A group of Navy sailors secretly used Starlink to check sports scores, social media and watch movies. They hid it from rank-and-file.

A U.S. Navy chief who wanted the internet so she and other enlisted officers could scroll social media, check sports scores and watch movies while deployed had an unauthorized Starlink satellite dish installed on a warship and lied to her commanding officer to keep it secret, according to investigators.

Internet access is restricted while a ship is underway to maintain bandwidth for military operations and to protect against cybersecurity threats.

The Navy quietly relieved Grisel Marrero, a command senior chief of the littoral combat ship USS Manchester, in August or September 2023, and released information on parts of the investigation this week.

  • aodhsishaj@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    5 days ago

    Look at what her rank was, she was Chief of Ship. She also lied about what it was and was allowing other enlisted, likely sigint/elint to use the starlink for streaming away from port.

    Simple low level fuckery on a naval vessel. The softest part of security are the squishy humans.

    • Rivalarrival@lemmy.todayEnglish
      1·
      5 days ago

      Ok, I don’t think you read what I wrote.

      Everytime you read “Starlink”, I want you to think about a flashing anti-collision beacon on a radio tower. Because that is what a Starlink transceivers looks like to every ELINT operator aboard, and on every nearby ship. Imagine a ship with a giant red blinky light on it, because that’s what an ELINT technician would be seeing.

      She would have had to have recruited every ELINT technician and supervisor aboard every vessel they sailed with to make this happen.