BT Group has delayed the launch of its Starlink satellite broadband service over allegations it disrupted services used by Ukraine\u2019s military<\/p>\n
In late 2025, BT announced an agreement with Starlink, a wholly owned division of Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX, to bring high-speed satellite broadband to customers in rural and remote locations.<\/p>\n
The service would tap directly into Starlink\u2019s low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellation to reach areas not covered by BT\u2019s fibre broadband network, Openreach. It is designed to offer download speeds of up to 280 Mbps.<\/p>\n
At the time, BT said the service would launch in the latter half of 2026. However, BT\u2019s CEO Allison Kirkby has now told the Financial Times<\/a> that while the technology is ready to launch, the firm will wait until public scrutiny over Starlink\u2019s recent disruptions to Ukraine\u2019s military has died down.<\/p>\n She said BT was \u201ccautious on how Starlink might be viewed at the moment considering what happened in Ukraine a couple of weeks ago\u201d and would wait until \u201cthe noise has died down\u201d.<\/p>\n In its war with Russia, Ukraine has routinely used both Starlink and Starshield – the military version of Starlink – to give its soldiers internet access on the frontline and help its jet-powered drones intercept long-range strikes.<\/p>\n But in October 2026, Ukraine\u2019s access to the service<\/a> was restricted after its military started targeting Russian oil refineries. While Musk was alleged to be behind the restriction, he took to X saying that Starshield was \u201cowned and controlled by the US government\u201d. The US government denied ordering the restrictions, which have since been fully restored.<\/p>\n Kirkby said \u201coffering the best products for our customers means working with the best partners\u201d, and that BT would launch satellite broadband with Starlink \u201cin the coming months\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Virgin Media O2 is already using Starlink in the UK. In February 2026, it launched its \u2018Direct to Cell\u2019 satellite mobile connectivity<\/a> targeting rural areas, taking the network\u2019s landmass coverage from 89% to 95%.\u00a0<\/p>\n In September 2026, SpaceX\u2019s huge Starship deployed more satellites in orbit before an explosive splashdown<\/a>. These satellites are the latest additions to a megaconstellation that Musk hopes will eventually consist of about 100,000 satellites<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BT Group has delayed the launch of its Starlink satellite broadband service over allegations it disrupted services used…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":76847,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[38914,1415,38915,20,4139,593,869,8372,24,2404],"class_list":["post-76846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ukraine-russia","tag-bt","tag-elon-musk","tag-mobile-networks","tag-news","tag-satellite-communications","tag-satellites","tag-starlink","tag-telecommunications","tag-ukraine","tag-ukraine-military"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@conflicts\/117593313351931904","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76846\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/conflicts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}