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Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

wired.com

341–350 of 640 posts

Re: Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

#341
Surprising the comments critical of how the test was performed publicly equate exploitation with guns:

> How about they remotely poke around your husband or wife's car and explore, as long as they promise not to intentionally trigger anything?

> Calling the cops on a loud neighbor might not be acceptable, but calling the cops on a neighbor firing a gun in the general direction of your house certainly would be.

> Anyone could shoot up a public place... should amateur researches be showing up in malls with firearms to test preparedness?

The lack of sound judgement _and_ arguments is astounding.

Re: Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

#343

To recap the facts: - Man drives car on public highway @ speeds of up to 70mph - Hackers turn on windshield wipers and fluid to blur view - Hackers Blare music and obscure any comms link to driver - Hackers disable vehicle on Highway at location with no shoulder And there are people who are not only ok with type of experiment but think there should be more of it. I understand that these exploits need to get attention…

> but I really can't stop thinking about my wife and kids What about all those wives and kids that would have been endangered if the flaw had continued to go unfixed and exploited in a more malicious manner? Can we please not make "BUT THINK OF THE CHILDREN" arguments? Appealing to emotion makes arguments, well, emotional.

The two options here are not "test on highway with other drivers" and "let flaw exist with no testing and no exposure". There are many ways to responsibly test this while not endangering others on a public road. For example, using a private road, a large empty parking lot, an abandoned airforce base, the salt flats, etc.

The Mythbusters test stuff like this all the time. What do they do? Use an abandoned airforce base or the Utah salt flats. Rule number one, don't endanger the public.

Re: Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

#344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that a dashboard system that controls your radio or AC has access to cut your transmission is also a hardware configuration issue. Accessories should be physically secured from ignition and drive train. The internet connected features of the car, in turn, should be severed from both of these. It should not be physically possible to turn on the wipers from the embedded processor that receives packets on the I…

And what are we going to do for self-driving cars? These are almost certainly going to rely heavily on internet access to perform basic driving functions. Figuring out how to make complex systems like these be secure in a trustworthy way is going to be a huge challenge as more and more critical devices are connected to the Internet.

"And what are we going to do for self-driving cars? These are almost certainly going to rely heavily on internet access to perform basic driving functions."

Actually, no. Google's Urmson has spoken at "connected vehicle" conferences and indicated they don't need car to car communication.

Re: Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

#345

To recap the facts: - Man drives car on public highway @ speeds of up to 70mph - Hackers turn on windshield wipers and fluid to blur view - Hackers Blare music and obscure any comms link to driver - Hackers disable vehicle on Highway at location with no shoulder And there are people who are not only ok with type of experiment but think there should be more of it. I understand that these exploits need to get attention…

> but I really can't stop thinking about my wife and kids What about all those wives and kids that would have been endangered if the flaw had continued to go unfixed and exploited in a more malicious manner? Can we please not make "BUT THINK OF THE CHILDREN" arguments? Appealing to emotion makes arguments, well, emotional.

>What about all those wives and kids that would have been endangered

>Can we please not make "BUT THINK OF THE CHILDREN" arguments

Re: Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

#346

To recap the facts: - Man drives car on public highway @ speeds of up to 70mph - Hackers turn on windshield wipers and fluid to blur view - Hackers Blare music and obscure any comms link to driver - Hackers disable vehicle on Highway at location with no shoulder And there are people who are not only ok with type of experiment but think there should be more of it. I understand that these exploits need to get attention…

> but I really can't stop thinking about my wife and kids What about all those wives and kids that would have been endangered if the flaw had continued to go unfixed and exploited in a more malicious manner? Can we please not make "BUT THINK OF THE CHILDREN" arguments? Appealing to emotion makes arguments, well, emotional.

This comment is shockingly naive. Can you really not think of any other way to demonstrate the vulnerability they found without taking the whole thing onto open public roadways? Safety researchers who work for auto manufacturers don't go out on the highway to do crash test exams and we trust their outcomes.

Re: Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

#347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think researchers should have complete 100% legal cover if they test private vehicles and private roads. But as someone who says the car manufacturer ought to face legal consequences for failing to fix a remotely exploitable stall-out in a timely manner (even without demonstration of anyone being harmed), I also say that people who fuck with moving cars on the road are a menace as well.

We could easily reverse that reasoning: Security researchers should only be liable for potential risks if we manage to hold those companies for potential risks . If we fail to do the latter it's quite unfair to let individuals bear the brunt of legal enforcement.

Unfair but also of great benefit to the corporations creating products with security holes. It reminds me of 'identity theft' where the average citizen bears the risk due to the poor verification practices of loaning institutions instead of the institutions who create the risk as a byproduct of profiting off making the loans. If anyone thinks this is accidental, you should contact me as I have a great deal on this new bridge that is about to hit the market.

Re: Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

#348
post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is also the checklist for most of the traffic that's currently driving on US interstate highways.

There's a lot of bad drivers out there that make a lot of bad decisions, but saying "most" of them are essentially not in control of their vehicles is frankly ridiculous.

It was a joke. Or at least a slight exaggeration.

I have a 26 mile daily drive, all high-traffic interstate freeways, and I can usually count at least two occurrences per day where I have to take evasive action to avoid a collision – people illegally on their (hand-held) phones, people blowing across three lanes at 75mph and not even bothering to check their mirrors, drivers leaning over in to the back seat on the freeway, people who drift into the wrong lane in a concurrent two-lane left turn, people who tailgate leaving mere inches between them and the car in front of them despite you having nowhere to go, people braking as if their car weighed half of what it actually weighs, et cetera.

I'm honestly not sure what the solution is, but it's (i) legitimately terrifying every single day, and (ii) hard to believe that any other kind of transportation modality would accept the kind of outcomes that humans driving on the US interstate highway system produces.

Re: Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

#349

To recap the facts: - Man drives car on public highway @ speeds of up to 70mph - Hackers turn on windshield wipers and fluid to blur view - Hackers Blare music and obscure any comms link to driver - Hackers disable vehicle on Highway at location with no shoulder And there are people who are not only ok with type of experiment but think there should be more of it. I understand that these exploits need to get attention…

Is there anything more human than to react with fear and anger towards scientists who make a difficult problem easy to understand?

Re: Hackers Remotely Attack a Jeep on the Highway

#350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As much as it seem over the top, those researcher could have hurt people. Calling the police will not have them go to jail or have their data deleted. It might (rightfully) get them a fine. It will however ensure that their next experiments are done in a safer, more legal way. Calling the police isn't all about emergency. You can call them to talk about issues that worry you such as this one. They will take care of b…

Calling the police is just going to discourage more researchers from even attempting "safe" experiments. Calling the Highway patrol is like trying to open an egg with a sledgehammer.

If I were to do experiment on a public or private road (or property) that I do not own, the first thing that I would do would be call up the owner.

You cannot simply test a car like that on the highway. There are privates road, abandoned airports, big parking lots that are more suited.

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