Over the past 70 years, human space activities have been regulated by a stable international legal regime. The legal framework for this regime is the Magna Carta of ISL—the 1967 Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies (the Outer Space Treaty). States have been major actors throughout the history of space activities. Due to their efforts, the provisions of the Outer Space Treaty and other treaties adopted to develop and enlarge individual articles of the former fully ensured proper intergovernmental cooperation. However, after private companies started to play a more significant role in space activities, the legal regime required consistent and corresponding changes. Considering that commercial operators are gaining stronger positions in the global space markets every year, basically displacing states, they are interested in comprehensive and efficient legal protection of their interests. This leads to the emergence of a new issue in international space law—the need to reorganize and reshape the liability institute, which does not currently provide actors involved in space activities with fair compensation for damage caused by space objects. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023.