What the military data includes

The SpaceX military tracking data deal means the company now receives Vector Covariance Messages, or VCMs, drawn from military ground sensors, telescopes and radars that track objects in lower orbit down to about 10cm in size.

The data sits inside US Space Command's High Accuracy Catalog, its most detailed and secure version, which no commercial company had been given enhanced access to before. The military has kept the VCMs closely held for two main reasons:

• The messages are designated "controlled unclassified information" and could expose the limits of defense capabilities.
• The defense department has wanted to prevent the reverse engineering of the satellite sensors it uses to monitor other nations' defense satellites.

Critics see an advantage for SpaceX

Cole Donovan, a former Traccs employee now with Stand Up for Science, said the access will give Musk's companies an advantage over competitors offering a similar service, and that it amounts to making a company the de facto source for space traffic coordination within the US.

Traccs weakened while SpaceX steps in

The access grant lands as the federal alternative to commercial space traffic coordination has been weakened. Musk's Doge fired many staff of the nascent federal space traffic control program in 2025, and the administration has twice tried to financially gut the Traffic Coordination System for Space, known as Traccs.

Traccs was established by the first Trump administration to take over commercial space traffic control from the defense department, but it has never been fully funded or staffed and has struggled to take root. The program manages thousands of satellites, debris and spacecraft, and helps prevent up to 50,000 near-collisions, called conjunctions, every day. The budget record so far:

• In fiscal year 2026 the administration tried to largely defund the $65m Traccs program, but Congress re-inserted the funding.
• For fiscal year 2027 the administration has proposed slashing the budget to nearly zero, and the House again reinserted the funding.

SpaceX's own tracking capability, meanwhile, has limits. The company operates about 11,000 Starlink satellites in orbit and could have as many as 20,000 in the coming years. Its Stargaze system - thousands of cameras and radars mounted on Starlink satellites - can only see objects down to about half a meter and is less accurate than the military system.

According to Breaking Defense, a SpaceX employee told an industry conference that "radar data is an extremely valuable tool to supplement Stargaze." The government is receiving something in return for the VCM data: access to Stargaze cameras and sensors.

Space Force response and market stakes

A Space Force spokesperson said "The Space Force is engaging with several companies to exchange commercial data sources for access to sections of the controlled, unclassified information, high accuracy catalogue."

SpaceX and the Space Force did not respond to requests for comment from the Guardian, but in a statement to Breaking Defense they acknowledged the move.

Not everyone in government service views SpaceX's role negatively. A former NOAA official, speaking anonymously, said SpaceX has largely been "remarkably responsive to space safety concerns" and said they do not fault Starlink for stepping in. Their greater disappointment, they said, is with "the government's failure to fulfil its responsibility to establish a coherent space governance framework."

Several commercial space company employees have said since early 2025 that the industry widely supports Traccs because it would level the playing field - a program the House has now funded again for fiscal year 2027 despite the administration's push to cut it to nearly zero.