Nah. Bolt cutters on an arm, or even just spray paint. You don’t need to be close to do an electronic attack. If you’re close, you might as well hit it with a hammer or snip the antenna and solar arrays off.
This kind of sudden malfunction, along with acceleration not due to firing of any engines, would be a signal for the self-destruction device, likely chemically powered (explosive) and mechanically actuated. It would be sure to shatter the interesting electronic parts, burning or detonating any remaining fuel for bonus points.
I would be very surprised if any orbiting spacecraft built today, or currently being planned has any sort of self destruct. We're talking about capabilities that are still theoretical, albeit pretty plausible and feasible.
Anyway, who cares if the self destruct goes off? You're breaking the satellite anyway, and if you were really concerned, about attacker survivability, just launch a gun on board, like Salyut 3.
I suspect the arguments about how much launch mass to devote to self destruct explosive and mechanism - compared to useful payload or manoeuvring propellant - would be interesting to see...
I suppose your self-destruct mechanism could be "aim retrograde and burn all remaining propellant". Might not turn out well for a spaceplane that latched onto such satellite.
You need an ounce or two of HE, strategically placed, to destroy the sensitive parts with confidence. Nobody needs to shatter the entire satellite to pieces.
mems accel gyro on the sat to detect when an exterior craft docs, rig up some airbags to propel shrapnel / acid / thermite in all directions when it triggers.
Cheap satellite does asymmetrical damage to space plane.
Backdoor? Hmm, I wonder how useful it would be when everything is encrypted to the brim.
It could report the orientation and thus e.g. the telescope direction. But this can be done remotely, too, with a large enough telescope, maybe on the same orbit.
