate variants require conjunctions of conditions (position + attitude + clock epoch) or incorporate drift so the trigger slowly evolves with the orbit. The result is effect-on-demand: execution occurs precisely where and when the actor intends, while remaining dormant elsewhere. | |
| EX-0003 | Modify Authentication Process | The adversary alters how the spacecraft validates authority so that future inputs are accepted on their terms. Modifications can target code (patching flight binaries, hot-patching functions in memory, hooking command handlers), data (changing key identifiers, policy tables, or counter initialization), or control flow (short-circuiting MAC checks, widening anti-replay windows, bypassing interlocks on specific opcodes). Common choke points include telecommand verification routines, bootloader or update verifiers, gateway processors that bridge payload and bus traffic, and maintenance dictionaries invoked in special modes. Subtle variants preserve outward behavior, producing normal-looking acknowledgments and counters, while internally accepting a broader set of origins, opcodes, or timetags. Others introduce conditional logic so the backdoor only activates under specific geometry or timing, masking during routine audit. Once resident, the modified process becomes the new trust oracle, enabling recurring execution for the attacker and, in some cases, denying legitimate control by causing authentic inputs to fail verification or to be deprioritized. | |
| EX-0005 | Exploit Hardware/Firmware Corruption | The adversary achieves execution or effect beneath the software stack, in device firmware, programmable logic, or the hardware itself, either by corrupting that layer or by driving it through interfaces that function exactly as designed. Examples include tampering with firmware images or configuration blobs burned into non-volatile memory; targeting MCU/SoC boot ROM fallbacks; editing FPGA bitstreams or partial-reconfiguration frames; leveraging physical phenomena and timing to flip bits or skip checks; or issuing legitimate low-level device, maintenance, and calibration commands that act directly on hardware without passing through high-level command mediation. Because these actions occur below or alongside the operating system and application FSW, traditional endpoint safeguards see normal interfaces while trust anchors are already altered. | |
| EX-0005.01 | Design Flaws | Threat actors may exploit inherent properties or errata in the hardware/logic design rather than injecting new code. Levers include undocumented or weakly specified behaviors (scan chains, test modes, debug straps), counter/timer rollovers and wraparound, interrupt storms and priority inversions, MMU/TLB corner cases, DMA engines that can write outside intended buffers, and bus arbitration or clock-domain crossing issues that permit stale or reordered writes. RNGs and crypto accelerators with flawed seeding or side-channel leakage can expose secrets or enable predictable authentication values. In programmable logic, vulnerable state machines, insufficient reset paths, and hazardous partial-reconfiguration regions create opportunities to drive the design into privileged or undefined states. Even reliability features can be turned: hardware timers intended for liveness can be paced to starve control loops; ECC policies can be nudged so correction conceals attacker-induced drift. The common thread is using the platform’s own guarantees, timing, priority, persistence, or fault handling, to cause privileged behavior that the software stack accepts as “by design.” | |
| EX-0005.02 | Malicious Use of Hardware Commands | Threat actors may issue low-level device or maintenance commands that act directly on hardware, bypassing much of the high-level command mediation. These may be memory-mapped register writes forwarded over the bus, vendor-specific instrument/control opcodes, built-in-test and calibration modes, boot-mode or fuse-programming sequences, file/sector operations to on-board non-volatile stores, or actuator primitives for wheels, thrusters, motors, heaters, and RF chains. Because these interfaces exist to configure sensors, zero momentum, switch power domains, tune gains, or adjust clocks, they can also be sequenced to produce harmful effects: over-driving mechanisms, altering persistent calibration, disabling watchdogs, or switching timing sources. Some hardware command sets are only exposed in maintenance or contingency modes, while others are always reachable through gateway processors that translate high-level telecommands into device-level operations. By crafting orders that respect expected framing and rate/size limits, the adversary can induce mechanical, electrical, or logical state changes with immediate, high-privilege impact, all while appearing to exercise legitimate device capabilities. | |
| EX-0006 | Disable/Bypass Encryption | The adversary alters how confidentiality or integrity is applied so traffic or data is processed in clear or with weakened protection. Paths include toggling configuration flags that place links or storage into maintenance/test modes; forcing algorithm “fallbacks” or null ciphers; downgrading negotiated suites or keys; manipulating anti-replay/counter state so checks are skipped; substituting crypto libraries or tables during boot/update; and selecting alternate routes that carry the same content without encryption. On some designs, distinct modes handle authentication and confidentiality separately, allowing an actor who obtains authentication material to request unencrypted service or to switch to legacy profiles. The end state is that command, telemetry, or data products traverse a path the spacecraft accepts while cryptographic protection is absent, weakened, or inconsistently applied, enabling subsequent tactics such as inspection, manipulation, or exfiltration. | |
| EX-0007 | Trigger Single Event Upset | The attacker induces or opportunistically exploits a single-event upset (SEU), a transient bit flip or latch disturbance in logic or memory, so that software executes in a state advantageous to the attack. SEUs arise when charge is deposited at sensitive nodes by energetic particles or intense electromagnetic stimuli. An actor may time operations to coincide with natural radiation peaks or use artificial means from close range. Outcomes include corrupted stacks or tables, altered branch conditions, flipped configuration bits in FPGAs or controllers, and transient faults that push autonomy/FDIR into recovery modes with broader command acceptance. SEU exploitation is probabilistic; the technique couples repeated stimulation with careful observation of mode transitions, watchdogs, and error counters to land the system in a desired but nominal-looking state from which other actions can proceed. | |
| EX-0008 | Time Synchronized Execution | Malicious logic is arranged to run at precise times derived from onboard clocks or distributed time sources. The trigger may be absolute or relative. Spacecraft commonly maintain multiple clocks and counters and schedule autonomous sequences against them. An attacker leverages this machinery to ensure effects occur during tactically advantageous windows. Time-based execution reduces exposure, simplifies coordination across assets, and makes reproduction difficult in lab settings that lack the same temporal context. | |
| EX-0008.01 | Absolute Time Sequences | Execution is keyed to a fixed wall-clock timestamp or epoch, independent of current vehicle state. The implant watches a trusted time source, GNSS-derived time, crosslink-distributed network time, oscillator-disciplined UTC/TAI, or mission elapsed time anchored at activation, and triggers exactly at a programmed date/time. Absolute triggering supports coordinated multi-asset actions and allows long dormancy with a precise activation moment. Variants incorporate calendar logic (e.g., “first visible pass after YYYY-MM-DD hh:mm:ss”) or guard bands to fire only if the clock is within certain tolerances, ensuring the event occurs even with minor drift yet remains rare enough to blend with scheduled operations. | |
| EX-0008.02 | Relative Time Sequences | Execution is keyed to elapsed time since a reference event. The implant latches a start point, boot, reset, safing entry/exit, receipt of a particular telemetry/command pattern, achievement of sun-pointing, and arms a countdown or set of offsets (“N seconds after event,” “repeat every M cycles”). Relative sequences are resilient to clock discontinuities and mirror how many spacecraft schedule internal activities (e.g., after boot, run calibrations; after acquisition, start downlink). An attacker exploits this to ensure the trigger fires only within specific operational phases and to survive resets that would thwart absolute timestamps: after every reboot, wait for housekeeping steady state, then act; or, after a wheel unload completes, inject an additional command while control laws are in a known configuration. | |
| EX-0009 | Exploit Code Flaws | The adversary executes actions on-board by abusing defects in software that runs on the vehicle, ranging from application logic in flight software to libraries, drivers, and supporting services. Outcomes range from arbitrary code execution and privilege escalation to silent logic manipulation (e.g., bypassing interlocks, suppressing alarms) that appears operationally plausible. The hallmark of this technique is that the attacker co-opts existing code paths, often rarely used ones, to run unintended behavior under nominal interfaces. These attacks may be extremely targeted and tailored to specific coding errors introduced as a result of poor coding practices or they may target known issues in the commercial software components. | |
| EX-0009.01 | Flight Software | Flight software presents rich attack surface where mission-specific parsing and autonomy live. Vulnerable components include command and telemetry handlers, table loaders, file transfer services, mode management and safing logic, payload control applications, and gateway processes that bridge payload and bus protocols. Typical flaws are unchecked lengths and indices in command fields, arithmetic overflows in rate/size calculations, insufficient validation of table contents, format-string misuse in logging, incomplete state cleanup across rapid mode changes, and race conditions in concurrent message processing. Some FSW suites expose operator-facing APIs or scripting/procedure engines used for automation; malformed invocations can coerce unexpected behaviors or enable arbitrary expressions. Because many subsystems act on “last write wins,” logic errors can yield durable configuration changes without obvious anomalies in protocol syntax. Successful exploitation lets an adversary execute code, alter persistent parameters, or chain effects across partitions that would otherwise be segmented by design. | |
| EX-0009.02 | Operating System | At the OS layer, the attacker targets primitives that schedule work and mediate hardware. Modern spacecraft, particularly small satellites, increasingly rely on Linux-based operating systems (e.g., Yocto-derived distributions) rather than traditional RTOSes, significantly expanding the applicable attack surface to include techniques documented in MITRE ATT&CK for Linux - <a href='https://attack.mitre.org/matrices/enterprise/linux/' class='internal-link' target='_blank'>https://attack.mitre.org/matrices/enterprise/linux/</a>. Maintenance builds may expose shells or management consoles; misconfigurations around these interfaces can provide paths to command interpreters or privileged syscalls. Linux-based flight systems inherit standard Unix/Linux vulnerabilities including kernel exploits, container escapes, privilege escalation via misconfigured sudo/capabilities, and exploitation of systemd or other init systems. Exploitation yields kernel-mode execution, arbitrary memory read/write, or control of scheduling and address spaces, letting the actor tamper with FSW processes, intercept command paths, or manipulate storage and bus drivers beneath application checks. Common Linux-specific vectors include exploiting unpatched kernel vulnerabilities, abusing misconfigurations in containerized environments, leveraging POSIX API weaknesses in flight applications, and targeting shared libraries or dynamic linkers to inject malicious code into flight processes. The technique leverages generic OS weaknesses adapted to the spacecraft's particular build, turning low-level control into mission-facing effects that appear to originate from legitimate processes. Because spacecraft Linux builds are often minimized, long-lived (limited patching), and may retain debug interfaces or permissive file permissions from ground testing, they present a unique risk profile combining embedded-system constraints with commodity OS attack techniques. Flight images frequently retain extraneous binaries and utilities (e.g., compilers, debuggers, network tools, package managers) intended for ground testing or development that are not removed before launch, providing adversaries with ready-made 'living off the land' capabilities for reconnaissance, lateral movement, and privilege escalation without needing to upload custom tooling. | |
| EX-0009.03 | Known Vulnerability (COTS/FOSS) | Using knowledge of the software composition on-board, the adversary maps components and versions to publicly or privately known defects and then crafts inputs to trigger them. Typical targets include standard libraries (libc, STL), cryptographic and compression libraries, protocol stacks (CCSDS implementations, IP over space links, SpaceWire bridges), filesystems and parsers (FITS/CCSDS packetization, custom table formats), and vendor SDKs for radios, sensors, or payloads. Triggers arrive as well-formed but malicious packets, frames, or files whose edge-case fields exercise version-specific bugs, overflowing a parser, bypassing an authentication check, or causing a kernel/driver fault that reboots into a more permissive mode. Because these flaws are documented somewhere, exploitation emphasizes matching the exact build and build-time options used on the mission. | |
| EX-0010 | Malicious Code | The adversary achieves on-board effects by introducing executable logic that runs on the vehicle, either native binaries and scripts, injected shellcode, or “data payloads” that an interpreter treats as code (e.g., procedure languages, table-driven automations). Delivery commonly piggybacks on legitimate pathways: software/firmware updates, file transfer services, table loaders, maintenance consoles, or command sequences that write to executable regions. Once staged, activation can be explicit (a specific command, mode change, or file open), environmental (time/geometry triggers), or accidental, where operator actions or routine autonomy invoke the implanted logic. Malicious code can target any layer it can reach: altering flight software behavior, manipulating payload controllers, patching boot or device firmware, or installing hooks in drivers and gateways that bridge bus and payload traffic. Effects range from subtle logic changes (quiet data tampering, command filtering) to overt actions (forced mode transitions, resource starvation), and may include secondary capabilities like covert communications, key material harvesting, or persistence across resets by rewriting images or configuration entries. | |
| EX-0010.01 | Ransomware | Ransomware on a spacecraft encrypts data or critical configuration so that nominal operations can no longer proceed without the attacker’s cooperation. Targets include mass-memory file stores (engineering telemetry, payload data), configuration and command tables, event logs, on-board ephemerides, and even intermediate buffers used by downlink pipelines. Some variants interfere with key services instead of bulk data, e.g., encrypting a command dictionary or table index so valid inputs are rejected, or wrapping the payload data path in an attacker-chosen cipher so downlinked products appear as noise. By denying access to on-board content or control artifacts at scale, attackers convert execution into bargaining power or irreversible mission degradation. | |
| EX-0010.02 | Wiper Malware | Wipers deliberately destroy or irreversibly corrupt data and, in some cases, executable images to impair or end mission operations. Destructive routines may overwrite with patterns or pseudorandom data, repeatedly reformat volumes, trigger wear mechanisms on non-volatile memory, or manipulate low-level translation layers so recovery tools see a blank or inconsistent device. Activation can be immediate or staged, sleeping until a specific time, pass, or maintenance action, and may be paired with anti-recovery steps such as erasing checksums, undo logs, or golden images. Because wipers operate at storage and image layers that underpin many subsystems, collateral effects can cascade: autonomy enters safing without viable recovery paths, downlinks carry only noise, and subsequent updates cannot be authenticated or applied. The defining feature is irreversible loss of data or executables as the primary objective, rather than concealment or monetization. | |
| EX-0010.03 | Rootkit | A rootkit hides the presence and activity of other malicious components by interposing on the mechanisms that report system state. On spacecraft this can occur within flight software processes, at OS kernel level, inside separation kernels/hypervisors, or down in system firmware where drivers and initialization routines run. Techniques include API and syscall hooking, patching message queues and inter-process communication paths, altering task lists and scheduler views, filtering telemetry packets and event logs, and rewriting sensor or health values before they are recorded or downlinked. Rootkits may also hook command handlers and gateways so certain opcodes, timetags, or sources are silently accepted or ignored while external observers see normal acknowledgments. Because many missions rely on deterministic procedures and limited observability, even small alterations to reporting can make malicious actions appear as plausible mode transitions or benign anomalies. Persistence often pairs with the concealment layer, with the rootkit reinjecting companions after resets or rebuilds by monitoring for specific files, tables, or image loads and modifying them on the fly. | |
| EX-0010.04 | Bootkit | A bootkit positions itself in the pre-OS boot chain so that it executes before normal integrity checks and can shape what the system subsequently trusts. After seizing early control, the bootkit can redirect image selection, patch kernels or flight binaries in memory, adjust device trees and driver tables, or install hooks that persist across warm resets. Some variants maintain shadow copies of legitimate images and present them to basic verification routines while steering actual execution to a modified payload; others manipulate fallback logic so recovery modes load attacker-controlled code. Because the boot path initializes memory maps, buses, and authentication material, a bootkit can also influence key/counter setup and gateway configurations, creating conditions favorable to later tactics. The central characteristic is precedence: by running first, the implant defines the reality higher layers observe, ensuring that every subsequent component launches under conditions curated by the attacker. | |
| EX-0010.05 | On-Board Process Injection | Adversaries may inject malicious code into trusted onboard software processes in order to execute arbitrary functionality within the context of legitimate spacecraft software. Targeted processes may include flight software tasks, operating system services, telemetry handlers, middleware, communication daemons, scheduler services, device drivers, or other mission-critical runtime components. Process injection enables malicious code to inherit the permissions, memory access, execution context, and trust relationships associated with the compromised process. This may allow adversaries to manipulate telemetry, alter spacecraft operational behavior, suppress reporting, interfere with fault management, inject unauthorized commands, or evade detection without interrupting nominal spacecraft operations. Unlike standalone malicious binaries or scripts, injected code executes within legitimate onboard software contexts, causing malicious activity to appear operationally valid and making detection and forensic analysis significantly more difficult. | |
| EX-0011 | Exploit Reduced Protections During Safe-Mode | The adversary times on-board actions to the period when the vehicle is in safe-mode and operating with altered guardrails. In many designs, safe-mode enables contingency command dictionaries, activates alternate receivers or antennas, reduces data rates, and prioritizes survival behaviors (sun-pointing, thermal/power conservation). Authentication checks, anti-replay windows, rate/size limits, and interlocks may differ from nominal; counters can be reset, timetag screening relaxed, or maintenance procedures made available for recovery. Ground cadence also changes, longer passes, emergency scheduling, atypical station selection, creating predictable windows for interaction. Using knowledge of these patterns, an attacker issues maintenance-looking loads, recovery scripts, parameter edits, or boot/patch sequences that the spacecraft is primed to accept while safed. Because responses (telemetry beacons, acknowledgments, mode bits) resemble normal anomaly recovery, the first execution event blends with expected behavior, allowing unauthorized reconfiguration, software modification, or state manipulation to occur under the cover of fault response. | |
| EX-0012 | Modify On-Board Values | The attacker alters live or persistent data that the spacecraft uses to make decisions and route work. Targets include device and control registers, parameter and limit tables, internal routing/subscriber maps, schedules and timelines, priority/QoS settings, watchdog and timer values, autonomy/FDIR rule tables, ephemeris and attitude references, and power/thermal setpoints. Many missions expose legitimate mechanisms for updating these artifacts, direct memory read/write commands, table load services, file transfers, or maintenance procedures, which can be invoked to steer behavior without changing code. Edits may be transient (until reset) or latched/persistent across boots; they can be narrowly scoped (a single bit flip on an enable mask) or systemic (rewriting a routing table so commands are misdelivered). The effect space spans subtle biasing of control loops, selective blackholing of commands or telemetry, rescheduling of operations, and wholesale changes to mode logic, all accomplished by modifying the values the software already trusts and consumes. | |
| EX-0012.01 | Registers | Threat actors may target the internal registers of the victim spacecraft in order to modify specific values as the FSW is functioning or prevent certain subsystems from working. Most aspects of the spacecraft rely on internal registers to store important data and temporary values. By modifying these registers at certain points in time, threat actors can disrupt the workflow of the subsystems or onboard payload, causing them to malfunction or behave in an undesired manner. | |
| EX-0012.02 | Internal Routing Tables | Threat actors may rewrite the maps that tell software where to send and receive things. In publish/subscribe or message-queued flight frameworks, tables map message IDs to subscribers, opcodes to handlers, and pipes to processes; at interfaces, address/port maps define how traffic traverses bridges and gateways (e.g., SpaceWire node/port routes, 1553 RT/subaddress mappings, CAN IDs). By altering these structures, commands can be misdelivered, dropped, duplicated, or routed through unintended paths; telemetry can be redirected or blackholed; and handler bindings can be swapped so an opcode triggers the wrong function. Schedule/routing hybrids, used to sequence activities and distribute results, can be edited to reorder execution or to create feedback loops that occupy bandwidth and processor time. The result is control over who hears what and when, achieved by changing the lookup tables that underpin command/telemetry distribution rather than the code that processes them. | |
| EX-0012.03 | Memory Write/Loads | The adversary uses legitimate direct-memory commands or load services to place chosen bytes at chosen addresses. Many spacecraft support raw read/write operations, block loads into RAM or non-volatile stores, and table/file loaders that copy content into working memory. With knowledge of address maps and data structures, an attacker can patch function pointers or vtables, alter limit and configuration records, seed scripts or procedures into interpreter buffers, adjust DMA descriptors, or overwrite portions of executable images resident in RAM. Loads may be sized and paced to fit link and queue constraints, then activated by a subsequent command, mode change, or natural reference by the software. | |
| EX-0012.04 | App/Subscriber Tables | In publish/subscribe flight frameworks, applications and subsystems register interest in specific message classes via subscriber (or application) tables. These tables map message IDs/topics to subscribers, define delivery pipes/queues, and often include filters, priorities, and rate limits. By altering these mappings, an adversary can quietly reshape information flow: critical consumers stop receiving health or sensor messages; non-critical tasks get flooded; handlers are rebound so an opcode or message ID reaches the wrong task; or duplicates create feedback loops that consume bandwidth and CPU. Because subscription state is usually read at init or refreshed on command, subtle edits can persist across reboots or take effect at predictable times. Similar effects appear in legacy MIL-STD-1553 deployments by modifying Remote Terminal (RT), subaddress, or mode-code configurations so that messages are misaddressed or dropped at the bus interface. The net result is control-by-misdirection: the software still “works,” but the right data no longer reaches the right recipient at the right time. | |
| EX-0012.05 | Scheduling Algorithm | Spacecraft typically rely on real-time scheduling, fixed-priority or deadline/periodic schemes, driven by timers, tick sources, and per-task parameters. Threat actors target these parameters and associated tables to skew execution order and timing. Edits may change priorities, periods, or deadlines; adjust CPU budgets and watchdog thresholds; alter ready-queue disciplines; or reconfigure timer tick rates and clock sources. They may also modify task affinities, message-queue depths, and interrupt masks so preemption and latency characteristics shift. Small changes can have large effects: high-rate control loops see added jitter, estimator updates miss deadlines, command/telemetry handling starves, or low-priority maintenance tasks monopolize cores due to mis-set periods. Manipulated schedules can create intermittent, state-dependent malfunctions that are hard to distinguish from environmental load. The essence of the technique is to weaponize time, reshaping when work happens so that otherwise correct code produces unsafe or exploitable behavior. | |
| EX-0012.06 | Science/Payload Data | Payload data, and the metadata that gives it meaning, can be altered in place to steal value, mislead users, or degrade mission outputs. Targets include raw detector frames, packetized Level-0 streams, onboard preprocessed products, and file catalogs/directories on mass memory. Adjacent metadata such as timestamps, pointing/attitude tags, calibration coefficients, compression settings, and quality flags are equally potent; slight bias in a calibration table or time tag can skew entire downlink campaigns while appearing routine. An adversary may rewrite frame headers, reorder packets, substitute segments from prior passes, or flip quality bits so ground pipelines silently discard or misclassify products. Recorder index manipulation can orphan files or cause downlinks to serve stale or fabricated content. Because many missions perform some processing or filtering onboard, tampering upstream of downlink propagates forward as “authoritative” truth, jeopardizing mission objectives without obvious protocol anomalies. | |
| EX-0012.07 | Propulsion Subsystem | Propulsion relies on parameters and sensed values that govern burns, pressure management, and safing. Editable items include thruster calibration and minimum impulse bit, valve timing and duty limits, inhibit masks, delta-V tables, plume keep-out constraints, tank pressure/temperature thresholds, leak-detection limits, and momentum-management coupling with attitude control. By modifying these, an adversary can provoke over-correction, waste propellant through repeated trims, bias orbit maintenance, or trigger protective sequences at inopportune times. False pressure or temperature readings can cause autonomous venting or lockouts; tweaked alignment matrices or misapplied gimbal limits can yield off-axis thrust and attitude excursions; altered desaturation rules can induce frequent wheel unloads that sap resources. Because consumables are finite and margins tight, even modest parameter drift can shorten mission life or violate keep-out and conjunction constraints while presenting as “normal” control activity. | |
| EX-0012.08 | Attitude Determination & Control Subsystem | ADCS depends on tightly coupled models and parameters: star-tracker catalogs and masks, sensor alignments and bias terms, gyro scale factors and drift rates, estimator covariances and process/measurement noise, controller gains and saturation limits, wheel/CMG torque constants, magnetic torquer maps, and sun sensor thresholds. Editing these values skews estimation or control, producing slow bias, limit cycles, loss of lock, or abrupt safing triggers. For example, a small change to a star-tracker mask can force frequent dropouts; an inflated gyro bias drives the filter away from truth; softened actuator limits or mis-set gains let disturbances accumulate; altered sun-point entry criteria cause unnecessary mode switches. Secondary impacts propagate to power, thermal, and communications because pointing and geometry underpin array generation, radiator view factors, and antenna gain. The technique turns the spacecraft against itself by nudging the parameters that close the loop between what the vehicle believes and how it responds. | |
| EX-0012.09 | Electrical Power Subsystem | Adversaries alter parameters and sensed values that govern power generation, storage, and distribution so the spacecraft draws or allocates energy in harmful ways. Editable items include bus voltage/current limits, MPPT setpoints and sweep behavior, array and SADA modes, battery charge/discharge thresholds and temperature derates, state-of-charge estimation constants, latching current limiter (LCL) trip/retry settings, load-shed priorities, heater duty limits, and survival/keep-alive rules. By changing these, a threat actor can drive excess consumption (e.g., disabling load shed, raising heater floors), misreport remaining energy (skewed SoC), or push batteries outside healthy ranges, producing brownouts, repeated safing, or premature capacity loss. Manipulating thresholds and hysteresis can also create oscillations where loads repeatedly drop and re-engage, wasting energy and stressing components. The effect is accelerated depletion or misallocation of finite power, degrading mission operations and potentially preventing recovery after eclipse or anomalies. | |
| EX-0012.10 | Command & Data Handling Subsystem | C&DH relies on tables and runtime values that define how commands are parsed, queued, and dispatched and how telemetry is collected, stored, and forwarded. Targets include opcode-to-handler maps, argument limits and schemas, queue depths and priorities, message ID routing, publish/subscribe bindings, timeline/schedule entries, file catalog indices, compression and packetization settings, and event/telemetry filters. Edits to these artifacts reshape control and visibility: commands are delayed, dropped, or misrouted; telemetry is suppressed or redirected; timelines slip; and housekeeping/data products are repackaged in ways that confuse ground processing. Because many frameworks treat these values as authoritative configuration, small changes can silently propagate across subsystems, degrading responsiveness, creating backlogs, or severing the logical pathways that keep the vehicle coordinated, without modifying the underlying code. | |
| EX-0012.11 | Watchdog Timer (WDT) | Watchdogs supervise liveness by requiring software to “pet” within defined windows or the system resets. Threat actors manipulate WDT behavior by changing timeout durations, windowed-WDT bounds, reset actions, enable/mask bits, or the source that performs the petting (e.g., moving it into a low-level ISR so higher layers can be stalled indefinitely). Software WDTs can be disabled or starved; hardware WDTs are influenced via control registers, strap pins, or supervisor commands that alter prescalers and reset ladders. Outcomes include preventing intended resets so runaway tasks consume power and bandwidth, or forcing repeated resets at tactically chosen moments, e.g., during updates or handovers, to keep the system in a degraded or easily predictable state. The technique converts a safety mechanism into a tool for either unbounded execution or rhythmic disruption, depending on how the WDT parameters are rewritten. | |
| EX-0012.12 | System Clock | Spacecraft maintain multiple time bases and distribute time to schedule sequences, validate timetags, manage anti-replay counters, and align navigation/attitude processing. By writing to clock registers, altering time-distribution services, switching disciplining sources, or biasing oscillator parameters, an adversary can skew these references. Effects include reordering or prematurely firing stored command sequences, invalidating timetag checks, desynchronizing counters used by authentication or ranging, misaligning estimator windows, and corrupting timestamped payload data. Even small offsets can accumulate into observable misbehavior when autonomy and scheduling depend on tight temporal guarantees. The result is execution that happens at the wrong moment, or not at all, because the system’s notion of “now” has been shifted. | |
| EX-0012.13 | Poison AI/ML Training Data | When missions employ AI/ML, for onboard detection/classification, compression, anomaly screening, guidance aids, or ground-side planning, training data becomes a control surface. Data poisoning inserts crafted examples or labels into the training corpus or fine-tuning set so the resulting model behaves incorrectly while appearing valid. Variants include clean-label backdoors (benign-looking samples with a hidden trigger that later induces a targeted response), label flipping and biased sampling (to skew decision boundaries), and corruption of calibration/ground-truth products that the pipeline trusts. For space systems, poisoning may occur in science archives, test vectors, simulated scenes, or housekeeping datasets used to train autonomy/anomaly models; models trained on poisoned corpora are then packaged and uplinked as routine updates. Once fielded, a simple trigger pattern in imagery, telemetry, or RF features can cause misclassification, suppression, or false positives at the time and place the adversary chooses, turning model behavior into an execution mechanism keyed by data rather than code. | |
| EX-0013 | Flooding | Flooding overwhelms a communication or processing path by injecting traffic at rates or patterns the system cannot comfortably absorb. In space contexts this can occur across layers: RF/optical links (continuous carriers, wideband noise, or protocol-shaped bursts); link/protocol layers (valid-looking frames at excessive cadence); application layers (command and telemetry messages that saturate parsers and queues); and internal vehicles buses where repeated messages starve critical publishers. Effects range from outright denial of service, dropped commands, lost telemetry, missed windows, to subtler corruption, such as out-of-order processing, watchdog trips, or autonomy entering protective modes due to backlogged health data. Secondary impacts include power and thermal strain as decoders, modems, or software loops spin at maximum duty, storage filling from retries, and control loops jittering when their messages are delayed. Timing matters: floods during handovers, maneuvers, or safing transitions can magnify consequences because margins are thinnest. | |
| EX-0013.01 | Valid Commands | Here the adversary saturates paths with legitimate telecommands or bus messages so the spacecraft burns scarce resources honoring them. Inputs may be innocuous (no-ops, time queries, telemetry requests) or low-risk configuration edits, but at scale they consume command handler cycles, fill queues, generate events and logs, trigger acknowledgments, and provoke downstream work in subsystems (e.g., repeated state reports, mode toggles, or file listings). On internal buses, valid actuator or housekeeping messages replayed at high rate can starve higher-priority publishers or cause control laws to chase stale stimuli. Because the traffic is syntactically correct, and often contextually plausible, the system attempts to process it rather than discard it early, increasing CPU usage, memory pressure, and power draw. Consequences include delayed or preempted legitimate operations, transient loss of commandability, and knock-on FDIR activity as deadlines slip and telemetry appears inconsistent. | |
| EX-0013.02 | Erroneous Input | In this variant, the attacker injects non-useful energy or data, noise, malformed frames, or near-valid messages, so receivers and parsers labor to acquire, decode, and reject it. At the RF layer, wideband or protocol-shaped interference drives AGC and clock recovery to hunt, elevates BER, and forces repeated acquisitions; at the link layer, frames with correct preambles but bad CRCs keep decoders busy while yielding no payload; at the application layer, malformed packets force parse/validate/deny cycles that still consume CPU and fill error logs. On internal buses, collisions or bursts of misaddressed traffic reduce effective bandwidth and reorder legitimate messages. Even though little of the injected content passes semantic checks, the effort of dealing with it crowds out real work and may trigger retransmission storms or fallback modes that further increase load. The hallmark is volumetric invalid activity, crafted to engage front ends and parsers just long enough, that degrades integrity and availability without relying on privileged or authenticated commands. | |
| EX-0014 | Spoofing | The adversary forges inputs that subsystems treat as trustworthy truth, time tags, sensor measurements, bus messages, or navigation signals, so onboard logic acts on fabricated reality. Because many control loops and autonomy rules assume data authenticity once it passes basic sanity checks, carefully shaped spoofs can trigger mode transitions, safing, actuator commands, or payload behaviors without touching flight code. Spoofing may occur over RF (e.g., GNSS, crosslinks, TT&C beacons), over internal networks/buses (message injection with valid identifiers), or at sensor/actuator interfaces (electrical/optical stimulation that produces plausible readings). Effects range from subtle bias (drifting estimates, skewed calibrations) to acute events (unexpected slews, power reconfiguration, recorder re-indexing), and can also pollute downlinked telemetry or science products so ground controllers interpret a false narrative. The hallmark is that the spacecraft chooses the adversary’s action path because the forged data passes through normal processing chains. | |
| EX-0014.01 | Time Spoof | Time underpins sequencing, anti-replay, navigation filtering, and data labeling. An attacker that forges or biases the time seen by onboard consumers can reorder stored command execution, break timetag validation, desynchronize counters, and misalign estimation windows. Spoofing vectors include manipulating the distributed time service, introducing a higher-priority/cleaner time source (e.g., GNSS-derived time), or crafting messages that cause clock discipline to slew toward attacker-chosen values. Once time shifts, autonomous routines keyed to epochs, wheel unloads, downlink starts, heater schedules, fire early/late or not at all, and telemetry appears inconsistent to ground analysis. The signature is correct-looking time metadata that steadily or abruptly departs from truth, driving downstream logic to act at the wrong moment. | |
| EX-0014.02 | Bus Traffic Spoofing | Here the adversary forges messages on internal command/data paths (e.g., 1553, SpaceWire, CAN, custom). By emitting frames with valid identifiers, addresses, and timing, the attacker can make subscribers accept actuator setpoints, power switch toggles, mode changes, or housekeeping values that originated off-path. Because many consumers act on “latest value wins” or on message cadence, forged traffic can mask real publishers, starve critical topics, or force handlers to execute unintended branches. Gateways that translate between networks amplify impact: a spoofed message on one side can propagate to multiple domains as legitimate payload. Outcomes include misdelivered commands, silent configuration drift, and control loops chasing phantom stimuli, all while bus monitors show protocol-conformant traffic. In architectures where component identity is derived solely from message identifiers, an adversary may suppress the genuine component and fully assume its identity by publishing under the same identifiers at the expected cadence. This sustained impersonation differs from transient injection because the attacker becomes the sole authoritative source for that subsystem's telemetry, housekeeping, and command responses, while ground systems that rely on message-ID-based attribution cannot distinguish spoofed output from legitimate data. Internal suppression commands remain invisible in ground logs, making the replacement potentially forensically undetectable. | |
| EX-0014.03 | Sensor Data | The attacker presents fabricated or biased measurements that estimation and control treat as ground truth. Targets include attitude/position sensors (star trackers, gyros/IMUs, sun sensors, magnetometers, GNSS), environmental and health sensors (temperatures, currents, voltages, pressures), and payload measurements used in autonomy. Spoofs may be injected electrically at interfaces, optically (blinding/dazzling trackers or sun sensors), magnetically, or by crafting packets fed into sensor gateways. Even small, consistent biases can drive filters to incorrect states; stepwise changes can trigger fault responses or mode switches. Downstream, timestamps, quality flags, and derived products inherit the deception, creating uncertainty for operators and potentially inducing temporary loss of service as autonomy reacts to a world that never existed. | |
| EX-0014.04 | Position, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Spoofing | The adversary transmits GNSS-like signals (or manipulates crosslink-distributed time/ephemeris) so the spacecraft’s navigation solution reflects attacker-chosen states. With believable code phases, Doppler, and navigation messages, the victim can be pulled to a false position/velocity/time, causing downstream functions, attitude pointing limits, station visibility prediction, eclipse timing, antenna pointing, and anti-replay windows, to misbehave. Even when GNSS is not the primary navigation source, spoofed PNT can bias timekeeping or seed filters that fuse multiple sensors, leading to mis-scheduling and errant control. The defining feature is externally provided navigation/time that passes validity checks yet encodes a crafted trajectory or epoch. | |
| EX-0015 | Side-Channel Attack | Adversaries extract secrets or steer execution by observing or perturbing physical byproducts of computation rather than the intended interfaces. Passive channels include timing, power draw, electromagnetic emissions, acoustic/optical leakage, and thermal patterns correlated with operations such as key use, counter updates, or parser activity. Active channels deliberately induce faults during runtime, e.g., voltage or clock glitches, electromagnetic/laser injection, or targeted radiation, to flip bits, skip checks, or bias intermediate values. On spacecraft, prime targets include crypto modules, SDR/FPGA pipelines, bootloaders, and bus controllers whose switching behavior or error handling reveals protocol state or key material. With sufficient samples, or with repeated fault attempts, statistical features emerge that reduce entropy of the sensitive variable under study; in effect, a successful fault campaign turns into information leakage comparable to a passive side channel. Collection vantage points range from on-orbit proximity (for EM/optical), to ATLO and ground test (for direct probing), to instrumented compromised hardware already in the signal path. | |
| EX-0016 | Jamming | Jamming is an electronic attack that uses radio frequency energy to deny the use of a signal, whether that signal carries communications, navigation, or timing. A jammer must operate in the same frequency band and within the field of view of the antenna it is targeting. Unlike physical attacks, the interference itself is completely reversible: once the jammer is disengaged, reception can be restored. Second-order effects may persist, however, where the outage has already caused a clock to drift, a schedule to slip, or a synchronization state to be lost. Attribution of jamming can be tough because the source can be small and highly mobile, and users operating on the wrong frequency or pointed at the wrong satellite can jam friendly communications.* Similar to intentional jamming, accidental jamming can cause temporary signal degradation. Accidental jamming refers to unintentional interference with communication signals, and it can potentially impact spacecraft in various ways, depending on the severity, frequency, and duration of the interference. *https://aerospace.csis.org/aerospace101/counterspace-weapons-101 | |
| EX-0016.01 | Uplink Jamming | The attacker transmits toward the spacecraft’s uplink receive antenna, within its main lobe or significant sidelobes, at the operating frequency and sufficient power spectral density to drive the uplink Eb/N₀ below the demodulator’s threshold. Uplink jamming prevents acceptance of telecommands and ranging/acquisition traffic, delaying or blocking scheduled operations. Because the receiver resides on the spacecraft, the jammer must be located within the spacecraft’s receive footprint and match its polarization and Doppler conditions well enough to couple energy into the front end. | |
| EX-0016.02 | Downlink Jamming | Downlink jammers target the users of a satellite by creating noise in the same frequency as the downlink signal from the satellite. A downlink jammer only needs to be as powerful as the signal being received on the ground and must be within the field of view of the receiving terminal’s antenna. This limits the number of users that can be affected by a single jammer. Since many ground terminals use directional antennas pointed at the sky, a downlink jammer typically needs to be located above the terminal it is attempting to jam. This limitation can be overcome by employing a downlink jammer on an air or space-based platform, which positions the jammer between the terminal and the satellite. This also allows the jammer to cover a wider area and potentially affect more users. Ground terminals with omnidirectional antennas, such as many GPS receivers, have a wider field of view and thus are more susceptible to downlink jamming from different angles on the ground.* *https://aerospace.csis.org/aerospace101/counterspace-weapons-101 | |
| EX-0016.03 | Position, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Jamming | The attacker raises the noise floor in GNSS bands so satellite navigation signals are not acquired or tracked. Loss of PNT manifests as degraded or unavailable position/velocity/time solutions, which in turn disrupts functions that depend on them, time distribution, attitude aiding, scheduling, anti-replay windows, and visibility prediction. Because GNSS signals at the receiver are extremely weak, modest jammers within the antenna field of view can produce outsized effects; mobile emitters can create intermittent outages aligned with the attacker’s objectives. | |
| EX-0017 | Kinetic Physical Attack | The adversary inflicts damage by physically striking space assets or their supporting elements, producing irreversible effects that are generally visible to space situational awareness. Kinetic attacks in orbit are commonly grouped into direct-ascent engagements, launched from Earth to intercept a target on a specific pass, and co-orbital engagements, in which an on-orbit vehicle maneuvers to collide with or detonate near the target. Outcomes include structural breakup, loss of attitude control, sensor or antenna destruction, and wholesale mission termination; secondary effects include debris creation whose persistence depends on altitude and geometry. Because launches and on-orbit collisions are measurable, these actions tend to be more attributable and offer near–real-time confirmation of effect compared to non-kinetic methods. | |
| EX-0017.01 | Direct Ascent ASAT | A direct-ascent ASAT is often the most commonly thought of threat to space assets. It typically involves a medium- or long-range missile launching from the Earth to damage or destroy a satellite in orbit. This form of attack is often easily attributed due to the missile launch which can be easily detected. Due to the physical nature of the attacks, they are irreversible and provide the attacker with near real-time confirmation of success. Direct-ascent ASATs create orbital debris which can be harmful to other objects in orbit. Lower altitudes allow for more debris to burn up in the atmosphere, while attacks at higher altitudes result in more debris remaining in orbit, potentially damaging other spacecraft in orbit.* *https://aerospace.csis.org/aerospace101/counterspace-weapons-101 | |
| EX-0017.02 | Co-Orbital ASAT | A co-orbital ASAT uses a spacecraft already in space to conduct a deliberate collision or near-field detonation. After insertion, often well before any hostile action, the vehicle performs rendezvous and proximity operations to achieve the desired relative geometry, then closes to impact or triggers a kinetic or explosive device. Guidance relies on relative navigation (optical, lidar, crosslink cues) and precise timing to manage closing speeds and contact angle. Compared with direct-ascent shots, co-orbital approaches can loiter, shadow, or “stalk” a target for extended periods, masking as inspection or servicing until the terminal maneuver. Effects include mechanical disruption, fragmentation, or mission-ending damage, with debris characteristics shaped by the chosen altitude, closing velocity, and collision geometry. | |
| EX-0018 | Non-Kinetic Physical Attack | The adversary inflicts physical effects on a satellite without mechanical contact, using energy delivered through the environment. Principal modalities are electromagnetic pulse (EMP), high-power laser (optical/thermal effects), and high-power microwave (HPM). These methods can be tuned for reversible disruption (temporary sensor saturation, processor upsets) or irreversible damage (component burnout, optics degradation), and may be executed from ground, airborne, or space platforms given line-of-sight and power/aperture conditions. Forensics are often ambiguous: signatures may resemble environmental phenomena or normal degradations, and confirmation of effect is frequently limited to what the operator observes in telemetry or performance loss. | |
| EX-0018.01 | Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) | An EMP delivers a broadband, high-amplitude electromagnetic transient that couples into spacecraft electronics and harnesses, upsetting or damaging components over wide areas. In space, the archetype is a high-altitude nuclear event whose prompt fields induce immediate upsets and whose secondary radiation environment elevates dose and charging for an extended period along affected orbits. Consequences include widespread single-event effects, latch-ups, permanent degradation of sensitive devices, and accelerated aging of solar arrays and materials. The effect envelope is large and largely indiscriminate: multiple satellites within view can experience simultaneous anomalies consistent with intense electromagnetic stress and enhanced radiation. | |
| EX-0018.02 | High-Powered Laser | A high-powered laser can be used to permanently or temporarily damage critical satellite components (i.e. solar arrays or optical centers). If directed toward a satellite’s optical center, the attack is known as blinding or dazzling. Blinding, as the name suggests, causes permanent damage to the optics of a satellite. Dazzling causes temporary loss of sight for the satellite. While there is clear attribution of the location of the laser at the time of the attack, the lasers used in these attacks may be mobile, which can make attribution to a specific actor more difficult because the attacker does not have to be in their own nation, or even continent, to conduct such an attack. Only the satellite operator will know if the attack is successful, meaning the attacker has limited confirmation of success, as an attacked nation may not choose to announce that their satellite has been attacked or left vulnerable for strategic reasons. A high-powered laser attack can also leave the targeted satellite disabled and uncontrollable, which could lead to collateral damage if the satellite begins to drift. A higher-powered laser may permanently damage a satellite by overheating its parts. The parts most susceptible to this are satellite structures, thermal control panels, and solar panels.* *https://aerospace.csis.org/aerospace101/counterspace-weapons-101 | |
| EX-0018.03 | High-Powered Microwave | High-powered microwave (HPM) weapons can be used to disrupt or destroy a satellite’s electronics. A “front-door” HPM attack uses a satellite’s own antennas as an entry path, while a “back-door” attack attempts to enter through small seams or gaps around electrical connections and shielding. A front-door attack is more straightforward to carry out, provided the HPM is positioned within the field of view of the antenna that it is using as a pathway, but it can be thwarted if the satellite uses circuits designed to detect and block surges of energy entering through the antenna. In contrast, a back-door attack is more challenging, because it must exploit design or manufacturing flaws, but it can be conducted from many angles relative to the satellite. Both types of attacks can be either reversible or irreversible; however, the attacker may not be able to control the severity of the damage from the attack. Both front-door and back-door HPM attacks can be difficult to attribute to an attacker, and like a laser weapon, the attacker may not know if the attack has been successful. A HPM attack may leave the target satellite disabled and uncontrollable which can cause it to drift into other satellites, creating further collateral damage.* *https://aerospace.csis.org/aerospace101/counterspace-weapons-101 | |
| PER-0001 | Memory Compromise | The adversary arranges for malicious content to survive resets and mode changes by targeting memories and execution paths that initialize the system. Candidates include boot ROM handoff vectors, first/second-stage loaders, non-volatile images (flash/EEPROM), “golden” fallback partitions, configuration words/fuses, and RAM regions reconstructed at start-up from stored files or tables. Persistence may also ride auto-run mechanisms, init scripts, procedure engines, stored command sequences, or event hooks that execute on boot, safe-mode entry/exit, time triggers, or receipt of specific telemetry/commands. Variants keep the core payload only in RAM but ensure it is reloaded after every restart by patching copy-on-boot routines, altering file catalogs, or modifying table loaders so the same bytes are restored. The common thread is control of where the spacecraft looks for what to run next, so unauthorized logic is reinstated whenever the system resets or transitions modes. | |
| PER-0002 | Backdoor | A backdoor is a covert access path that bypasses normal authentication, authorization, or operational checks so the attacker can reenter the system on demand. Backdoors may be preexisting (undocumented service modes, maintenance accounts, debug features) or introduced by the adversary during development, integration, or on-orbit updates. Triggers range from “magic” opcodes and timetags to specific geometry/time conditions, counters, or data patterns embedded in routine traffic. The access they provide varies from expanded command sets and relaxed rate/size limits to alternate communications profiles and hidden file/parameter interfaces. Well-crafted backdoors blend with nominal behavior, appearing as ordinary operations while quietly accepting instructions that other paths would reject, thereby sustaining the attacker’s foothold across passes, resets, and operator handovers. | |
| PER-0002.01 | Hardware Backdoor | Hardware backdoors leverage properties of the physical design to provide durable, low-visibility reentry. Examples include enabled test/scan chains, manufacturing or boot-strap modes invoked by pins or registers, persistent debug interfaces (JTAG/SWD/UART), undocumented device commands, and logic inserted in FPGA/ASIC designs that activates under specific stimuli. Because these mechanisms sit below or beside flight software, they can grant direct access to buses, memories, or peripheral control even when higher layers appear healthy. Triggers may be electrical (pin states, voltage/clock sequences), protocol-level (special patterns on an instrument link), or environmental/temporal (particular temperature ranges, timing offsets). Once on orbit, such pathways are difficult to remove or reconfigure, allowing the attacker to persist by reusing the same physical entry points whenever conditions are met. | |
| PER-0002.02 | Software Backdoor | Software backdoors are code paths intentionally crafted or later inserted to provide privileged functionality on cue. In flight contexts, they appear as hidden command handlers, alternate authentication checks, special user/role constructs, or procedure/script hooks that accept nonpublic inputs. They can be embedded in flight applications, separation kernels or drivers, gateway processors that translate bus/payload traffic, or update/loader utilities that handle tables and images. SDR configurations offer another avenue: non-public waveforms, subcarriers, or framing profiles that, when selected, expose a private command channel. Activation is often conditional, specific timetags, geometry, message sequences, or file names, to keep the feature dormant during routine testing and operations. Once present, the backdoor provides a repeatable way to execute commands or modify state without traversing the standard control surfaces, sustaining the adversary’s access over time. | |
| PER-0003 | Ground System Presence | The adversary maintains long-lived access by residing within mission ground infrastructure that already has end-to-end reach to the spacecraft. Persistence can exist in operator workstations and mission control software, schedulers/orchestrators, station control (antenna/mount, modem/baseband), automation scripts and procedure libraries, identity and ticketing systems, and cloud-hosted mission services. With this foothold, the actor can repeatedly queue commands, updates, or file transfers during routine passes; mirror legitimate operator behavior to blend in; and refresh their tooling as software is upgraded. Presence on the ground also supports durable reconnaissance (pass plans, dictionaries, key/counter states) and continuous staging so each window to the vehicle can be exploited without re-establishing access. | |
| PER-0004 | Replace Cryptographic Keys | The adversary cements control by changing the cryptographic material the spacecraft uses to authenticate or protect links and updates. Targets include uplink authentication keys and counters, link-encryption/session keys and key-encryption keys (KEKs), key identifiers/selectors, and algorithm profiles. Using authorized rekey commands or key-loading procedures, often designed for over-the-air use, the attacker installs new values in non-volatile storage and updates selectors so subsequent traffic must use the attacker’s keys to be accepted. Variants desynchronize anti-replay by advancing counters or switching epochs, or strand operators by flipping profiles to a mode for which only the adversary holds parameters. Once replaced, the new material persists across resets and mode changes, turning the spacecraft into a node that recognizes the adversary’s channel while rejecting former controllers. | |
| PER-0005 | Credentialed Persistence | Threat actors may acquire or leverage valid credentials to maintain persistent access to a spacecraft or its supporting command and control (C2) systems. These credentials may include system service accounts, user accounts, maintenance access credentials, cryptographic keys, or other authentication mechanisms that enable continued entry without triggering access alarms. By operating with legitimate credentials, adversaries can sustain access over extended periods, evade detection, and facilitate follow-on tactics such as command execution, data exfiltration, or lateral movement. Credentialed persistence is particularly effective in environments lacking strong credential lifecycle management, segmentation, or monitoring allowing threat actors to exploit trusted pathways while remaining embedded in mission operations. | |
| DE-0001 | Disable Fault Management | The adversary suppresses or alters fault detection, isolation, and recovery (FDIR) so unauthorized actions proceed without triggering safing or alerts. Targets include watchdogs and heartbeat monitors; limit and sanity checks on sensor/command values; command interlocks and inhibit masks; voting and redundancy-management logic; and event/alert generation and routing. Techniques range from patching or bypassing checks in flight code, to rewriting parameter/limit tables, to muting publishers that report faults. More subtle variants desensitize thresholds, freeze counters, or delay responses just long enough for a malicious sequence to complete. With FDIR dulled or offline, anomalous states resemble nominal behavior and automated mitigations do not engage, masking the attack from ground oversight. | |
| DE-0002 | Disrupt or Deceive Downlink | Threat actors may target any point in the telemetry chain, onboard generation and transmission, the downlink path itself, or ground-side reception, processing, and display, to disrupt the operator’s visibility into spacecraft health and activity. This may involve denial-based attacks that prevent the spacecraft from transmitting telemetry to the ground (e.g., disabling telemetry links or crashing telemetry software), or more subtle deception-based attacks that manipulate telemetry content to conceal unauthorized actions. Since telemetry is the primary method ground controllers rely on to monitor spacecraft status, any disruption or manipulation can delay or prevent detection of malicious activity, suppress automated or manual mitigations, or degrade trust in telemetry-based decision support systems. | |
| DE-0002.01 | Inhibit Ground System Functionality | Threat actors may utilize access to the ground system to inhibit its ability to accurately process, render, or interpret spacecraft telemetry, effectively leaving ground controllers unaware of the spacecraft’s true state or activity. This may involve traditional denial-based techniques, such as disabling telemetry software, corrupting processing pipelines, or crashing display interfaces. In addition, more subtle deception-based techniques may be used to falsify telemetry data within the ground system , such as modifying command counters, acknowledgments, housekeeping data, or sensor outputs , to provide the appearance of nominal operation. These actions can suppress alerts, mask unauthorized activity, or prevent both automated and manual mitigations from being initiated based on misleading ground-side information. Because telemetry is the primary method by which ground controllers monitor the health, behavior, and safety of the spacecraft, any disruption or falsification of this data directly undermines situational awareness and operational control. Architectural limitations in ground station software can also enable deception without requiring direct compromise of the ground system. In publish-subscribe spacecraft architectures, ground tools typically attribute telemetry solely by Message ID rather than by producing application. This design assumes that Message IDs reliably identify the originating component. When a malicious onboard application publishes telemetry under a legitimate subsystem's Message ID, ground logs permanently record the spoofed data as genuine with no indication of the true source. Similarly, internal spacecraft bus commands may not be downlinked or logged by ground systems, rendering suppression events forensically invisible. This attribution gap allows onboard component impersonation to succeed without any ground system compromise: the ground infrastructure functions as designed, yet cannot distinguish authentic telemetry from architecturally valid spoofing. | |
| DE-0002.02 | Jam Link Signal | Threat actors may overwhelm/jam the downlink signal to prevent transmitted telemetry signals from reaching their destination without severe modification/interference, effectively leaving ground controllers unaware of vehicle activity during this time. Telemetry is the only method in which ground controllers can monitor the health and stability of the spacecraft while in orbit. By disabling this downlink, threat actors may be able to stop mitigations from taking place. | |
| DE-0002.03 | Inhibit Spacecraft Functionality | In this variant, telemetry is suppressed at the source by manipulating on-board generation or transmission. Methods include disabling or pausing telemetry publishers, altering packet filters and rates, muting event/report channels, reconfiguring recorder playback, retuning/muting transmitters, or switching to modes that emit only minimal beacons. The spacecraft continues operating, but the downlink no longer reflects true activity or arrives too sparsely to support monitoring. By constraining what is produced or transmitted, the adversary reduces opportunities for detection while other actions proceed. | |
| DE-0003 | On-Board Values Obfuscation | The adversary manipulates housekeeping and control values that operators and autonomy rely on to judge activity, health, and command hygiene. Targets include command/telemetry counters, event/severity flags, downlink/reporting modes, cryptographic-mode indicators, and the system clock. By rewriting, freezing, or biasing these fields, and by selecting reduced or summary telemetry modes, unauthorized actions can proceed while the downlinked picture appears routine or incomplete. The result is delayed recognition, misattribution to environmental effects, or logs that cannot be reconciled post-facto. | |
| DE-0003.01 | Vehicle Command Counter (VCC) | The VCC tracks how many commands the spacecraft has accepted. An adversary masks activity by zeroing, freezing, or selectively decrementing the VCC, or by steering actions through paths that do not increment it (maintenance dictionaries, alternate receivers, hidden handlers). They may also overwrite the telemetry field that reports the VCC so ground displays show a lower or steady count while high volumes of commands are processed. This breaks simple “command volume” heuristics and makes bursty activity look normal. | |
| DE-0003.02 | Rejected Command Counter | This counter records commands that failed checks or were refused. To hide probing and trial-and-error, the adversary suppresses increments, periodically clears the value, or forges the downlinked field so rejection rates appear benign. Variants also tamper with associated reason codes or event entries, replacing them with innocuous outcomes. Analysts reviewing telemetry see no evidence of failed attempts even as the system is being exercised aggressively. | |
| DE-0003.03 | Command Receiver On/Off Mode | By toggling receiver enable states (per-receiver, per-antenna, or per-band), the adversary creates deliberate “quiet windows” in which outside intervention cannot arrive. Turning a command receiver off, or shifting to a configuration that ignores the primary path, allows queued actions or onboard procedures to run without interruption, while operators perceive a transient loss of commandability consistent with geometry or environment. Brief, well-timed toggles can also desynchronize counters and handovers, complicating reconstruction of what occurred. | |
| DE-0003.04 | Command Receivers Received Signal Strength | Threat actors may target the on-board command receivers received signal parameters (i.e., automatic gain control (AGC)) in order to stop specific commands or signals from being processed by the spacecraft. For ground controllers to communicate with spacecraft in orbit, the on-board receivers need to be configured to receive signals with a specific signal to noise ratio (ratio of signal power to the noise power). Targeting values related to the antenna signaling that are modifiable can prevent the spacecraft from receiving ground commands. | |
| DE-0003.05 | Command Receiver Lock Modes | Receivers advertise acquisition states, bit lock, frame lock, and command lock, that indicate readiness to accept telecommands. Adversaries leverage these indicators in two ways: (1) use command-lock tests to validate geometry, power, Doppler, and polarization without risking visible command execution; and (2) tamper with the values that report lock status so ground views never show that lock was achieved. Techniques include freezing or clearing lock flags and counters, raising/lowering internal thresholds so lock occurs without being reported (or vice versa), and timing brief lock intervals between telemetry samples. The result is a window where the spacecraft is receptive to commands while downlinked status suggests otherwise. | |
| DE-0003.06 | Telemetry Downlink Modes | Spacecraft expose modes that control what telemetry is sent and how, real-time channels, recorder playback, beacon/summary only, event-driven reporting, and per-virtual-channel/APID selections. By switching modes or editing the associated parameters (rates, filters, playback queues, index ranges), an adversary can thin, defer, or reroute observability. Typical effects include suppressing high-rate engineering streams in favor of minimal beacons, delaying playback of time periods of interest, replaying benign segments, or redirecting packets to alternate virtual channels that are not routinely monitored. Telemetry continues to flow, but it no longer reflects the activity the operators need to see. | |
| DE-0003.07 | Cryptographic Modes | Many missions separate authentication from confidentiality and allow on-orbit selection of algorithms, keys, profiles, or “crypto off/clear” states. Adversaries manipulate these mode controls and selectors to desynchronize ground and space or to hide content: flipping to a profile that the ground is not using, requesting clear telemetry while maintaining authenticated uplink, or rotating key IDs so frames validate internally but appear undecodable to external tools. Mode indicators and status words can also be biased so ground displays show expected settings while the link actually operates under attacker-chosen parameters, masking command and data exchanges within normal-looking traffic. | |
| DE-0003.08 | Received Commands | Spacecraft typically maintain histories of accepted, rejected, and executed commands, buffers, logs, or file records that can be downlinked on demand or periodically. An adversary conceals activity by editing or pruning these artifacts: removing entries, altering opcodes or arguments, rewriting timestamps and source identifiers, rolling logs early, or repopulating with benign-looking commands to balance counters. Related acknowledgments and event records may be suppressed or reclassified so cross-checks appear consistent. After manipulation, the official command history shows a plausible narrative that omits or mischaracterizes the adversary’s actions. | |
| DE-0003.09 | System Clock for Evasion | The adversary biases the spacecraft’s authoritative time so that telemetry, event logs, and command histories appear shifted or inconsistent. By writing clock registers, altering disciplining sources (e.g., GNSS vs. free-running oscillator), or tweaking distribution services and offsets, they can make stored commands execute “earlier” or “later” on the timeline and misalign acknowledgments with actual actions. Downlinked frames still carry plausible timestamps near packet headers, but those stamps no longer reflect when data was produced, complicating reconstruction of sequences and masking causality during incident analysis. | |
| DE-0003.10 | GPS Ephemeris | A satellite with a GPS receiver can use ephemeris data from GPS satellites to estimate its own position in space. A hostile actor could spoof the GPS signals to cause erroneous calculations of the satellite’s position. The received ephemeris data is often telemetered and can be monitored for indications of GPS spoofing. Reception of ephemeris data that changes suddenly without a reasonable explanation (such as a known GPS satellite handoff), could provide an indication of GPS spoofing and warrant further analysis. Threat actors could also change the course of the vehicle and falsify the telemetered data to temporarily convince ground operators the vehicle is still on a proper course. | |
| DE-0003.11 | Watchdog Timer (WDT) for Evasion | By modifying watchdog parameters or who “pets” them, an adversary shapes what evidence survives. Extending or disabling timeouts allows long-running processes to operate without forced resets that would expose abnormal CPU or power usage; conversely, shortening windows or relocating the petting source to a low-level ISR can induce frequent resets that wipe volatile traces, break correlation in logs, and explain anomalies as “spurious reboots.” In both directions, the watchdog becomes a timing tool for hiding activity rather than a guardrail against it. | |
| DE-0003.12 | Poison AI/ML Training for Evasion | When security monitoring relies on AI/ML (e.g., anomaly detection on telemetry, RF fingerprints, or command semantics), the training data itself is a target. Data-poisoning introduces crafted examples or labels so the learned model embeds false associations, treating attacker behaviors as normal, or flagging benign patterns instead. Variants include clean-label backdoors keyed to subtle triggers, label flipping that shifts decision boundaries, and biased sampling that suppresses rare-but-critical signatures. Models trained on tainted corpora are later deployed as routine updates; once in service, the adversary presents inputs containing the trigger or profile they primed, and the detector omits or downranks the very behaviors that would reveal the intrusion. | |
| DE-0003.13 | Trusted Process Reporting Suppression | Adversaries may leverage process injection methods to execute malicious functionality within trusted onboard software processes in order to suppress, delay, filter, or selectively conceal telemetry and operational reporting associated with unauthorized activity. By operating inside legitimate telemetry handlers, flight software tasks, middleware, or operating system services, attackers can interfere with the generation, aggregation, or transmission of monitoring data before it is downlinked or processed by onboard monitoring systems. Unlike direct modification of individual operational values, this technique focuses on manipulating the reporting path itself to prevent malicious activity from being observed, correlated, or reconstructed by operators or autonomy systems. Examples may include suppressing telemetry associated with unauthorized commands, filtering fault events prior to downlink, selectively disabling event reporting during malicious operations, delaying housekeeping updates, or preventing monitoring services from publishing anomalous state information. | |
| DE-0004 | Masquerading | The adversary presents themselves as an authorized origin so activity appears legitimate across RF, protocol, and organizational boundaries. Techniques include crafting telecommand frames with correct headers, counters, and dictionaries; imitating station “fingerprints” such as Doppler, polarization, timing, and framing; replaying or emulating crosslink identities; and using insider-derived credentials or roles to operate mission tooling. Masquerading can also target metadata, virtual channel IDs, APIDs, source sequence counts, and facility identifiers, so logs and telemetry attribute actions to expected entities. The effect is that commands, file transfers, or configuration changes are processed as if they came from approved sources, reducing scrutiny and delaying detection. | |
| DE-0005 | Subvert Protections via Safe-Mode | The adversary exploits the spacecraft’s recovery posture to bypass controls that are stricter in nominal operations. During safe-mode, vehicles often accept contingency dictionaries, relax rate/size and timetag checks, activate alternate receivers or antennas, and emit reduced or summary telemetry. By timing actions to this state, or deliberately inducing it, the attacker issues maintenance-looking edits, loads, or mode changes that proceed under broadened acceptance while downlink visibility is thinned. Unauthorized activity blends with anomaly response, evading both automated safeguards and operator suspicion. | |
| DE-0006 | Modify Whitelist | Threat actors may target whitelists on the spacecrafts as a means to execute and/or hide malicious processes/programs. Whitelisting is a common technique used on traditional IT systems but has also been used on spacecrafts. Whitelisting is used to prevent execution of unknown or potentially malicious software. However, this technique can be bypassed if not implemented correctly but threat actors may also simply attempt to modify the whitelist outright to ensure their malicious software will operate on the spacecraft that utilizes whitelisting. | |
| DE-0007 | Evasion via Rootkit | A rootkit hides malicious activity by interposing on reporting paths after the system has booted. In flight contexts this includes patching flight software APIs, kernel syscalls, message queues, and telemetry publishers so task lists, counters, health channels, and event severities are falsified before downlink. Command handlers can be hooked to suppress evidence of certain opcodes or sources; recorder catalogs and file listings can be rewritten on the fly; and housekeeping can be biased to show nominal temperatures, currents, or voltages while actions proceed. The defining feature is runtime concealment: the observability surfaces operators rely on are altered to present a curated, benign narrative. | |
| DE-0008 | Evasion via Bootkit | A bootkit hides activity by running first and shaping what higher layers will later observe. Positioned in boot ROM handoff or early loaders, it can select or patch images in memory, alter device trees and driver tables, seed forged counters and timestamps, and preconfigure telemetry/crypto modes so subsequent components launch into a reality curated by the attacker. Because integrity and logging mechanisms are initialized afterward, the resulting view of processes, files, and histories reflects the bootkit’s choices, allowing long-term evasion that persists across resets and mode transitions. | |
| DE-0009 | Camouflage, Concealment, and Decoys (CCD) | The adversary exploits the physical and operational environment, or manipulates the sensing and processing on which observers depend, to reduce detectability, mislead, or provoke a response. Tactics include signature management (minimizing RF/optical/thermal/RCS), controlled emissions timing, deliberate power-down/dormancy, geometry choices that hide within clutter or eclipse, and the deployment of decoys that generate convincing tracks. CCD can also leverage naturally noisy conditions, debris-rich regions, auroral radio noise, solar storms, to mask proximity operations or to provide plausible alternate explanations for anomalies. The unifying theme is perception management: shape what sensors and their processing chains perceive so surveillance and attribution lag, misclassify, or look elsewhere. This may be achieved through the environment, through decoys and signatures presented to distant observers, or through deception directed at a particular vehicle’s onboard sensing or a particular ground processing pipeline. The same methods may be used to provoke a defender into committing limited resources prematurely. | |
| DE-0009.01 | Debris Field | The attacker co-orbits within or near clusters of small objects, matching apparent characteristics (brightness, RCS, tumbling, intermittent emissions) so the vehicle blends with background debris. Dormant periods with minimized attitude control and emissions further the illusion. This posture supports covert inspection, staging for a later intercept, or timing cyber-physical actions (e.g., propulsion or actuator manipulation) to coincide with passages through clutter, increasing the chance that damage or anomalies are attributed to debris strikes rather than deliberate activity. Maintenance of the disguise may involve small, infrequent maneuvers to keep relative motion consistent with “free” debris dynamics. | |
| DE-0009.02 | Space Weather | The adversary aligns operations with heightened solar/geomagnetic activity so effects resemble natural disturbances. During storms, receivers struggle with scintillation and increased noise; SEUs and resets rise; navigation and timing degrade; and operators expect anomalies. By conducting EMI, spoofing, or timing-sensitive sequences within these windows, the attacker benefits from ambient interference and plausible attribution to space weather. Telemetry gaps, link fades, or transient upsets appear consistent with the environment, delaying suspicion that a deliberate action occurred. | |
| DE-0009.03 | Trigger Premature Intercept | Decoys and deceptive signatures are used to provoke defenders into committing limited resources early, inspection vehicles, interceptors, laser dwell time, maneuver fuel, or analyst attention. The attacker deploys objects or emissions that mimic credible threats (trajectories, RCS/brightness, modulation) so tracking and discrimination systems prioritize the decoy. While defenses engage, the true operation proceeds with reduced scrutiny, or follows shortly after when defensive capacity and timelines are depleted. The effect is resource exhaustion and timeline compression on the defender’s side, increasing the success window for the actual action. | |
| DE-0009.04 | Targeted Deception of Onboard SSA/SDA Sensors | The attacker aims at the spacecraft’s own proximity-awareness stack, cameras, star-tracker side products, lidar/radar, RF transponders, and the onboard fusion that estimates nearby objects. Methods include optical dazzling or reflective camouflage that confuses centroiding and detection, RCS management to fall below radar gate thresholds, intermittent or misleading transponder replies, and presentation of spoofed fiducials or optical patterns tuned to the vehicle’s detection algorithms. By biasing these local sensors and their fusion logic, the adversary hides approach, distorts relative-state estimates, or induces the target to classify a nearby object as benign clutter, masking proximity operations without relying on external catalog errors. | |
| DE-0009.05 | Corruption or Overload of Ground-Based SDA Systems | The adversary targets terrestrial space-domain awareness pipelines, sensor networks, tracking centers, catalogs, and their data flows, to blind or confuse broad-area monitoring. Paths include compromising or spoofing observational feeds (radar/optical returns, TLE updates, ephemeris exchanges), injecting falsified or time-shifted tracks, tampering with fusion/association parameters, and saturating ingestion and alerting with noisy or adversarial inputs. Where SDA employs AI/ML for detection and correlation, the attacker can degrade models by flooding them with ambiguous scenes or crafted features that increase false positives/negatives and consume analyst cycles. Unlike onboard deception, this approach skews the external decision-support picture across many assets at once, delaying detection of real maneuvers and providing cover for concurrent operations. | |
| DE-0010 | Overflow Audit Log | The adversary hides activity by exhausting finite on-board logging and telemetry buffers so incriminating events are overwritten before they can be downlinked. Spacecraft typically use ring buffers with severity filters, per-subsystem quotas, and scheduled dump windows; by generating bursts of benign but high-frequency events (file listings, status queries, low-severity housekeeping, repeated mode toggles) or by provoking chatter from chatty subsystems, the attacker accelerates rollover. Variants target recorder indexes and event catalogs so new entries displace older ones, or they align floods with known downlink gaps and pass handovers when retention is shortest. To analysts on the ground, logs appear present but incomplete, showing a plausible narrative that omits the very interval when unauthorized commands or updates occurred. | |
| DE-0011 | Credentialed Evasion | Threat actors may leverage valid credentials to conduct unauthorized actions against a spacecraft or related system in a way that conceals their presence and evades detection. By using trusted authentication mechanisms attackers can blend in with legitimate operations and avoid triggering access control alarms or anomaly detection systems. This technique enables evasion by appearing authorized, allowing adversaries to issue commands, access sensitive subsystems, or move laterally within spacecraft or constellation architectures without exploiting software vulnerabilities. When credential use is poorly segmented or monitored, this form of access can be used to maintain stealthy persistence or facilitate other tactics under the guise of legitimate activity. | |
| LM-0001 | Hosted Payload | The adversary pivots through the host–payload boundary to reach additional subsystems. Hosted payloads exchange power, time, housekeeping, and data with the bus via defined gateways (e.g., SpaceWire, 1553, Ethernet) and often support file services, table loads, and command dictionaries distinct from the host’s. A foothold on the payload can be used to inject traffic through the gateway processor, request privileged services (time/ephemeris distribution, firmware loads), or ride shared backplanes where payload traffic is bridged into C&DH networks. In some designs, payload processes execute on host compute or expose maintenance modes that temporarily widen access, creating paths from the payload into attitude, power, storage, or recorder resources. The movement is transitive: compromise a co-resident unit, then traverse the trusted interface that already exists for mission operations. | |
| LM-0002 | Exploit Lack of Bus Segregation | On flat architectures, where remote terminals, subsystems, and payloads share a common bus with minimal partitioning, any node that can transmit may influence many others. An attacker leverages this by forging message IDs or terminal addresses, replaying actuator/sensor frames, seizing or imitating bus-controller roles, or abusing gateway bridges that forward traffic between links (e.g., 1553↔SpaceWire/CAN). Because consumers often act on the latest valid-looking message, crafted traffic from one compromised device can reconfigure peers, toggle power domains, or write persistent parameters. Weak role enforcement and broadcast semantics allow privilege escalation from a peripheral to effective system-wide influence, turning the shared medium into a highway for further compromise. | |
| LM-0003 | Constellation Hopping via Crosslink | In networks where vehicles exchange data over inter-satellite links, a compromise on one spacecraft becomes a springboard to others. The attacker crafts crosslink traffic, routing updates, service advertisements, time/ephemeris distribution, file or tasking messages, that appears to originate from a trusted neighbor and targets gateway functions that bridge crosslink traffic into command/data paths. Once accepted, those messages can queue procedures, deliver configuration/table edits, or open file transfer sessions on adjacent vehicles. In mesh or hub-and-spoke constellations, this enables “hop-by-hop” spread: a single foothold uses shared trust and protocol uniformity to reach additional satellites without contacting the ground segment. | |
| LM-0004 | Visiting Vehicle Interface(s) | Docking, berthing, or short-duration attach events create high-trust, high-bandwidth connections between vehicles. During these operations, automatic sequences verify latches, exchange status, synchronize time, and enable umbilicals that carry data and power; maintenance tools may also push firmware or tables across the interface. An attacker positioned on the visiting vehicle can exploit these handshakes and service channels to inject commands, transfer files, or access bus gateways on the host. Because many actions are expected “just after dock,” malicious traffic can ride the same procedures that commission the interface, allowing lateral movement from the visiting craft into the target spacecraft’s C&DH, payload, or support subsystems. | |
| LM-0007 | Credentialed Traversal | Movement is achieved by reusing legitimate credentials and keys to cross boundaries that rely on trust rather than strict isolation. Using operator or service accounts, maintenance logins, station certificates, or spacecraft-recognized crypto, the adversary invokes gateways that bridge domains, C&DH to payload, crosslink routers to onboard networks, or constellation management planes to individual vehicles. Because the traversal occurs through approved interfaces (file services, table loaders, remote procedure calls, crosslink tasking), actions appear as routine operations while reaching progressively more privileged subsystems or neighboring spacecraft. Where roles and scopes are broad or reused, the same credential opens multiple enclaves, turning authorization itself into the lateral path. | |
| EXF-0001 | Replay | The adversary re-sends previously valid commands or procedures to cause the spacecraft to transmit data again, then captures the resulting downlink. Typical targets are recorder playbacks, payload product dumps, housekeeping snapshots, or file directory listings. By aligning replays with geometry (e.g., when the satellite is in view of actor-controlled apertures) and with acceptance conditions (counters, timetags, mode), the attacker induces legitimate transmissions that appear routine to operators. Variants include selectively replaying index ranges to fetch only high-value intervals, reissuing subscription/telemetry-rate changes to increase data volume, or queueing playbacks that fire during later passes when interception is feasible. | |
| EXF-0002 | Side-Channel Exfiltration | Information is extracted not by reading files or decrypting frames but by observing physical or protocol byproducts of computation, power draw, electromagnetic emissions, timing, thermal signatures, or traffic patterns. Repeated measurements create distinctive fingerprints correlated with internal states (key use, table loads, parser branches, buffer occupancy). Matching those fingerprints to models or templates yields sensitive facts without direct access to the protected data. In space systems, vantage points span proximity assets (for EM/thermal), ground testing and ATLO (for direct probing), compromised on-board modules that can sample rails or sensors, and remote observation of link-layer timing behaviors. | |
| EXF-0002.03 | Traffic Analysis Attacks | In a terrestrial environment, threat actors use traffic analysis attacks to analyze traffic flow to gather topological information. This traffic flow can divulge information about critical nodes, such as the aggregator node in a sensor network. In the space environment, specifically with relays and constellations, traffic analysis can be used to understand the energy capacity of spacecraft node and the fact that the transceiver component of a spacecraft node consumes the most power. The spacecraft nodes in a constellation network limit the use of the transceiver to transmit or receive information either at a regulated time interval or only when an event has been detected. This generally results in an architecture comprising some aggregator spacecraft nodes within a constellation network. These spacecraft aggregator nodes are the sensor nodes whose primary purpose is to relay transmissions from nodes toward the ground station in an efficient manner, instead of monitoring events like a normal node. The added functionality of acting as a hub for information gathering and preprocessing before relaying makes aggregator nodes an attractive target to side channel attacks. A possible side channel attack could be as simple as monitoring the occurrences and duration of computing activities at an aggregator node. If a node is frequently in active states (instead of idle states), there is high probability that the node is an aggregator node and also there is a high probability that the communication with the node is valid. Such leakage of information is highly undesirable because the leaked information could be strategically used by threat actors in the accumulation phase of an attack. | |
| EXF-0003 | Signal Interception | The adversary captures mission traffic in transit, on ground networks or over the space link, so that payload products, housekeeping, and command/ack exchanges can be reconstructed offline. Vantage points include tapped ground LANs/WANs between MOC and stations, baseband interfaces (IF/IQ), RF/optical receptions within the antenna field of view, and crosslink monitors. Depending on protection, the haul ranges from plaintext frames to encrypted bitstreams whose headers, rates, and schedules still yield valuable context (APIDs, VCIDs, pass timing, file manifest cues). Intercepted sessions can guide later replay, cloning, or targeted downlink requests. | |
| EXF-0003.01 | Uplink Exfiltration | Here the target is command traffic from ground to space. By receiving or tapping the uplink path, the adversary collects telecommand frames, ranging/acquisition exchanges, and any file or table uploads. If confidentiality is weak or absent, opcode/argument content, dictionaries, and procedures become directly readable; even when encrypted, session structure, counters, and acceptance timing inform future command-link intrusion or replay. Captured material can reveal maintenance windows, contingency dictionaries, and authentication schemes that enable subsequent exploitation. | |
| EXF-0003.02 | Downlink Exfiltration | The attacker records spacecraft-to-ground traffic, real-time telemetry, recorder playbacks, payload products, and mirrored command sessions, to obtain mission data and health/state information. With sufficient signal quality and protocol knowledge, frames and packets are demodulated and extracted for offline use; where protection exists only on uplink or is inconsistently applied, downlink content may still be in clear. Downlinked command echoes, event logs, and file catalogs can expose internal activities and aid follow-on targeting while the primary objective remains data capture at scale. | |
| EXF-0004 | Out-of-Band Communications Link | Some missions field secondary links, separate frequencies and hardware, for limited, purpose-built functions (e.g., rekeying, emergency commanding, beacons, custodial crosslinks). Adversaries co-opt these channels as covert data paths: embedding content in maintenance messages, beacon fields, or low-rate housekeeping; initiating vendor/service modes that carry file fragments; or switching to contingency profiles that bypass normal routing and monitoring. Because these paths are distinct from the main TT&C and may be sparsely supervised, they provide discreet avenues to move data off the spacecraft or to external relays without altering the primary link’s traffic patterns. | |
| EXF-0005 | Proximity Operations | A nearby vehicle serves as the collection platform for unintended emissions and other proximate signals, effectively a mobile TEMPEST/EMSEC sensor. From close range, the adversary measures near-field RF, conducted/structure-borne emissions, optical/IR signatures, or leaked crosslink traffic correlated with on-board activity, then decodes or models those signals to recover information (keys, tables, procedure execution, payload content). Proximity also enables directional gain and repeated sampling passes, turning weak side channels into usable exfiltration without engaging the victim’s logical interfaces. | |
| EXF-0009 | Compromised Partner Site | The adversary leverages third-party infrastructure connected to the mission, commercial ground stations, relay networks, operations service providers, data processing partners, to capture or relay mission data outside official channels. From these footholds, the attacker can mirror TT&C and payload feeds, scrape shared repositories, and man-in-the-middle cross-organization links (e.g., between partner stations and the primary MOC). Because partner environments vary in segmentation and monitoring, exfiltration can affect multiple missions or operators simultaneously, with stolen data exiting through the partner’s routine distribution mechanisms. | |
| EXF-0010 | Payload Communication Channel | Many payloads maintain communications separate from the primary TT&C, direct downlinks to user terminals, customer networks, or experimenter VPNs. An adversary who implants code in the payload (or controls its gateway) can route host-bus data into these channels, embed content within payload products (e.g., steganographic fields in imagery/telemetry), or schedule covert file transfers alongside legitimate deliveries. Because these paths are expected to carry high-rate mission data and may bypass TT&C monitoring, they provide a discreet conduit to exfiltrate payload or broader spacecraft information without altering the primary command link’s profile. | |
| ID | Description | |
| SV-MA-2 |
Heaters and flow valves of the propulsion subsystem are controlled by electric signals so cyberattacks against these signals could cause propellant lines to freeze, lock valves, waste propellant or even put in de-orbit or unstable spinning |
|
| SV-AV-4 |
Attacking the scheduling table to affect tasking |
|
| SV-MA-3 |
Attacks on critical software subsystems Attitude Determination and Control (AD&C) subsystem determines and controls the orientation of the satellite. Any cyberattack that could disrupt some portion of the control loop - sensor data, computation of control commands, and receipt of the commands would impact operations Telemetry, Tracking and Commanding (TT&C) subsystem provides interface between satellite and ground system. Computations occur within the RF portion of the TT&C subsystem, presenting cyberattack vector Command and Data Handling (C&DH) subsystem is the brains of the satellite. It interfaces with other subsystems, the payload, and the ground. It receives, validate, decodes, and sends commands to other subsystems, and it receives, processes, formats, and routes data for both the ground and onboard computer. C&DH has the most cyber content and is likely the biggest target for cyberattack. Electrical Power Subsystem (EPS) provides, stores, distributes, and controls power on the satellite. An attack on EPS could disrupt, damage, or destroy the satellite. |
|
| SV-SP-3 |
Introduction of malicious software such as a virus, worm, Distributed Denial-Of-Service (DDOS) agent, keylogger, rootkit, or Trojan Horse |
|
| SV-AC-8 |
Malicious Use of hardware commands - backdoors / critical commands |
|
| SV-AV-2 |
Satellites base many operations on timing especially since many operations are automated. Cyberattack to disrupt timing/timers could affect the vehicle (Time Jamming / Time Spoofing) |
|
| SV-AV-3 |
Affect the watchdog timer onboard the satellite which could force satellite into some sort of recovery mode/protocol |
|
| SV-SP-11 |
Software defined radios - SDR is also another computer, networked to other parts of the spacecraft that could be pivoted to by an attacker and infected with malicious code. Once access to an SDR is gained, the attacker could alter what the SDR thinks is correct frequencies and settings to communicate with the ground. |
|
| SV-AV-5 |
Using fault management system against you. Understanding the fault response could be leveraged to get satellite in vulnerable state. Example, safe mode with crypto bypass, orbit correction maneuvers, affecting integrity of TLM to cause action from ground, or some sort of RPO to cause S/C to go into safe mode; |
|
| SV-AV-6 |
Complete compromise or corruption of running state |
|
| SV-MA-5 |
Not being able to recover from cyberattack |
|
| SV-IT-1 |
Communications system spoofing resulting in denial of service and loss of availability and data integrity |
|
| SV-AV-1 |
Communications system jamming resulting in denial of service and loss of availability and data integrity |
|
| SV-MA-7 |
Exploit ground system and use to maliciously to interact with the spacecraft |
|
| SV-AV-7 |
The TT&C is the lead contributor to satellite failure over the first 10 years on-orbit, around 20% of the time. The failures due to gyro are around 12% between year one and 6 on-orbit and then ramp up starting around year six and overtake the contributions of the TT&C subsystem to satellite failure. Need to ensure equipment is not counterfeit and the supply chain is sound. |
|
| SV-MA-4 |
Not knowing what your crown jewels are and how to protect them now and in the future. |
|
| SV-MA-6 |
Not planning for security on SV or designing in security from the beginning |
|
| SV-SP-2 |
Testing only focuses on functional requirements and rarely considers end to end or abuse cases |
|
| SV-SP-4 |
General supply chain interruption or manipulation |
|
| SPARTA ID | Requirement | Rationale/Additional Guidance/Notes |
|---|---|---|
| SPR-28 | The [spacecraft] shall provide the capability to enter the platform into a known good, operational cyber-safe mode from a tamper-resistant, configuration-controlled (“gold”) image that is authenticated as coming from an acceptable supplier, and has its integrity verified. The [spacecraft] shall refresh only from cryptographically authenticated [organization]-approved sources.{SV-AV-5,SV-AV-6,SV-AV-7}{CP-10(6),CP-12,CP-13,IR-4(3),SA-8(16),SA-8(19),SA-8(21),SA-8(24),SI-13,SI-17} | Cyber-safe mode is an operating mode of a spacecraft during which all nonessential systems are shut down and the spacecraft is placed in a known good state using validated software and configuration settings. Within cyber-safe mode authentication and encryption should still be enabled. The spacecraft should be capable of reconstituting firmware and SW functions to preattack levels to allow for the recovery of functional capabilities. This can be performed by self-healing, or the healing can be aided from the ground. However, the spacecraft needs to have the capability to replan, based on available equipment still available after a cyberattack. The goal is for the vehicle to resume full mission operations. If not possible, a reduced level of mission capability should be achieved. |
| SPR-29 | The [spacecraft] shall enter cyber-safe mode software/configuration should be stored onboard the spacecraft in memory with hardware-based controls and should not be modifiable.{CP-10(6),CP-13,SA-8(16),SA-8(19),SA-8(21),SA-8(24),SI-17} | |
| SPR-30 | The [spacecraft] shall fail to a known secure state for failures during initialization, and aborts preserving information necessary to return to operations in failure.{SV-AV-5,SV-AV-6,SV-AV-7}{CP-10(6),CP-13,SA-8(16),SA-8(19),SA-8(24),SC-24,SI-13,SI-17} | |
| SPR-31 | The [spacecraft] shall fail securely to a secondary device in the event of an operational failure of a primary boundary protection device (i.e., crypto solution).{SV-AC-1,SV-AC-2,SV-CF-1,SV-CF-2}{CP-13,SA-8(19),SA-8(24),SC-7(18),SI-13,SI-13(4)} | If a primary boundary protection device fails, the spacecraft must not revert to insecure operation. Secure failover ensures continuity of confidentiality and integrity protections. This prevents adversaries from inducing failure states to bypass encryption. Redundancy strengthens mission resilience. |
| SPR-32 | The [spacecraft] shall provide or support the capability for recovery and reconstitution to a known state after a disruption, compromise, or failure.{SV-AV-5,SV-AV-6,SV-AV-7}{CP-4(4),CP-10,CP-10(4),CP-10(6),CP-13,IR-4,IR-4(1),SA-8(16),SA-8(19),SA-8(24)} | |
| SPR-33 | The [spacecraft] shall utilize TRANSEC. TRANSEC shall be implemented and verified as a distinct layer in coordination with Traffic Flow Security and RF anti‑fingerprinting.{SV-AV-1}{CP-8,RA-5(4),SA-8(18),SA-8(19),SC-8(1),SC-8(4),SC-16,SC-16(1),SC-16(2),SC-16(3),SC-40,SC-40(4)} | Transmission Security (TRANSEC) is used to ensure the availability of transmissions and limit intelligence collection from the transmissions. TRANSEC is secured through burst encoding, frequency hopping, or spread spectrum methods where the required pseudorandom sequence generation is controlled by a cryptographic algorithm and key. Such keys are known as transmission security keys (TSK). The objectives of transmission security are low probability of interception (LPI), low probability of detection (LPD), and antijam which means resistance to jamming (EPM or ECCM). |
| SPR-62 | The [spacecraft] shall enter a cyber-safe mode when conditions that threaten the platform are detected, enters a cyber-safe mode of operation with restrictions as defined based on the cyber-safe mode.{SV-AV-5,SV-AV-6,SV-AV-7}{CP-10(6),CP-12,CP-13,IR-4,IR-4(1),IR-4(3),PE-10,RA-10,SA-8(16),SA-8(21),SA-8(24),SI-3,SI-4(7),SI-13,SI-17} | Cyber-safe mode provides a deterministic fallback posture when compromise or anomalous conditions threaten mission integrity. Restricting non-essential functions reduces attack surface and prevents further propagation of malicious activity. Defined restrictions ensure predictable behavior under cyber stress conditions. This supports survivability and controlled recovery rather than uncontrolled degradation. |
| SPR-74 | The [organization] shall define the security safeguards that are to be automatically employed when integrity violations are discovered.{SV-IT-2}{CP-2,SA-8(21),SI-3,SI-4(7),SI-4(12),SI-7(5),SI-7(8)} | Predefined safeguards ensure consistent and timely response to detected integrity violations. Ad hoc response increases uncertainty and recovery time. Automated actions may include isolation, reconstitution from gold images, or transition to cyber-safe mode. Defined response paths improve resilience and reduce operator burden during crisis. |
| SPR-107 | The [spacecraft] shall have multiple uplink paths {SV-AV-1}{CP-8,CP-11,SA-8(18),SC-5,SC-47} | Redundant uplink paths preserve command capability during jamming, interference, or subsystem failure. Availability is a core mission assurance objective. Diverse communication channels reduce single-point failure risk. This enhances resiliency in contested RF environments. |
| SPR-121 | The [organiztion] shall maintain the ability to establish communication with the spacecraft in the event of an anomaly to the primary receive path.{SV-AV-1,SV-IT-1}{CP-8,SA-8(18),SC-47} | Receiver communication can be established after an anomaly with such capabilities as multiple receive apertures, redundant paths within receivers, redundant receivers, omni apertures, fallback default command modes, and lower bit rates for contingency commanding, as examples |
| SPR-229 | The [organization] shall protect documentation and Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) as required, in accordance with the risk management strategy.{SV-CF-3,SV-SP-4,SV-SP-10}{AC-3,CM-12,CP-2,PM-17,RA-5(4),SA-3,SA-3(1),SA-5,SA-10,SC-8(1),SC-28(3),SI-12} | Documentation may reveal architecture details exploitable by adversaries. Proper handling prevents leakage. Protection of CUI supports regulatory compliance. Information governance complements technical controls. |
| SPR-230 | The [organization] shall identify and properly classify mission sensitive design/operations information and access control shall be applied in accordance with classification guides and applicable federal laws, Executive Orders, directives, policies, regulations, and standards.{SV-CF-3,SV-AV-5}{AC-3,CM-12,CP-2,PM-17,RA-5(4),SA-3,SA-3(1),SA-5,SA-8(19),SC-8(1),SC-28(3),SI-12} | * Mission sensitive information should be classified as Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) or formally known as Sensitive but Unclassified. Ideally these artifacts would be rated SECRET or higher and stored on classified networks. Mission sensitive information can typically include a wide range of candidate material: the functional and performance specifications, the RF ICDs, databases, scripts, simulation and rehearsal results/reports, descriptions of uplink protection including any disabling/bypass features, failure/anomaly resolution, and any other sensitive information related to architecture, software, and flight/ground /mission operations. This could all need protection at the appropriate level (e.g., unclassified, SBU, classified, etc.) to mitigate levels of cyber intrusions that may be conducted against the project’s networks. Stand-alone systems and/or separate database encryption may be needed with controlled access and on-going Configuration Management to ensure changes in command procedures and critical database areas are tracked, controlled, and fully tested to avoid loss of science or the entire mission. |
| SPR-231 | The [organization] shall distribute documentation to only personnel with defined roles and a need to know.{SV-CF-3,SV-AV-5}{CM-12,CP-2,SA-5,SA-10} | Least privilege and need to know should be employed with the protection of all documentation. Documentation can contain sensitive information that can aid in vulnerability discovery, detection, and exploitation. For example, command dictionaries for ground and space systems should be handles with extreme care. Additionally, design documents for missions contain many key elements that if compromised could aid in an attacker successfully exploiting the system. |
| SPR-232 | The [organization] shall conduct a criticality analysis to identify mission critical functions and critical components and reduce the vulnerability of such functions and components through secure system design.{SV-SP-3,SV-SP-4,SV-AV-7,SV-MA-4}{CP-2,CP-2(8),PL-7,PM-11,PM-30(1),RA-3(1),RA-9,SA-8(9),SA-8(11),SA-8(25),SA-12,SA-14,SA-15(3),SC-7(29),SR-1} | During SCRM, criticality analysis will aid in determining supply chain risk. For mission critical functions/components, extra scrutiny must be applied to ensure supply chain is secured. |
| SPR-245 | The [organization] shall define processes and procedures to be followed when integrity verification tools detect unauthorized changes to software, firmware, and information.{SV-IT-2}{CM-3,CM-3(1),CM-3(5),CM-5(6),CM-6,CP-2,IR-6,IR-6(2),PM-30,SC-16(1),SC-51,SI-3,SI-4(7),SI-4(24),SI-7,SI-7(7),SI-7(10)} | Predefined response procedures reduce reaction time. Clear escalation paths improve containment. Consistent handling prevents confusion during incidents. Preparedness strengthens resilience. |
| SPR-258 | The [organization] shall test the contingency plan, with special consideration for space operations, to determine the effectiveness of the plan and readiness to execute the plan.{SV-MA-5}{CP-4} | Contingency plans must be validated under realistic mission conditions. Testing confirms feasibility during communication latency or constrained power states. Exercises reveal gaps in readiness. Preparedness reduces recovery time during incidents. |
| SPR-259 | The [organization] shall develop an incident response and forensics plan that covers the spacecrafts.{SV-MA-5}{CP-2,IR-1,IR-3,IR-3(2),IR-4(12),IR-4(13),IR-8,SA-15(10),SI-4(24)} | A structured response plan enables coordinated containment and recovery. Forensics planning ensures evidence preservation. Defined procedures reduce confusion during crisis. Incident readiness enhances resilience. |
| SPR-292 | The [organization] shall ensure that role-based security-related training is provided to personnel with assigned security roles and responsibilities: (i) before authorizing access to the system or performing assigned duties; (ii) when required by system changes; and (iii) at least annually thereafter.{SV-AC-4}{AT-3,CP-2} | Personnel must understand role-specific responsibilities. Tailored training reduces misuse. Continuous reinforcement maintains awareness. Human factors are central to defense. |
| SPR-293 | The [organization] shall employ techniques to limit harm from potential adversaries identifying and targeting the [organization]s supply chain.{SV-SP-4,SV-SP-5,SV-SP-6}{CP-2,PM-30,SA-9,SA-12(5),SC-38,SR-3,SR-3(1),SR-3(2),SR-5(2)} | Adversaries often exploit supplier relationships. Protective measures reduce reconnaissance and manipulation. Supply chain resilience strengthens mission integrity. Proactive defense mitigates systemic exposure. |
| SPR-461 | The [spacecraft] shall fail over mission critical processing to a redundant onboard compute element while maintaining authentication, authorization, and cryptographic protections.{SV-MA-5}{CP-2(6),CP-10} | Redundant compute without preserved security controls introduces new risk. Failover must maintain authentication and cryptographic state. Secure redundancy prevents availability from undermining integrity. Resilience must not weaken protection. |
| SPR-494 | The [spacecraft] shall preserve and protect a golden backup of security credentials and integrity anchors and shall restore them automatically when corruption is detected.{SV-AC-3,SV-IT-3}{SI-13,CP-9} | Protected backups enable secure recovery from corruption. Automatic restoration reduces downtime. Integrity anchors preserve trust. Backup governance strengthens resilience. |
| SPR-495 | The [spacecraft] shall detect impending failure of security components and initiate controlled failover to preserve confidentiality, integrity, and availability.{SV-MA-5,SV-DCO-1}{SI-4,SI-13,CP-10} | Early detection prevents cascading compromise. Controlled switchover maintains CIA properties. Structured alerting enhances situational awareness. Fault handling preserves assurance. |
| SPR-496 | The [spacecraft] shall provide standby instances for [organization]-defined high-criticality security components and automatically switch to the standby upon failure detection, generating an immediate alert that includes the component identity, time, and fault reason.{SV-MA-5}{SI-13(4),CP-10,AU-5} | Automatic failover reduces human delay. Immediate alerts support oversight. Identity and fault logging strengthen accountability. Resilient architecture supports mission continuity. |
| SPR-538 | The [spacecraft] shall budget CPU/power/memory for security functions (crypto, logging, verification), implement graceful degradation (e.g., summarize logs, throttle verification) that preserves TT&C and safing, and expose telemetry showing throttling decisions and residual capacity.{SV-AV-1,SV-DCO-1}{PE-9,SA-8(8),SC-6,CP-2} | Security must not starve essential TT&C. Explicit resource budgeting ensures sustained enforcement. Graceful degradation preserves mission priority. Telemetry visibility supports oversight. |
| SPR-542 | The [spacecraft] shall reserve CPU/memory/link budget for essential TT&C (command authentication, attitude/power control loops, critical telemetry) and preempt/shape payload and nonessential traffic under stress.{SV-AV-1,SV-AC-8}{SC-5,SC-5(2),SC-6,CP-10} | Command authentication and attitude control may take precedence. Traffic shaping prevents payload starvation attacks. Priority enforcement preserves safe operations. Resource governance strengthens availability. |