India’s latest communication satellite GSAT-15 successfully launched

November 11, 2015

Bengaluru, Nov 11: India’s latest communication satellite GSAT-15 was successfully launched by Ariane-5 rocket in the early hours on Wednesday from the spaceport of Kourou in French Guiana.

GSATThe European launcher blasted off at 03:04am (IST) and hurled the GSAT-15, designed to deliver telecommunications services, as well as dedicated navigation-aid and emergency services, into space in a flawless flight.

The satellite was launched into a Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) after its co-passenger Arabsat-6B (BADR-7) was injected into space.

“Arianespace successfully launched two satellites this evening (local time): Arabsat-6B (BADR-7) for the operator Arabsat, and GSAT-15 for Isro (Indian Space Research Organisation),” Arianespace said.

GSAT-15, weighing 3,164 kg at lift-off, is a high power satellite being inducted into the INSAT/GSAT system. It carries a total of 24 communication transponders in Ku-band as well as a GPS-Aided GEO Augmented Navigation (GAGAN) payload operating in L1 and L5 bands, Isro said adding that it is the third satellite to carry GAGAN payload after GSAT-8 and GSAT-10, which are already providing navigation services from orbit.

It also carries a Ku-band beacon as well to help in accurately pointing ground antennas towards the satellite.

GSAT-15 is the 19th payload launched by Arianespace for Isro.

Speaking at Kourou, Isro Satellite Centre (ISAC) director M Annadurai said, “GSAT-15 satellite signal has been acquired by Master Control Facility at Hassan (in Karnataka). The initialisation commands are in process and the satellite health is hail and healthy.”

He said the launch of GSAT-15 will enable ISRO to provide continuity of service to Indian users in Ku-band and the navigation payload GAGAN of GSAT-15 will provide in orbit backup to ensure safety of life navigation services in civil aviation sector as well as other location based services to various services in the Indian region.

Annadurai also said other two communication satellites GSAT-17 and GSAT-18 are getting ready for launch by Ariane vehicle in the next year.

“The realisation of both the satellites are in very advanced stage.”

The launch was telecast live by Doordarshan. GSAT-15 brings in Ku-band capacity to augment as well as provide replacement to indigenous operational satellite capacity, Isro said.

“The launch of GSAT-15 will be one more step towards further strengthening the satellite navigation infrastructure and sustaining the communication infrastructure in the country,” Isro chief AS Kiran Kumar said in a recorded video message.

Indian satellite’s co-passenger Arabsat-6B, lofted for Airbus Defence and Space and Thales Alenia Space as part of a turnkey contract with Saudi Arabia-based Arabsat, was also launched by Ariane 5 VA-227.

According to Arianespace, Arabsat-6B, to be renamed BADR-7 once in orbit will provide broadcast, broadband and telecommunications services over the Middle East, Africa and Central Asia.

Ariane 5 mission had a total payload lift performance of 9,810kg. This includes the two satellites’ mass at liftoff -5,798kg for Arabsat-6B and 3,164kg for GSAT-15 - along with launcher integration hardware and Ariane 5’s dual-passenger deployment system.

The GAGAN payload in GSAT-15 provides the Satellite Based Augmentation System, through which the accuracy of the positioning information obtained from the GPS satellites is improved by a network of ground based receivers and made available to the users in the country through geostationary satellites, Isro said.

In the next few days, the MCF at Hassan will perform the initial orbit raising manoeuvres using the Liquid Apogee Motor (LAM) of the satellite to take it to its intended space home.

With the designed in-orbit operational life of 12 years, GSAT-15 will be positioned at 93.5 degree east longitude and co-located with INSAT-3A and INSAT-4B satellites.

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News Network
June 19,2020

New Delhi, Jun 19: Petrol price on Friday was hiked by 56 paise per litre and diesel by 63 paise a litre, taking the cumulative increase in rates to Rs 7.11 and Rs 7.67 per litre respectively in less than two weeks.

Petrol price in Delhi was hiked to Rs 78.37 per litre from Rs 77.81, while diesel rates were increased to Rs 77.06 a litre from Rs 76.43, according to a price notification of state oil marketing companies.

Rates have been increased across the country and vary from state to state depending on the incidence of local sales tax or VAT.

This is the 13th daily increase in rates in a row since oil companies on June 7 restarted revising prices in line with costs, after ending an 82-day hiatus in rate revision.

In 13 hikes, petrol price has gone up by Rs 7.11 per litre and diesel by Rs 7.67 a litre.

The freeze in rates was imposed in mid-March soon after the government hiked excise duty on petrol and diesel to shore up additional finances.

Oil PSUs Indian Oil Corp (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL) instead of passing on the excise duty hikes to customers adjusted them against the fall in the retail rates that was warranted because of fall in international oil prices to two decade low.

International oil prices have since rebounded and oil firms are now adjusting retail rates in line with them.

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News Network
July 11,2020

New Delhi, Jul 11: India's COVID-19 case count crossed the eight lakh-mark on Saturday with yet another highest single-day spike of 27,114 new cases in the last 24 hours.

As many as 519 deaths were reported during this period.

The total number of positive cases in the country stands at 8,20,916, including 2,83,407 active cases, 5,15,386 cured/discharged/migrated and 22,123 deaths, according to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

With as many as 2,38,461 COVID-19 cases, Maharashtra continues to remain the worst-affected state, followed by Tamil Nadu (1,30,261) and Delhi (1,09,140).

Meanwhile, 1,13,07,002 samples have been tested for COVID-19 till July 10. Out of these 2,82,511 samples were tested yesterday, according to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).

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Agencies
May 26,2020

In a startling revelation, cybersecurity researchers have claimed that a hacker has posted personal details of nearly 2.9 crore Indian job seekers at one of the hacking forums on the Dark Web for free.

As part of the regular sweep over the Deep Web and Dark Web, researchers from cybersecurity firm Cyble came across an interesting item, where a threat actor posted 2.3GB (zipped) file on one of the hacking forums.

"The leak actually has a lot of personal details of millions of Indians Job seekers from different states," Cyble said in its blog on Friday.

This breach includes sensitive information such as email, phone, home address, qualification and work experience etc from job seekers spanning across states, from New Delhi to Mumbai and Bengaluru. 

Cybercriminals are always on the lookout for such personal information to conduct various nefarious activities such as identity thefts, scams, and corporate espionage.

"It appears to have originated from a resume aggregator service given the sheer volume and detailed information," it added.

Cyble indexed this information at ‘AmIbreached.com; – Cyble's data breach monitoring and notification platform.

Cyble researchers have identified a sensitive data breach on the dark web where an actor has leaked personal details of nearly 29 million Indian job seekers from various states. 

"Cyble's team is still investigating this further and will be updating their article as they bring more facts to the surface,” it said in a statement.

Cyble said it has acquired the leaked data. 

The same cyber security firm earlier exposed that Bengaluru-based edtech firm Unacademy was hacked.

According to Cyble researchers, nearly 22 million Unacademy user accounts were affected and the data was dumped and sold on Dark Web.

'We would like to assure our users that no sensitive information such as financial data or location has been breached," said Hemesh Singh, Co- Founder and CTO, Unacademy, in a statement.

In April, hackers sold personal data of a whopping 267 million Facebook users for just Rs 41,500 (approximately 500 Euros) that includes email addresses, names, Facebook IDs, dates of birth and phone numbers.

No passwords of the 267 million Facebook users were exposed by the hacker, according to Cyble.

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