• Veon’s Kyivstar to launch direct-to-cell services in Ukraine
• Starlink ends 2024 with more than 4.6 million customers
• The US hacking saga continues

In today’s industry news roundup: Elon Musk’s Starlink to help provide satellite-to-smartphone services to Kyivstar’s customers; Starlink is fast approaching the five million satellite broadband customer mark; Salt Typhoon hacked nine US telcos; and more!

Kyivstar, the mobile operator in Ukraine that is part of the Veon Group, has struck an agreement with Elon Musk’s low-earth orbit (LEO) satellite operator Starlink to enable satellite-to-smartphone services to its customers. Kyivstar expects to launch initial SMS and digital messaging services via Starlink’s satellites to areas in Ukraine that are beyond the reach of its terrestrial mobile network before the end of 2025. “Kyivstar has been the backbone of Ukraine’s resilience throughout the war, and we are committed to leaving no stone unturned to keep Ukraine connected,” noted Kyivstar’s CEO, Oleksandr Komarov. “Our collaboration with Starlink is a game-changer in our journey towards achieving our ‘LTE everywhere’ ambition,” he added. Kaan Terzioglu, Veon Group CEO, commented: “Kyivstar has done a tremendous job in investing in Ukraine’s 4G connectivity, expanding coverage to remote areas and increasing the energy resilience of its network. We are excited to work with Starlink to make Ukraine one of the leading countries in the world to have direct-to-cell services, and we look forward to exploring the opportunities across our markets that are home to 520 million people,” added Terzioglu. According to Veon, Kyivstar has invested significantly in its 4G network, spectrum and energy redundancy since the beginning of the war with Russia in order to expand its 4G coverage to remote areas of Ukraine and maintain “the resilience of connectivity and digital services during energy blackouts… With access to Starlink direct-to-cell technology, Kyivstar customers will benefit from satellite-powered connectivity, even when the terrestrial network is unable to service an area,” noted Veon. The news comes only a few weeks after One New Zealand (One NZ) became the first mobile service provider to offer a direct-to-cell communications service via satellite to its customers, again in partnership with Starlink.  

Direct-to-cell is an up-and-coming growth area for Starlink, but its current commercial success is coming from its satellite broadband services, which are now available in countries with a combined population of 2.8 billion, the operator noted in this post on X. According to this blog from Starlink, its satellite broadband service is now available in 118 countries and is already being used by more than 4.6 million customers. That number could grow significantly this year if Starlink, as expected, is awarded a licence to provide its services in India, where the major telcos tried to persuade the government (unsuccessfully!) to award licences via an auction rather than through an administrative process, one that is perceived to favour Starlink.   

The impact of the cybersecurity breaches carried out by the Salt Typhoon hacking group, which were first reported last October and are in the process of being addressed by the FCC, continues to rock the US government and telco sector. Late last month, Anne Neuberger, the US deputy national security advisor for cyber and emerging technology, told reporters during a White House media briefing that the number of telcos affected by the Salt Typhoon group now stands at nine (up from the eight initially reported) and that the breaches were extensive. The Chinese hackers “essentially had broad and full access. That’s why… they had the capability to geolocate millions of individuals, to record phone calls at will, because they had that broad access. So, some of the… requirements that we’re looking for the FCC [Federal Communications Commission] to include [in its cybersecurity risk management requirements] include segmenting the networks. Even if an attacker like the Chinese government gets access to a network, they’re controlled and they’re contained,” stated Neuberger. Then, earlier this week, Bloomberg reported that AT&T and Verizon had finally admitted to having been breached by the Salt Typhoon attacks but added that their networks are now “clear from the intrusion”. Verizon’s chief legal officer, Vandana Venkatesh, stated that the telco had not “detected threat actor activity in Verizon’s network for some time, and after considerable work addressing this incident, we can report that Verizon has contained the activities associated with this particular incident.” AT&T noted that it is currently not detecting any “activity by nation-state actors in our networks at this time”, adding: “Based on our current investigation of this attack, the People’s Republic of China targeted a small number of individuals of foreign intelligence interest. In the relatively few instances in which an individual’s information was impacted, we have complied with our notification obligations in cooperation with law enforcement.”

Telcos are set to reap as much as $720m in 2025 from the sale of recycled copper as they replace their legacy fixed access lines with fibre, reports the Financial Times, citing figures from refurbished telecom equipment supplier TXO. According to TXO, telcos could collectively glean as much as $10bn from the sale of copper over the next 15 years. 

Telstra has agreed to sell its 35% stake in Australian pay-TV firm Foxtel to streaming services giant DAZN for AUS$128m in cash, which will be used to pay off loans made to Foxtel, and a 3% stake in DAZN. News Corp also agreed to sell its 65% stake in Foxtel to DAZN. Foxtel Group CEO Patrick Delany noted: “We are grateful to News Corp and Telstra for their unwavering support over the past 30 years. With News Corp’s guidance and support, we have reinvented the Foxtel Group as a growth business with 4.7 million subscribers, a dynamic digital advertising business and strong revenues and EBITDA. We are pleased that News Corp and Telstra will remain involved with a shareholding in DAZN.”

– The staff, TelecomTV