How does dish tv cange which channels you get without touching your box ?

like it used to be that they had to come to your house and change your channel lineup card, but nowadays they can change it from satellite in space ? how do they tell the satellite 22000 miles up in Space not to transmit certain channels to your dish on your roof, when they used to have to come to your home and mess with your "cable box" ?|||The receiver is addressable. The satellite company up links instruction to your receiver to the satellite. The satellite then down links that information to your receiver. Every receiver has it's own address.|||its called technology