A small California town was hit with a dazzling nighttime glare as a tech startup tested its futuristic plan to beam sunlight onto Earth after dark — using powerful spotlights in the mountains instead of mirrors in space.
The Oct. 10 demonstration near Lone Pine illuminated a three-mile stretch of desert, giving locals a taste of the company’s ambitious vision to deploy 50,000 satellites over the next decade to reflect sunlight onto selected locations at night.
Reflect Orbital hauled high-powered generators and spotlights up Horseshoe Meadows Road near Mount Whitney, projecting intense beams onto the desert floor.
The company partnered with volunteers from the China Lake Mountain Rescue Group, who used the artificial illumination to practice nighttime search-and-rescue drills and stretcher carries under full-moon-level brightness.
But the technology has sparked public criticism and scientific concerns. Researchers warn that atmospheric scattering could create widespread “sky glow,” brightening areas miles beyond the target zone to levels exceeding a full moon and potentially disrupting nocturnal wildlife.
“This is not a ‘concern’ — this is like a bullet in your head,” Princeton astrophysicist Gaspar Bakos told Sky and Telescope. “It’s the end of ground-based astronomy.”
Others fear the satellites could enable mass surveillance and attract military clients, while raising questions about who controls the night sky.
Climate scientists have also blasted the proposal.
“This is an idiotic project,” Earthjustice attorney Jan Hasselman told The Guardian, warning of “a huge number of unresolved questions and significant potential impacts.”
Reflect Orbital has purchased two dedicated rocket launches from India’s Skyroot Aerospace to deploy its first experimental mirror satellites. Its initial “Earendil” mission is scheduled for the second quarter of 2027.
Regulatory questions also loom.
The Federal Communications Commission granted the company its initial US demonstration license but explicitly said light pollution and environmental impacts fall outside its authority, leaving a legal grey area as responsibility shifts toward Indian space regulators.

Details of more than 41,000 personnel working for the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), including thousands involved in immigration enforcement, have been leaked to the public.
The leak includes names, work addresses and phone numbers of DHS staff, including agents working with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection, along with descriptions of the work they do for each agency.
Wednesday’s leak marks the third time in recent weeks that a government agency has been targeted by leaks or hacks.
A DHS spokesperson said the agency is “aware of a potential breach and is actively working to address the situation swiftly and effectively.”
“We take all security threats against our employees and officers seriously and will work to ensure all are properly protected,” the spokesperson added.
The seemingly unprecedented breach of employee information was made public online. A group called the Department of Peace accessed the information from DHS, while journalist and cybersecurity researcher maia crimew alongside the website Distributed Denial of Secrets put it online.
Most of the agents included, more than 21,000 of them, work for CBP, according to the data. Nearly 6,600 work for ICE.
Other records show agents with Homeland Security Investigations, the Federal Protective Service and even people working for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.
The leaked information also included dozens of previously unknown operation names, the agents that led and worked on those operations, and some of the technology they used in their work, including tech provided by Cellbrite and Palantir.
The groups wrote in an online statement that the the leak was not meant to be a directory of every DHS agent. Rather the aim was to replace “anonymity with accountability”, according to Emma Best, a co founder of DDoSecrets.
“The leak is extraordinary but deceptive in it’s simplicity as it identifies the officials responsible for overseeing covert and undercover operations, the government’s hunt for leakers and the failed BlueLeaks investigation – along with key personnel in DHS’s ever-escalating rendition and deportation programs,” Best added.
BlueLeaks refers to a massive leak of US police data in 2020, data from which DDoSecrets also hosted.
A spokesperson for the Department of Peace pointed directly at actions by ICE agents for the groups work to hack DHS records.
“On July 17th, Markwayne Mullin said he was ‘turning up the heat’. This is what happens to ICE when you do that,” the spokesperson wrote on Wednesday.
Okta is a popular online security tool that organisations use to ensure that only people with access to internal platforms are logging on to them.
A spokeswoman for Okta said the company is aware of the claims being made, but said: “Okta is secure, and we have no evidence our data or systems were compromised.”
Last month, the FBI was hacked by a group called ShinyHunters, which took personal information about thousands of agents.
In recent days, the Federal Election Commission, which makes public political campaign donation data, was taken offline because of a suspected hacking attempt.
Public backlash to US immigration enforcement has been building as the Trump Administration has pushed a huge increase in arrests and deportations of people suspected of being in the country illegally.
Immigration operations this year have repeatedly turned violent, with ICE agents shooting at more than two dozen people and killing at least nine people.

The Trump administration is proposing to dramatically scale back a Biden-era rule that aimed to cut methane emissions from the oil and gas industry at drilling sites nationwide.
Methane is a major contributor to climate change and is estimated to be 80 times more planet-warming than carbon dioxide in a twenty-year time frame. In 2023, the Biden administration finalized rules that were meant to rein in methane emissions from the oil and gas sector.
President Trump made the announcement while campaigning in Lubbock, Texas, Tuesday, saying his administration’s revision, under the Clean Air Act, would save the industry billions in production costs and spur more domestic drilling. The proposal comes as Republicans face a backlash from voters over high gas prices heading into the midterms.
“Behind every barrel of oil and every cubic foot of natural gas produced in the U.S. are millions of workers, businesses, and the heartbeat of this nation’s economy. The Biden EPA destructively targeted all this,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a press release.
The oil and gas industry, which vigorously opposed the 2023 rules, said EPA’s proposed rollback will address some of the challenges companies have faced in trying to comply with the regulations.
“We look forward to working with the Trump administration on a more workable approach that supports American energy production, provides greater regulatory certainty and advances continued emissions reductions,” Dustin Meyer, vice president at the American Petroleum Institute, a trade organization for the U.S. oil and gas industry, said in a statement.
But environmentalists say this may end up actually costing the industry more.
“Methane is natural gas, or natural gas is methane,” says Jon Goldstein, associate vice president at the Environmental Defense Fund. “And so if you’re capturing more natural gas, you’re not allowing it to leak out, you’re not allowing it to be flared, you have more product that you can sell. And so that offsets a lot of the costs.”
“That is harmful to our energy security, and it’s harmful to taxpayers that ought to be seeing royalty and tax revenue collected off of this gas that’s going to waste,” Goldstein adds.
One of the regulations the EPA wants to cut is the “Methane Super Emitter Program.” Across the U.S., oil and gas pipelines, refineries, and other energy facilities sometimes have huge leaks of methane. But methane is invisible and difficult, not to mention expensive, to detect. The super emitter program is supposed to take effect in January 2027. It would allow the government to delegate monitoring for big methane leaks to certified third parties, including private and nonprofit methane satellite programs.
“The easiest way to think about it is that if the government is alerted to a big leak, then if it’s reported by certified third parties, then they could use that information,” says Paasha Mahdavi, a political science professor at UC Santa Barbara who studies the oil industry.
“[The government] needs help from other people to say, ‘Hey! You’re breaking the law!’ so they’re able to prosecute,” Mahdavi adds.
If that program goes away, Mahdavi says it will be harder for the government to spot large leaks of the planet-heating gas from oil and gas facilities. “And we need that because it’s really hard to see this stuff,” he says.
The EPA’s announcement would also loosen regulations on methane leaks coming from low-volume “marginal” oil wells that are considered “marginally economic,” meaning they don’t make much money.
“People assume marginal well must equal small emissions,” Goldstein says. But he says satellites and new technology find that’s not true. “These old sort of end-of-life wells nearing the end of their production life are actually responsible for the lion’s share of methane pollution from the [oil and gas] production sector,” Goldstein says.

Skydance Corp., the new company formed from David Ellison’s massive Paramount-Warner Bros. Discovery merger, has established the leadership team overseeing financial operations across the business.
Ellison and Ynon Kreiz, co-CEO of Skydance, previously announced the senior leadership team for the new company (a day before the deal officially closed). Since then, different business units and corporate groups have been laying out the new executive teams for the combined Paramount-WBD, which will have annual revenue of nearly $70 billion on a pro-forma basis and net debt of around $80 billion.
On Wednesday morning, Skydance CFO Dennis Cinelli (formerly Paramount Skydance’s finance chief) sent a memo to staffers announcing the leadership team for the finance group — which will be intimately involved in trying to help the company achieve its projected $6 billion in annualized cost savings, an exercise set to include what are expected to be several rounds of layoffs.
“Today we’re announcing the leadership team for Skydance Finance. Each of these leaders brings the experience and judgment to help us build something exceptional, and I’m excited to work alongside them and to share where I think we can take this team from here,” Cinelli wrote in the memo, a copy of which was obtained by Variety.
Cinelli thanked employees who “put in extraordinary effort to support the acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery” and said that “your work was essential to getting this deal done.” He also gave a shout-out to the legacy Warner Bros. Discovery finance team, writing that “you kept the business performing through a long period of not knowing how this would end. That takes discipline, and it didn’t go unnoticed.”
He continued, “As you’ve heard David [Ellison] say, our goal is to become the next-generation media and entertainment company. We’ll only get there if Finance operates at the highest level and helps drive the business. Every greenlight decision, technology investment, partnership deal and number reported externally depends on the quality of your work.”
According to Cinelli, the new Skydance financial leadership “reflects the strengths of both organizations and puts the right leaders in the right places.” Here’s the structure he outlined in the memo:
Corporate Leaders
Business Unit CFOs (dual-reporting to Cinelli and their respective BU heads)
In addition to those appointments, Bryon Rubin is stepping out of his role as CFO of TV Media to become COO of Skydance Television.
“There will be challenges as we integrate businesses and keep raising the bar, but I have great confidence in this team. What we do matters, and how we do it matters even more,” Cinelli wrote in the memo.
Cinelli also outlined six “pillars” guiding the finance organization:

Below are quotes from Healey:
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HEALEY’S FIRST WORDS
“This is a budget for the working people of Britain, for British businesses, big and small, delivered at a time when global uncertainties and pressures are swirling worldwide and hitting people here at home. A budget built on fiscal discipline, which matches immediate action today, with clear direction for the future.”
GLOBAL ECONOMIC STORMS
“Analysts like to speak of economic headwinds. But what we face today are global economic storms with trade tensions ​acting as a drag on global growth, and (Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s illegal invasion of Ukraine approaching the end of its fifth year.”
“The OBR sets out that the war in the Middle East is a key driver affecting today’s forecasts. And this government continues to work with ‌our allies to end the conflict and restore shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.”
“In the budget today, I have chosen to use some of the headroom established last year to absorb the impact of the Iran war to protect the economy, and to protect family budgets.”
FISCAL HEADROOM AND BORROWING
“The OBR confirms today that headroom against the stability rule is £15 billion in 2029/30, before rising to £22 billion in 2030/31.”
“That’s what a buffer is for. Use it when you need it. Rebuild it when you can. And so, despite the global challenges, this budget puts us on track to eliminate the current budget deficit and get Britain’s finances into the black within 3 years.”
“In today’s forecast, borrowing falls to 4.2% this year, 3.4% next year, 2.9% in 2028/29, 2.1% in 2029/30, and 1.8% in 2030/31 ​and 2031/32.”
DEBT
“Our debt as a percentage of GDP is 83.2% this year, 83.8% next year and in 2028/29, before falling to 83.1% in 2029/30, 82.3% in 2030/31 and 81.7% in 2031/32.”
ECONOMIC GROWTH
“Three months ago, the Bank of England upgraded their forecasts for growth this year. Two weeks ago, the IMF did ​the same.”
“And today, the OBR has upgraded its forecast too – to 1.2% this year, followed by 1% next year, 1.6% in 2028, 1.8% in 2029, 1.7% in 2030 and 1.6% in 2031.”
“Yes, there are real challenges ahead, but Britain has beaten ⁠the forecasts this year, and with the action I’m taking today, I believe Britain can beat them again.”
BANK SURCHARGE
“I am looking to our banks to help fund breathing space for British families. And so banks will pay an extra 3% on the Bank Surcharge. This will be time-limited, to pay for immediate support on energy bills, starting ​in January, ending 15 months later.”
DEFENCE
“I want to thank my cabinet colleagues for everything they are doing, prioritising within their departmental budgets in the face of tough fiscal constraints.
“In today’s budget, I am fully funding the Defence Investment Plan, including through capital reprioritisation across Whitehall.”
“I am today launching the new Innovative Defence Finance Taskforce to lead this ​work forward ahead of the Spending Review.”
“We will commence treaty negotiations on the Multilateral Defence Mechanism [with Finland, Poland, and the Netherlands] to boost defence investment and joint procurement across NATO allies.”
“The National Wealth Fund and the British Business Bank will launch a new focus on defence, dual-use technology and sovereign capability, deploying up to £5 billion of investment and lending over the next four years.”
NATIONAL MINIMUM WAGE
“For 2.3 million of our lowest paid workers, I am increasing both the National Minimum Wage and the National Living Wage by 3.9%.”
TAXES
“I am raising taxes on gambling – by increasing Machine Games Duty from 20% to 25% for higher stakes machines, while protecting pubs and seaside arcades.”
“I will carve out adult gaming centres and vape shops from business rate reliefs, and extend the business rates ​Transitional Relief Supplement for a further two years.”
“For those who feel like celebrating tax cuts for our high streets – I’m providing a £10 million alcohol duty relief for around 2000 small British brewers and cider makers.”
HOUSEHOLD BILLS
“We will introduce a new cost control framework to drive down all aspects of energy bills, and I will scrap the upcoming ​Gas Shipper Obligation – a levy to fund hydrogen projects – and instead back those projects directly from government.”
“First, on clean power generation, this government will only buy and build new projects when they lower bills and when they can connect to the grid.”
“Second, we will break the grip of international gas prices on our bills by moving more of our old renewables ‌onto fixed-price contracts.”
“And third, ⁠we will build cheaper, faster grid connections through GB Grid, and reform the complex web of institutions that govern them.”
“This winter, for 20 million households in council tax bands A-D, I am announcing a £100 ‘Household Energy Payment’. Paid directly into people’s bank accounts to help deal with rising energy bills, a £2.6 billion scheme, to take the pressure off in the coldest months and see people through to the Spring.”
HOUSING
“From today, I am dealing with the LISA penalty. If the home you want costs more than the limit, you will get back at least what you put in.”
“From next Spring, a new scheme for first-time buyers who don’t have the bank of mum and dad behind them. ‘Your First Home’ – an equity loan scheme, which I’m funding today with £4.7 billion of government-backed lending.”
“I am providing an additional £1.5 billion for the Social and Affordable Housing Programme, taking our total government backing for council housing to £40 billion.”
REFORM TO TAX SYSTEM
“First, I am giving HMRC funding to improve compliance, and stronger powers to collect overdue tax from those who can clearly ​afford to pay, but ignore repeated contact. And I am reforming the administration ​of self-assessed income tax from 2029, bringing more of these taxpayers in ⁠line with the majority.”
“Second, I am changing outdated rules so that people taking profits out of their companies are taxed consistently, and I will protect the treatment of genuine commercial transactions and families passing their businesses down to the next generation.”
“Third, I am modernising the tax treatment of investment by foreign sovereigns.”
“And fourth, I will resolve the question of VAT for larger taxi companies, ensuring they play by the same rules, no matter where they are located, while still protecting smaller local firms.”
SAVINGS AND INVESTMENT
“I am ​taking a new approach today to encourage people on ordinary incomes to save and to invest, I will not go ahead with the cut to the tax-free amount that people can put into a cash ISA.”
“The limit will stay at £20,000 ​per year, tax-free, for people of all ages ⁠and to make investment accessible, I will work with the sector to create a new ‘Starter ISA’ to reward first-time investors.”
“I’m boosting investment through our Public Financial Institutions – a further £20.4 billion for the National Wealth Fund and the British Business Bank over the coming years, supporting 140,000 jobs.”
DATA CENTRE COVENANT AND AI
“I am today launching a new British Data Centre Covenant with strict tests that data centres must meet: to invest in local communities, create local jobs and protect local water supplies.”
“In return, critical data centres will get the grid connections they need, and, where necessary, be allowed to build onsite generation while they wait.”
“I am announcing a new AI Challenge Prize to find innovative uses for AI in public services and the ⁠Union Learning Fund to ​back workers.”
ENTREPRENEURS AND START-UPS
“I’m tripling the trading allowance – the amount you can earn from a new venture tax-free – from £1,000 to £3,000.”
“I’m launching a new Young Entrepreneurs Allowance, which will cover a year of living costs ​for young founders while they turn their ideas into businesses.”
“The British Business Bank will double its commitments to women-led businesses and funds to £200 million.”
“I’m reforming skilled worker visas and non-compete clauses in contracts.”
“Today I’m launching EMI2 – doubling the generosity of the Company Share Option Plan, so more companies can hire and retain top talent as they grow.”
DEVOLUTION
“For the first time I’m making the commitment that 100% of business rates ​will be retained locally by the end of the decade.”
“From next year, 20% of business rates revenue will go to mayors. From 2028, a share of income tax receipts will go to mayors as well. From 2028, mayors and other strategic authorities will have new powers to introduce an overnight visitor levy.”