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Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
41–50 of 51 posts
Re: Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Is there a particular reason why the 5 o'clock news is dumbed down to non-verbal pre-schooler degrees of retardation? Yes, getting eyeballs and selling ads. The simple model of appeals with high emotional resonance and low rational content that generates among a large segment of the population a feeling that the world is a scary, scary place and if they don't keep tabs on the latest danger by watching the news it w…
Often, there's simply no benefit to putting more than the minimum amount of effort into a story. Staff may be untrained, overworked, underpaid, crunched for time or (apparently in this case) just serving up whatever shit the mothership gives them to fill some space. Just look at how many times that particular 'story' mentions 'CNN reported' and 'CNN says.' And the whole thing is like ten sentences. I bet someone didn…
I've worked at a local NBC station that was exactly like this. Nice people, but there's absolutely no incentive at all for anything in depth. Local stations sometimes redeem themselves when shitty weather hits the fan though.
Re: Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
#43Too bad there isn't a market for modern vehicles with minimalist, open-source embedded systems. That would be cool.
There are many options, my favorite: https://www.factoryfive.com/kits/project-818/ Go ahead and put whatever you like in there from there if you like. In person I've seen custom instruments built on Tegra and QNX in someone's project even. Sky's the limit!
Re: Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The competition should not be in the critical software. That much needs to be standard. The competition should be around fluff, construction quality, body design, brand, perks, horsepower, etc. Could you explain your reasoning for this claim? Does competition lead to better/more efficient products, or doesn't it? Why do you desire to leave non-critical parts to competitive forces, but not the critical parts?
It doesn't because 99% of people are entirely and completely ignorant of these systems and their importance. And no amount of discussion or even car theft is going to put it in terms that they understand. Here the news item is "with a black box that nobody understands." That wording is HORRIBLE for HN. Because it makes it sound like it's black magic and this group has found some genie that opens cars. Instead, it's m…
> Until we have a car that kills 500 people because of faulty software, it's just not that important to people, which means there's no pressure in industry to get it right.
I agree with that. But what is your alternate proposal, and where does the pressure to get it right come from in your proposal?
Re: Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
#45Re: Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
It doesn't because 99% of people are entirely and completely ignorant of these systems and their importance. And no amount of discussion or even car theft is going to put it in terms that they understand. Here the news item is "with a black box that nobody understands." That wording is HORRIBLE for HN. Because it makes it sound like it's black magic and this group has found some genie that opens cars. Instead, it's m…
> Until we have a car that kills 500 people because of faulty software, it's just not that important to people, which means there's no pressure in industry to get it right. I agree with that. But what is your alternate proposal, and where does the pressure to get it right come from in your proposal?
I don't think there's any other way to apply pressure to these companies other than regulation, unfortunately. They don't care much about what we think, and their customers don't care, so outside of forcing them to use a secure system (or else not be allowed to sell their products), it'll never happen.
Re: Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Until we have a car that kills 500 people because of faulty software, it's just not that important to people, which means there's no pressure in industry to get it right. I agree with that. But what is your alternate proposal, and where does the pressure to get it right come from in your proposal?
I don't think there's any other way to apply pressure to these companies other than regulation, unfortunately. They don't care much about what we think, and their customers don't care, so outside of forcing them to use a secure system (or else not be allowed to sell their products), it'll never happen.
But what I meant is: where does the "pressure to get it right" come from when government decides to regulate something? If the aggregation of actors' choices in a competitive market doesn't provide pressure to get it right, why would the aggregation of actors' choices in a government provide pressure to get it right?
Re: Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think there's any other way to apply pressure to these companies other than regulation, unfortunately. They don't care much about what we think, and their customers don't care, so outside of forcing them to use a secure system (or else not be allowed to sell their products), it'll never happen.
But what I meant is: where does the "pressure to get it right" come from when government decides to regulate something? If the aggregation of actors' choices in a competitive market doesn't provide pressure to get it right, why would the aggregation of actors' choices in a government provide pressure to get it right?
I'm not saying it would. But the point is that it should, and it's stupid that it doesn't.
It's 2014.
"Someone stole my car by using a packaged exploit that is easier to find and abuse than breaking anything on DVL"
This is just unacceptable.
I think most of us (here) care about the software our cars are running. It's also absurd that we can't access the computers and put our own software on them. It may be difficult to get legislators to realize just how bad this software is and how much important it is to get right, but it's their job to listen. An alternative is to push for openness of these computing devices. Having access to put your own software on any computer you own may enable the existence of open source implementations that are better than the defaults, and sensationalist headlines might get enough attention of the right people to make something happen. "These hackers can keep your car from being stolen, for free."
Alternatively, headlines about this kind of issue need to be more specific. 'Mysterious "black box"' seems like the headline created by someone in the pocket of the industry. Instead, how about a headline like "a black box created by low-tech criminals exploiting massive security holes that car manufacturers know about allows anyone to unlock and start any car". Maybe it's a bit wordy, but it's somewhere to start. And it shines a light on the real problem. It doesn't paint it as a mystery with only the thieves at fault.
Re: Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
#49This is only the tip of the iceberg as far as this kind of thing is concerned (this kind of thing being people relying on software to keep them and their belongings safe). With peoples' lives at risk and with cars representing huge investments for many people, it's probably about time to get regulation that requires the software systems that are interacting with vehicles to be open to experts at large. The same goes…
While I agree with your general point of making car security openly auditable, I think the best short-term approach to fix this is via insurance companies. They have a direct financial loss from badly designed car locks, and probably sufficient power to issue direct pressure to the car makers as well as indirect pressure to car owners through astronomical insurance rates.
Re: Thieves Break Into Cars Using Mysterious 'Black Box'
#50This is only the tip of the iceberg as far as this kind of thing is concerned (this kind of thing being people relying on software to keep them and their belongings safe). With peoples' lives at risk and with cars representing huge investments for many people, it's probably about time to get regulation that requires the software systems that are interacting with vehicles to be open to experts at large. The same goes…
How is this kind of thing handled in the medical and aviation industries?
Since you ask, I'll draw on what I've learned from my childhood best friend (an electrical engineer who worked first in the aviation industry and now in the medical device industry) and my son (who was a summer intern for a medical device company). Simply put, safety-critical devices are heavily regulated in those industries, and everything new is assumed to be safety-critical by default. My son's summer work designing the doctor-facing user interface of a new bedside patient monitor was subject to a line-by-line code review by programmers on the FDA staff. He estimated that the product he worked on would take six years to get to market, even thought it was just version 2 of a device that already worked and had clinical usefulness. Federal government regulators try to be extra careful in review of new software that protects human lives in those industries.