A Starlink antenna used in illegal mining in the Amazon was seized by authorities. Photo by Bruno Mancinelle/Casa de Governo, used with permission.

This article, written by Rubens Valente and edited by Thiago Domenici, was originally published on the Agência Pública website on July 29, 2024. It has been edited for length and context and has been republished here under a partnership agreement with Global Voices.

Starlink, a company that sells satellite communication antennas owned by billionaire Elon Musk, has resisted implementing additional security protocols that might help protect exploited Indigenous lands, such as utilizing video calls and facial biometrics.

The company is technically capable of identifying and locating buyers and users of its satellite communication antennas, including those used in illegal mining, but in practice, it only conducts basic checks when its services are contracted.

The public prosecutor in Manaus, the capital city of Amazonas state, André Luiz Porreca Ferreira Cunha, told Agência Pública that “about 90 percent” of the Starlink antennas seized in illegal mining in the Amazon since 2022 were registered in the name of “oranges” (a Brazilian expression to referring to people using a fraudulent name).

The company acknowledged that it requires only basic information, such as personal data, address, and a phone number from its customers, but argues that there is no Brazilian law obliging it to act differently.

The arrival of Starlink antennas in the Amazon in 2022, under the government of then-Presdient Jair Bolsonaro (PL, Liberal Party), revolutionized communication in regions with little or no mobile phone signal. However, they were also used, on a large scale, for criminal activities, especially by illegal prospectors who invade Indigenous lands to steal minerals (known as “garimpeiros”).

Pública revealed that since March 2024, at least 50 Starlink antennas have been seized from illegal mines within the Yanomami Indigenous Territory, located in the Amazon region and Brazil's largest Indigenous territory.

In May, the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office (MPF) opened an inquiry to “investigate the expansion of satellite internet in areas of illegal prospecting and mining in Amazonas state, particularly with the unrestricted availability of the service from the company Starlink.” 

They also highlight that “[the company] has not adopted basic criteria for verifying users’ identity or the veracity of the documentation presented and the addresses provided during the sale, potentially facilitating the practice of environmental crimes.”

Lack of cooperation with Brazilian authorities

The investigation also revealed that the company has not cooperated with Ibama, the Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources, the agency responsible for fighting environmental crimes.

Ibama's president, Rodrigo Agostinho, told the MPF that the antennas have become instruments “for conducting environmental crimes,” aiming “to enable and facilitate the communication of people who are on the frontline of illegal mining with people located in cities,” which would help in “logistics, in the sending of supplies and provisions, as well as in all the necessary organization to enable the continuation of environmental crimes.”

The Federal Police (PF) informed the MPF that Starlink's willingness to collaborate with its investigations only changed “recently” when the company began to give the authorities users’ registration data, according to the director of Amazon and the Environment, delegate Humberto Freire de Barros. 

The public prosecutor André Cunha, who is following the case, told Pública that the company's actions are illegal:

These antennas cannot remain in the hands of orange [fraudulent] users, of people who reside in other states and are providing their data to users here in the Amazon. And they cannot be [permitted to be] used as instruments of crime while no measures are taken and these people are not identified. Because the company has a duty to, at least, provide the data so that public bodies can know who they are.

Cunha wrote Starlink a letter, questioning what mechanisms the company has adopted to verify the identity of buyers, citing “facial biometrics, video calls, [or] manual checking of identification documents” as potential examples. According to the company, it requires only “basic information” for customers to register.

In a reply signed by the director of Starlink Brazil Internet Services and Starlink Brazil Holding Ltd., Vitor James Urner, the company argued that “there is no law or regulation in Brazil that obliges telecommunications service providers, or service providers in other regulated sectors, to conduct biometric identification of its users.”

Urner stated that Starlink “takes proactive measures to check on the usage of the services it makes available, for lawful purposes, [sic] in Brazil and worldwide” and that it has cooperated with the Brazilian Federal Police.

In July, the lawyers representing Starlink during the inquiry requested a meeting with prosecutor André Cunha. According to the registry, during the meeting, the prosecutor again questioned the company about the measures taken to improve the identification of Starlink users. The lawyer representing the company stressed “the existence of limitations imposed by Brazil's General Data Protection Law (LGPD),” indicating the company does not feel it can strengthen the identification requirements of its users.

In its written response, the company argued that “as with any other mass-market electronic product, Starlink cannot be required to independently police the way in which each terminal is used after purchase.”

Antennas in Yanomami Indigenous lands

In the documents sent by Starlink to the MPF, the company stated that it had deactivated 68 user terminals located in the Yanomami Indigenous Territory “on suspicion of violating the terms of service.”

The company stated:

Starlink used the available data to identify user terminals in areas associated with illegal mining on Yanomami Indigenous lands. […] The Starlink users affected by a deactivation [of their device] were instructed to provide certain verification information, including proof of identity and a detailed description of how they plan to use Starlink services, to ensure that Starlink is only used for legitimate purposes.

The documents state that the company has the technical capability to know where the antennas are and who bought the antennas used within Indigenous lands. However, the company claimed that “telecommunications service providers are subject to an explicit legal prohibition regarding the inviolability of the secrecy of users’ communications via the internet, except by court order.”

In response to the MPF, Starlink also said that “no user can have multiple antennas and, if detected by Starlink, users who are practicing illegal resale immediately have their contracts suspended.”

The company also stated that it has collaborated with the Federal Police — including that it “allowed” police “to use a Starlink kit to help fight crime” and that, last year, it responded to a letter from Roraima State Federal Police it “provided important information to the PF's Regional Superintendency, which enabled the capture of several illegal prospectors in Yanomami Indigenous communities, as well as the seizure of 11 Starlink antennas.”

“The measures taken on a daily basis by Starlink, in identifying customers who use these services to carry out illegal activities, and the support offered to the relevant local authorities are a clear example of Starlink's commitment to collaborating with the justice system and authorities in Brazil, to the greatest extent, for the purpose of fighting illegal mining,” the company told the MPF.

The firm representing Starlink in the inquiry, Tozzini Freire Lawyers, said this to Pública's request for comment: “Thank you for your contact, but unfortunately, we do not comment on ongoing cases.”

Starlink informed the National Telecommunications Agency (Anatel) that it had 65,215 customers across these states of the Amazon region as of 2023. The company has authorization from Anatel to operate 4,408 satellites until 2027. It has applied for permission to operate another 7,000 units.

The company has also been involved in the recent confrontation between Elon Musk and the Supreme Federal Court (STF), following the suspension of X (formerly Twitter) due its non-compliance with court orders.

Starlink had its assets frozen following a Supreme Court decision because of fines owed by X. Starlink's accounts were liberated again after the payment of 18.3 million Brazilian Reais (around USD 3.3 million) in fines.