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By Sean Lyngaas, CNN

(CNN) — Elon Musk’s SpaceX is now providing free internet access via its Starlink satellite service to users in Iran as the country’s regime continues its bloody crackdown on anti-government protests, according to a tech expert in touch with Iranian Starlink users.

Starlink accounts in Iran that were previously inactive now have connections and their subscription fees have been waived as of Tuesday, said Ahmad Ahmadian, executive director at the technology nonprofit Holistic Resilience. “It’s plug and connect … just put [the satellite terminal] somewhere that has access to a clear view of the sky, and you’re good to go,” he told CNN.

The news follows a phone call earlier this week between US President Donald Trump and Musk in which the two men discussed Starlink access in Iran. Neither SpaceX nor the White House responded to requests for comment.

For several days, the Iranian government has choked off internet access for its population while reportedly killing over 1,800 protesters in what observers say is one of the regime’s largest ever digital blackouts. The death toll could be much higher because the communications shutdown has made it harder to tally, according to human rights groups.

Providing free access will be a welcome step for activists, but it’s only likely to help a small percentage of Iran’s 92 million population get online and the regime has the ability to jam Starlink, experts told CNN.

‘The only way to get the information out’

The scale of the information blackout means that Starlink in some cases has been “the only way to get the information out” to the world about the protesters being killed, Ahmadian told CNN. With thousands of low-orbit satellites worldwide that communicate with ground equipment, Starlink has become a crucial arm of US soft power in closed societies or war zones like Ukraine.

Trump has told the protesters to keep resisting the Iranian regime while claiming that all options for US support for the protesters, including military action, are on the table.

Iran’s rulers have “created their own Great Firewall that blocks everything but approved traffic,” Doug Madory, who works at network monitoring firm Kentik, told CNN. Blocking internet access for Iranians is relatively straightforward for the regime, Madory said, because there are only two companies that connect Iran to the internet.

The Iranian government is building on decades of experience in surveilling its population and exporting that surveillance to other countries, like Syria, according to experts. Right now, Iranian authorities are using various tactics to jam or degrade Starlink signals within Iran, according to Ahmadian. Some of that is “military-grade” jamming similar to what Russia has done to Starlink terminals on the front lines in Ukraine, he added.

To get around the regime’s firewall, digital rights activists have pleaded for more access to Starlink for Iranians. Although Starlink is not officially licensed to operate in Iran, Musk previously stated that the service is active and available in the country. Iranian authorities criminalized use of Starlink after the 12-day war between Israel and Iran last year.

Despite the risk of being executed for usin

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By Haley Britzky, Natasha Bertrand, Zachary Cohen, Jennifer Hansler, CNN

(CNN) — The aircraft used in the US military’s first strike on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean, a strike which has drawn intense scrutiny and resulted in numerous Congressional briefings, was painted as a civilian aircraft and was part of a closely guarded classified program, sources familiar with the program told CNN. Its use “immediately drew scrutiny and real concerns” from lawmakers, one of the sources familiar said, and legislators began asking questions about the aircraft during briefings in September.

Two sources familiar with the matter told CNN the plane is largely used for reconnaissance and surveillance missions and wasn’t painted the usual grey applied to military planes. Administration officials told lawmakers the aircraft wasn’t pretending to be a civilian aircraft and pointed out the fact that it was using a military transponder and had a military tail number, a source said.

While lawmakers raised concerns in the fall, it’s not clear that the use of the aircraft would violate the law of war which prohibits military personnel from pretending to be civilians to attack an enemy.

Pentagon officials told lawmakers during the briefings that the operation was hurried and that the aircraft was the most available at the time. But one of the sources familiar with the matter said the reasoning didn’t hold up given the intensive planning that supposedly went into the operation and the months-long buildup of US military assets in the region.

“There were unlimited assets available to use, but they chose this one,” the source familiar with the matter said. The New York Times first reported concerns about the aircraft.

“The U.S. military utilizes a wide array of standard and nonstandard aircraft depending on mission requirements,” Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson said in response to questions from CNN about the use of the aircraft. “Prior to the fielding and employment of each aircraft, they go through a rigorous procurement process to ensure compliance with domestic law, department policies and regulations, and applicable international standards, including the law of armed conflict.”

The intentional disguising of a military aircraft as civilian in order to trick enemy combatants would be an act of perfidy, defined in the Defense Department’s Law of War Manual as an act that invites the confidence of the enemy to believe they are entitled to protection, with the intent to betray that confidence. One of the examples that falls under prohibited actions of killing or wounding the enemy through perfidy is feigning civilian status and then attacking the enemy.

But the situation in September is not so clear cut, according to legal experts. The operations in the Caribbean – which have killed at least 115 people – have not been legally defined as a war, as Congress has not declared such a conflict.

The head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel told lawmakers last year that the activities in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean do not require a declaration of war from Congress and don’t meet the definition of hostilities. Still, a Pentagon notice provided to Congress in October said President Donald Trump determined the US was in an “armed conflict” with the drug cartels.

“Perfidy rules apply in war, and this was no

CNN

By John Fritze, Devan Cole, CNN

(CNN) — The Supreme Court’s conservative majority indicated Tuesday it is likely to side with two states that have enacted bans on transgender athletes playing on girls’ sports teams, delving into a divisive culture war dispute that could have implications far beyond sports.

For over three hours, the justices waded through exceedingly technical debates and hypotheticals as they tried to assess whether the bans enacted by Idaho and West Virginia are consistent with the 14th Amendment or a landmark 1972 law that bars discrimination in schools. The court’s decision could affect similar laws in more than half the country.

“I hate – hate – that a kid who wants to play sports might not be able to play sports,” said Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who then quickly added that if a transgender girl makes a competitive team, that might bump a cisgender girl from the roster. “It’s kind of zero-sum game for a lot of teams.”

Even as the court’s conservatives seemed sympathetic to the states’ bans, several expressed concerns about potential spillover effects of a decision in their favor beyond athletics. Some seemed to be searching for a way to side with the states that would limit that potential impact.

Here are five takeaways from the arguments:

Conservatives raise fairness questions

Several conservative justices seized on language and themes that have punctuated the national debate around whether trans athletes had an unfair advantage, another sign of their readiness to back the state bans.

Kavanaugh, who for years coached his daughter’s basketball team and emphasized that during his contentious confirmation hearings, was especially sympathetic to arguments from the states that the restrictions are needed to ensure cisgender women and girls don’t face a “harm” resulting from having to compete against trans athletes.

“One of the great successes in America over the last 50 years has been the growth of women and girls’ sports. And it’s inspiring,” said Kavanaugh, who was appointed to the high court by President Donald Trump in 2018.

The conservative justice and occasional swing vote went on to note that states, the NCAA and the US Olympic Committee have all concluded that allowing trans athletes to compete “will create unfairness.” (Some of those decisions were made in response to an executive order signed by Trump.)

“For the individual girl who does not make the team or doesn’t get on the stand for the medal, or doesn’t make all-league, there’s a harm there, and I think we can’t sweep that aside,” Kavanaugh said.

But such claims have long been disputed by opponents of the bans, who point to the fact that some trans at