BTRC to seek govt nod for Starlink’s bandwidth export

Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC), the country’s internet regulator, is taking a cautious approach to Starlink Services Bangladesh Ltd’s proposal to export unfiltered internet bandwidth to neighbouring countries via local cable providers, and will seek the government’s opinion before approval.

After extensive internal discussions, technical reviews, and exchanges of letters with the company and international terrestrial cable companies that operate in the country, the BTRC will submit the matter to the Posts and Telecommunications Division, according to official documents.

Unfiltered bandwidth, unlike filtered connections, bypasses network controls like firewalls, deep packet inspection, or application blocking, which governments or operators use to restrict access, slow traffic, or monitor data. Industry experts say such unfiltered Internet Protocol (IP) transit is essential for exporting data internationally.

Two international terrestrial cable licensees, Summit Communications Limited and Fiber@Home Global Limited, have applied to the commission for permission to provide Starlink with unfiltered IP transit, which the company plans to use exclusively for customers outside Bangladesh.

Starlink has requested 40 Gbps of committed bandwidth, scalable up to 400 Gbps as needed.

Technology expert Sumon Ahmed Sabir told The Daily Star, “If approved, the arrangement could make Bangladesh a regional data hub and earn foreign currency for local operators.”

“No country would accept bandwidth that has already been filtered by another country,” he said, adding that neighbouring countries like Bhutan and Nepal require unfiltered connectivity for quality service.

Starlink received its licence from the BTRC on April 29, 2025, to provide non-geostationary satellite orbit services. The company launched in May and officially began operations on August 8, currently sourcing 80 Gbps of bandwidth from two international internet gateway operators for domestic use.

STRICT CONDITIONS FOR EXPORTING BANDWIDTH

In mid-August, Starlink applied to use international private leased circuit connections and unfiltered IP transit from Bangladeshi operators to carry internet traffic for users in neighbouring countries.

The BTRC instructed the company to ensure that this bandwidth serves only foreign customers, not Bangladeshi users or foreigners in Bangladesh.

The commission also required Starlink to demonstrate, through strong technical measures, full separation of domestic and foreign data traffic, including detailed network diagrams and monitoring tools for real-time verification.

Starlink said foreign traffic could pass between its points of presence (PoPs) in Bangladesh and overseas locations like Singapore and Oman via leased circuit links without carrying Bangladeshi data.

At a later meeting, the BTRC set conditions clarifying whether roaming foreign users in Bangladesh would be served through local ground stations, ensuring strict traffic separation and effective monitoring systems as regulatory safeguards.

On December 15, 2025, the BTRC held a high-level technical meeting with Starlink, the National Telecommunication Monitoring Centre (NTMC), and senior officials to review Starlink’s operations, monitoring, reporting, and on-site inspections, especially at its Kaliakoir PoP.

In a January 13 letter, Starlink informed the commission that it had submitted updated network diagrams, responded to queries, applied to Summit Communications and Fiber@Home for unfiltered IP transit, and met NTMC’s lawful interception requirements.

The company also provided a “Compliance API (application programming interface)” giving the regulator direct access to Bangladeshi customer data.

Before seeking government approval, the BTRC noted past precedent: between 2020 and 2025, Bangladesh Submarine Cable Company PLC supplied up to 20 Gbps of unfiltered IP transit to India’s BSNL under various arrangements, showing that exporting unfiltered bandwidth across borders is not entirely unprecedented, according to the BTRC document.