U.S. president Donald Trump said he’ll talk to billionaire Elon Musk about restoring internet services in Iran. Authorities in Iran had shut down internet services amid anti-government protests.
“He’s very good at that kind of thing, he’s got a very good company,” Trump told reporters in response to a question about whether he would engage with Musk’s SpaceX company, which offers a satellite internet service called Starlink that has been used in Iran.
However, it is unsure how effective this would be, since military jammers have been reportedly deployed in the country to shut down access to Starlink. “Despite reports that tens of thousands of Starlink units are operating inside Iran,” Iran Wire reports, “the blackout has also reached satellite connections.” It is reported that about 30 per cent of Starlink’s uplink and downlink traffic was (initially) disrupted,” quickly rising “to more than 80 per cent” within hours.
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The shutdown came amid nationwide anti-government protests where at least 544 people have been killed, according to a U.S. based rights group cited by CNN. The protests have gone on for over three weeks, with a communication blackout going on for over 84 hours.
Trump and Musk have had a complicated relationship. While Musk initially played a key role in the Trump administration, the two later had a public fallout. However, the two seem to be on good terms again. Musk and Trump were seen dining together at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort this month, and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is scheduled to visit a SpaceX facility in Texas on Monday.
Musk has supported providing Starlink to Iranians to help them circumvent the government’s restrictions, including amid previous protests in 2022. That year, the Biden White House engaged with Musk to set up Starlink in Iran after the country was engulfed by protests following the death in police custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini.
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Starlink also recently said it will be offering free broadband internet services in Venezuela following U.S. airstrikes and the capture of ousted leader Nicolás Maduro. The company had said in a statement that its focus is on “enabling connectivity for new and existing customers to support the people of Venezuela with free service credits,” adding that the company is “actively monitoring evolving conditions and regulatory requirements.”
Starlink has also previously been deployed in Ukraine after Russia’s invasion damaged large portions of the country’s internet and communications infrastructure. It quickly became a critical tool for both civilian and military connectivity. However, this also raised concerns about the power a single private company could wield over internet access during wartime.