Intelligence and geospatial experts have raised doubts over media reports that link the satellite imagery tasking of a US-based commercial satellite company to the recent Pahalgam terror attack.
Earlier reports alleged that Maxar Technologies – a leading Earth observation company – received a high number of tasking requests for imagery over Pahalgam and surrounding areas, while also having a Pakistan-linked firm, Business Systems International (BSI), as a client.
Maxar Technologies has firmly denied these claims, clarifying that the firm in question did not order any recent satellite imagery of the area.
“Our records indicate that BSI (the Pakistan-linked firm) has neither placed any tasking orders of Pahalgam or the surrounding areas this year, nor have they ordered any of the imagery of those areas through our archive,” a Maxar official told India Today TV. The official further said that the speculation in the news reports implying otherwise was “false and misleading”.
Preliminary investigations into the incident have pointed to local support in the Pahalgam terror attack.
“When you have local support and logistics in the form of sleeper cells, you don’t need fresh satellite imagery to execute a terror plot that involved shooting at tourists from point-blank range,” an intelligence officer familiar with the developments told India Today TV.
Basic routes and high-resolution terrain data are freely available on tools like Google Earth anyway. “Why would they risk operational secrecy with high-end satellite imagery acquisition when they have feet on the ground?” the officer added. Being a popular tourist destination, ample videos and photographs of the Baisaran Valley are available in the public domain.
Experts in the geospatial and open-source intelligence community have also questioned the premise of the reports. Nathan Ruser, an analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), an independent think tank, also found nothing unusual in his review of Maxar’s imaging patterns.
“Nothing in this article successfully demonstrates any abnormal patterns of satellite imaging over the terror attack,” he wrote on X.
“Accessing satellite imagery is no longer a bureaucratic exercise of the past, and it is no longer limited to large satellite companies. There are US, European, Chinese and even Israeli service providers competing in the market. Today, one can even order a satellite tasking request for new imagery through a mobile app, without even incorporating a company,” an industry insider told India Today TV.
Ordering new high-resolution satellite imagery from a popular Earth intelligence platform, which sources images from several Chinese satellites, over a place like Pahalgam today would cost approximately USD 400 for 50 cm-1 m resolution imagery. Very high-resolution imagery (30-50 cm/pixel) would cost about USD 700, while super-high-resolution (15-30 cm/pixel) could go up to USD 2,000.
Another Canada-based space intelligence company offers high and very high-resolution imagery from Western satellites at slightly higher rates.
At least 26 civilians, mostly tourists, were killed on April 22 by terrorists armed with M4 carbines and AK-47s, who entered the Baisaran Valley surrounded by dense pine forests.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA), investigating the case, has appealed to tourists, visitors and locals who might have any more information, photographs or videos relating to the Pahalgam attack to immediately contact the anti-terror agency.
Tune In