Alén Space to Participate in ESA’s CyberCUBE Mission, Led by GMV 

October 25, 2024

The CyberCUBE mission, aimed at strengthening the European Space Agency’s (ESA) space cybersecurity, will leverage Alén Space’s technology. The Galician company will serve as a subcontractor within the consortium led by GMV, which was awarded the contract and will manage the mission’s lifecycle through its teams in Romania and Spain.  

The project is a key initiative within the Cyber Evolutions program of ESA’s Cyber Security Operations Centre (CSOC). Its goal is to provide the European Space Agency with cost-effective, reconfigurable cyber capabilities to demonstrate new in-orbit technologies, minimize risks, and accelerate the adoption of cybersecurity solutions in future missions. 

The consortium will handle the specifications, design, supply, assembly, verification, validation, launch, and LEOP (Launch and Early Orbit Phase) of the CyberCUBE mission. This initiative marks a crucial step in consolidating the cybersecurity of space assets and ensuring resilience against emerging cyber threats in future operations. 

Platforms and Control Center 

Alén Space, which has been part of the GMV group since 2023, will supply a 3U CubeSat platform equipped with advanced reprogrammable processing capabilities and a central payload dedicated to cybersecurity monitoring. The platform will remain operational in orbit for at least a year, during which essential data on space asset vulnerabilities and cyber resilience will be collected. 

Additionally, GMV will also supply components for the ground segment, including Alén Space’s mission control center integrated with GMV’s commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) FocuSsuite, and a representative flatsat. ESA’s CSOC will be the primary user segment, responsible for managing mission requests, ingesting raw data, and processing it for cybersecurity analysis. 

The contract includes GMV’s oversight of the launch segment to ensure the CubeSat is deployed into its designated orbit. The mission will focus on orbits that allow regular communication with ESA’s main antenna located at Redu (Belgium) in the European Space Security and Education Centre (ESEC). 

After the satellite’s commissioning, GMV will transfer control of CyberCUBE to ESA for nominal operations. The mission’s results will guide future cybersecurity strategies and help assess potential expansions based on performance and resource availability. At the end of its operational life, the CyberCUBE satellite will be decommissioned in accordance with ESA’s space debris mitigation policy. 

The CyberCUBE mission will validate the radio frequency (RF) capabilities of CSOC and demonstrate real-world applications of sophisticated data analysis tools designed to detect and counter potential cyber threats. In response to the growing need for stronger space cybersecurity, GMV will provide a pioneering in-orbit operational lab equipped with innovative cyber capabilities. This platform will support the development, testing, and refinement of cryptographic functions and key management strategies, and will collect valuable security data from operating systems. 

Image source: ESA