What Happens if You Try to Download Torrents on Elon Musk’s Starlink?

A curious Starlink subscriber wanted to know if the satellite Internet service from SpaceX had a policy against downloading copyrighted content.

By Edited by Gadgets 360 Newsdesk | Updated: 6 May 2021 14:58 IST

Photo Credit: HO/ SpaceX/ AFP

The user used Torrent purposefully on Starlink connection and ended up received a notice from the company

Highlights

The subscriber posted a screenshot of notice he received from Starlink
Downloading material without licence may lead to suspension of connection
SpaceX has not set a date for Starlink's service launch

Starlink, the satellite Internet service of Elon Musk's SpaceX, sends you a notice if you use it to illegally download copyrighted material. A subscriber, who wished to know if the company had a policy on such user behaviour, used Torrent purposefully on his Starlink connection and ended up received a notice from the company. The subscriber posted a screenshot of the notice he received from Starlink on Reddit and wrote that he had intentionally used the service to see what happens. “Been purposefully torrenting without a VPN to see what would happen and got a notice,” the user, known as substrate-97, said.

In the notice posted by the user on Reddit, the Starlink team urged the user and others to refrain from using its service to download copyrighted material without licence. "Downloading copyrighted material without a licence may lead to suspension or termination of your connection and put you at the risk of legal action from the content owner," the notice reads.

Reacting to the post, a user known as woodland_dweller thanked the subscriber for “checking that out and taking the risk.”

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User realister quipped in the comments, "They should have suggested a VPN in that email. My provider did."

"That's honestly hilarious. It's like a teacher seeing a kid cheating during a test and being like “C'mon bro, you gotta cheat better than that," commented Neocactus.

Another user, it appears, wanted to check the patience of the company further. "Someone needs to find out how many copyright notices until they terminate your internet access," wrote funny_b0t.

User Kariered, however, warned everyone against even trying what substrate-97 did. "Don't mess around too much with this. I had a friend of a friend who got into trouble doing this and had to go to court."

Meanwhile, on Tuesday, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said his company had received over 500,000 pre-orders for its Starlink satellite Internet service and that he anticipates no technical problems meeting the demand.

"Only limitation is high density of users in urban areas," Musk tweeted, responding to a post from a CNBC reporter who said the $99 (roughly Rs. 7,300) deposits SpaceX took for the service were fully refundable and did not guarantee service.

SpaceX has not set a date for Starlink's service launch, but commercial service would not likely be offered in 2020 as it had previously planned.

Is Mi 11X the best phone under Rs. 35,000? We discussed this on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Later (starting at 23:50), we jump over to the Marvel series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Orbital is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.

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