In some ways, the final frontier of space is similar to the Wild West of yore: lawless and full of opportunity.

Northern Sky Research, a space industry consulting firm, projects that the industry will generate over $1.25 trillion in cumulative revenue by 2030. And because the cost of launch has never been lower—thanks to reusability of rockets, cheaper components, and the rise of private space companies—space is getting more and more crowded with those looking to take advantage.

Enter...Privateer, a startup that was founded in 2021 but debuted in early March with an undisclosed amount of funding, is looking to help companies deal with that congestion.

• By aggregating satellite location data into a single place, it wants to help space companies see where their competition is, avoid collisions between objects and satellites, and track space debris.

“The more that I looked at it, the more depressed I got,” Alex Fielding, CEO and chairman of Privateer, told Emerging Tech Brew. “We don’t agree on where things in low-Earth orbit are within an average deviation of a couple hundred kilometers. So how do you dock with something in low-Earth space? Or how do you, even if you could, clean it up?”

Its first product is Wayfinder, a real-time visualization of objects in space, from defunct satellites to active constellations and space junk. Wayfinder, which is available for free to anyone, also details each satellite’s orbit, speed, owner, and the source of that data.

• Fielding co-founded the company alongside Moriba Jah, an associate professor of aerospace engineering at University of Texas, and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak.

So, how does Privateer plan to help companies navigate the night sky? Keep reading here.—JM

Just as all families have a designated member who acts as tech support, US cities are also hiring people to run point on their transition to the digital age.

The role is often called chief innovation officer, or CIO, but it’s not uncommon for it to be called chief information officer or chief technology officer.

While the specific title and responsibilities may vary place-to-place, the core mission remains the same: to improve the municipality’s relationship with technology. America’s 10 most populous cities all have some form of the role, with some cities, like Phoenix, creating the position as recently as 2021.

• Responsibilities can range from updating legacy government IT systems to helping usher in smart-city projects, like running pilots on wrong-way-driving detection or using software to manage crowd size and movement at public events.

Zoom in: We talked with Mike Sarasti, the former innovation chief for the city of Miami, to learn more about the day-to-day of this role. Sarasti became Miami's first chief innovation officer in May 2016, serving in the role for nearly six years, until February 2022.

• During his time, the city also merged its IT department with Sarasti's innovation department, and put him in charge of the combined unit, which he said has 85 employees.

“It’s one thing to say, ‘We’re going to do innovation, and we’re going to assign it to some random person in an office,’” Sarasti said. “It’s a very different thing to say, ‘We’re going to have a funded role. We’re going to name it.’ That is a named, funded position that sends a signal to the community that you’re serious.”

Chek out the interview here.—JM

A team at Penn State University discovered a data-loss vulnerability while doing some squats—cloud squats, specifically.

Eric Pauley, a graduate research fellow and PhD candidate at Penn State, along with five team members, found that user information can be leaked during the fairly common process of companies leaving a public cloud service.

• When one company’s service is terminated, cloud providers often lease the same server space and IP addresses to another company. A new cloud client with a reused IP address, it turns out, can receive network traffic from end users trying to connect to the original service.
• Acting as “cloud squatters,” Pauley and the Penn State researchers demonstrated how attackers could potentially get a hold of valuable data meant for a previous destination—information that could even include bank-transaction details.

And when you’re a cloud squatter, the data comes to you.

“People will be trying to connect, and they’ll be sending you potentially privileged information intended for other customers,” said Pauley, whose team found over 5,400 organizations potentially leaking sensitive data.

How serious is the threat? To exploit the vulnerability, an attacker would have to get lucky…for now, at least.

“Customers don’t get to choose what IP they get, so you can’t really intentionally target a specific customer for this kind of squatting attack,” said Mike Rothman, president of the cloud security operations platform DisruptOPS and an analyst at the security firm Securosis.

Read the full story from IT Brew.—BH

For more, click here to sign up for IT Brew, our brand-new publication for IT and cybersecurity professionals.

Stat: By the end of 2023, Lego wants to triple the number of software engineers it had on staff at the start of last year to 1,800. Yes, that Lego.

Quote: “There’s a [capital expenditure] problem of building a carbon-removal facility—that takes years, that takes a lot of money—but the demand for carbon removal can move as quickly as the speed of thought.”—Michelle You, co-founder and CEO of Supercritical to Emerging Tech Brew

Read: How Amazon uses Alexa data to target ads.

Feeling metaverse-curious? Here’s your way in: Citi estimates the metaverse may be an opportunity worth up to $13 billion by 2030. The Roundhill Ball Metaverse ETF (aka METV) was the first and largest ETF to provide exposure into this exciting market. Learn more here.*

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• The Biden admin allocated $3.16 billion of the infrastructure law funding earmarked for building out the domestic battery supply chain.
• SpaceX set a new record for rocket turnaround, using the same booster twice within a three-week span.
• Anthropic, the safety-focused AI research company founded ~a year ago by OpenAI alums, raised a $580 million Series B last week.
• Gemini, a 690 megawatt solar-plus-storage project in Nevada, locked down $1.3 billion in financing. It’ll be the largest solar plant in the US when built. But, zooming out, the US solar industry is “frozen,” with more than 300 projects canceled or delayed due to a Commerce Department investigation.

Snap poll: Forget grid-level solar for a sec, let’s talk about rooftops. Do you have solar panels on your house or apartment building?

Yes

No

Time for another dispatch from the minds of you all, the readers of this very newsletter. Last week, we wondered if any of you would consider visiting a Meta store to mess around with its VR headsets.

Survey says: You’ll pass, for the most part. We got about 2,500 responses to this one, and 34% of you said yes, you would. That means two-thirds (66%) said, “Nope.”

• The store that inspired this question will be Meta’s first-ever IRL hardware store when it opens on May 9. It’s located in Burlingame, California, and it’ll stock Meta’s Portal devices and Ray-Ban Stories sunglasses in addition to its VR headsets.

Maybe one of the four new VR headsets Meta reportedly plans to release by 2024 will change these feelings? Or...maybe not?

Morning Brew Leadership (MB/L) has officially launched! And we put the Morning Brew spin on it, giving you actionable lessons in a fun, engaging environment—unlike what some other leadership programs offer.

So, what is MB/L? In this 8-week education program, students will learn about the tactics of leadership, including hiring, delegation, strategy, and execution. This might sound like what you’d get from a run-of-the-mill leadership course, but MB/L is designed to make topics that can feel overwhelming feel approachable instead.

What’s more, MB/L helps you build authentic relationships with your fellow students that go beyond the virtual classroom. To top it all off, access to alumni benefits means your professional growth won’t stop at graduation.

Download the syllabus now to find out everything you’ll learn in Morning Brew Leadership. (Psst: You can also save $500 on tuition if you join our founding cohort!)

Catch up on the top Emerging Tech Brew stories from the past few editions:

• The “bug” that turns waste gasses into useful chemicals
• These robots could help uncover the ocean’s mysteries
• A previously ignored battery chemistry is now surging in popularity. Here’s why