Discover's New York headquarters from a satellite.
Image © Google
Corona was just the start. With the development of light-sensitive solid-state chips in the 1970s, the spy community turned to reconnaissance satellites that could dispense with parachutes and beam images to Earth. These so-called electro-optical satellites produced images at resolutions better than 1 meter (about 3 feet)—detailed enough to show individual cars and revealing such secrets as a new Soviet aircraft carrier under construction at a Black Sea shipyard.
The civilian world was also getting into the act, and its most notable early achievement was SPOT, launched by the French in 1986. With 10-meter ground resolution, SPOT was hardly a match for military counterparts, but it was certainly good enough for the press to embrace its images and break news. In one instance, journalists used the images to document the construction of the Soviet Krasnoyarsk radar, an alleged violation of the antiballistic missile treaty, explains nuclear physicist Peter D. Zimmerman, former science adviser for arms control in the U.S. State Department.
By the 1990s foreign countries including France and Russia were offering satellite imagery for sale at increasingly crisp resolutions of up to five meters. A critical turning point, according to Zimmerman, was the Persian Gulf war, when Mark Brender, then a journalist at ABC News, obtained high-resolution satellite images of Kuwait from Russia, and another journalist, Jean Heller of the St. Petersburg Times, made those images public. The revelations were critical: The U.S. government had claimed that Iraq had around 250,000 troops in Kuwait, but the evidence revealed just a fraction of that number.
Some hoped to rein in the imagery and all the associated leaks—but it was a hopeless cause. Today, supported and even encouraged by a U.S. government hoping to sharpen the national edge, companies can sell imagery to private customers here and abroad, though not to what are dubbed “bad actors,” such as Iran. Companies in the United States also cannot sell satellite imagery with a resolution better than about 1.5 feet (0.5 meter), except to the U.S. government. Resolution better than half a meter is “seen as having significant national security value,” explains Kay Weston, who manages the licensing process at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “That’s the tipping point.”
THE RISE OF GOOGLE EARTH
Maintaining even minimal security may be hard because, in the last couple of years, the bad actor clause, the resolution limit, and other protections have been challenged by easy access to Internet services like Google Earth. This open-access technology combines satellite images with even better pictures taken from planes and on the ground. The irony of Google Earth—something not lost on national security agencies—is that the technology itself is a product of government support. In 2003 the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (now known as the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency) began investing in a new company called Keyhole, which melded satellite imagery and photographs taken from aircraft into a three-dimensional tool for nuanced mapping of all kinds of terrain, including military areas and city streets.
Google bought Keyhole in 2004 and rolled out Keyhole’s software as Google Earth, opening the door to a new set of national security questions. Especially for amateurs, the power of the tool is extraordinary. Once Internet users download the free software, Google Earth enables them to swoop in on their own home simply by entering a street address or GPS coordinates, creating the visual sensation of flying from outer space to a specific point on Earth in a split second. Once you reach the designated site, you can zoom in and out for more or less detail or click on screen buttons that allow you to explore the surrounding area.
Not only is the tool simple to use, but it is available to anyone, anywhere in the world. While U.S. companies must observe government restrictions on selling images to certain countries and individuals, Google Earth just puts the images online, enabling unrestricted access. How then can bad actors be stopped from viewing imagery that they cannot legally buy? According to Weston, some protection accrues from the simple profit motive. “Companies don’t want to give away current imagery for free,” she says. The satellite imagery on Google Earth ranges from a few months to three years in age.
Yet old satellite pictures become more powerful when combined with some of the other free offerings from Google Earth, such as high-resolution aerial photographs (from planes or helicopters). Sometimes such images are freely available directly from the government, and other times they are purchased from private companies that take the photos for a fee. To expand this capability, in 2007 Google bought ImageAmerica, a private company that provides aerial shots. Indeed, while the U.S. government prohibits sale of satellite imagery with ground resolution better than a half-meter, no such rule applies to images from nonsatellite sources. So while a satellite company may be forced to “fuzz up” an image of, say, CIA headquarters in McLean, Virginia, to meet the half-meter standard, that same picture is available in even sharper focus from aerial photographs on Google Earth.
“I worry about the self-delusion factor,” Hitchens says. “It’s almost like willing ourselves to believe no one can see what we’re doing. That’s patently not true.”
