461–470 of 773 posts
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>Your car is filmed and recognized by other teslas. - coolspot Is this true?
- filmed: definitely - recorded: not sure (probably not long term) - recognized: unlikely
I'm torn. On one hand, I absolutely think that a capability available in the vehicle/device when you purchased it should be available for you to use, and not behind a software lock (heated seats, etc). On the other hand, an "upgrade" or 100% new software delivered via OTA (self driving, etc) seems a little more like it should be a separate thing.
> I absolutely think that a capability available in the vehicle/device when you purchased it should be available for you to use, and not behind a software lock (heated seats, etc). While I intuitively agree with you, I'm having a hard time arguing against the economic argument in favor it. Producing a single version of a product is generally cheaper than producing two different versions. Also offering a lower-margin,…
First, they absolutely will not pass the savings on to the customer. Prices are governed by what people will pay, not by what it costs to make the car. If they can make the cars for $100 cheaper, they will pocket the $100, unless market forces (like cheaper cars from other manufacturers) signal that they should lower their prices.
Second, heated seats are heavier than non-heated seats. Customers who get software-locked heated seats and don't want the feature will get slightly worse gas mileage or EV range. So not only is the manufacturer potentially saving money building the car (savings they likely are not passing on to the customer), but they're pushing added operational costs onto the customer.
I think it's fine (though somewhat shady[0]) for a company to use these sorts of software interlocks. But the product sold to the customer belongs to the customer. If they want to hack or mod it to disable that software interlock, the company should just have to live with that, and shouldn't be allowed to punish the customer in other ways (like refusing to provide software updates, refusing to do maintenance, making that maintenance more expensive, etc.).
[0] Ultimately they can do whatever is legal. But customers don't like being nickel-and-dimed for things, and doing too much of this might cause customers to find alternatives. For example, I refuse to fly on super-low-cost airlines like Frontier and Spirit because I don't want a super-bare-bones experience where I have to pay extra for every little quality of life improvement. Flying is already not a particularly great experience, and I don't care to make it worse. It's Frontier & Spirit's prerogative to operate like that (and clearly enough customers are fine with it for these companies to be successful), but it's also my choice to spend my money elsewhere. But if the only option was airlines like these (or car manufacturers who software-lock everything), that would really suck.
Pretty sophisticated attack vector: low voltage attack on AMD secure execution environment during boot. I wonder how many tries you need to get whatever bits you need in the right place. Also, I imagine you only need to cut 12V wires to do this, but I admire the willingness to get in there direct on these systems. I'd be a little nervous to make those cuts personally. Buried in the article is the claim that this will…
Just like we used to have cable box guys willing to sell you an unlocked box for premium channels, we are eventually going to have feature unlock guys that you go do and for a small fee perform some slightly more technical hack to enable features that are already there.
Building a car in a uniform way for economy of scale savings, fine.
Having a software unlock for hardware you already have (but didn't pay for in the price). Fine.
Using software to rent-seek on one time costs like heated seats. Not fine. Less fine too if the seat subscription can't carry to secondary market. This can he used to cripple secondary markets: sorry, the BMW account you have isn't linked to this VIN. Heated seats and android auto are disabled.
Let's stop the third.
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> I don't understand the mental gymnastic here. They built car with heated seats. You paid for car with heated seats that are technically fully functional but you can't use them until you pay even more. No, doesn't make sense to me. That's because you don't understand. The customer didn't pay for a car with heated seats. The manufacturer included them anyway, but disabled them in software. Presumably, a consumer coul…
> The customer didn't pay for a car with heated seats. Well, when you buy a car your payment gives you ownership of the entire car. There may not be a written contract or specification explicitly saying that the valves in the tyres are included in the deal, but they're your property nonetheless (in the absence of obvious errors like the dealer letting you drive the wrong car off the lot) The customer paid for a car w…
Sure.
> If the customer wants to modify their property, that's their business.
If you were talking about a vacuum cleaner or something, I'd agree. But modern cars are "fly by wire". It is not, in fact, only the customer's business if they modify their car's software.
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Producing the extra weight of the seat heater requires extra fuel to burn. Now multiply that by the number of cars on the road. Will cost the customer a (small) amount extra in fuel costs for a part that is not being used. So there is an economic argument that ya, we can subsidize manufactures by taxing people more. Seems like a bad deal to me. Now lets talk about CO2 output of driving around extra dead weight. Makes…
> Now lets talk about CO2 output of driving around extra dead weight We're talking about a few grams of extra weight on an ICE vehicle over 1.5 tons, if not even an SUV over two tons. If you put a spare bottle of water in your car you'll most likely have similar dead weight. Now, I get where you're coming from, but the amount of dead weight this adds is so miniscule compared to the general overhead any modern vehicle…
But a few grams is definitely not correct. It's probably more on the order of 3-5lbs per seat.
If we don't like the heated seat example, let's use power seats. Those are much heavier than the equivalent seat with manual controls to adjust its position and angle. Granted, I don't know of any car manufacturer gating power seats behind a software lock...
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If you opt out of the heated seat package when you purchase the car, that doesn't mean the manufacturer can't add that hardware in a disabled state. That also doesn't mean you own the heating feature after you opted out That's like asking Intel to fix a processor you overclocked
Here's an analogy: the year is 1950. I bought a car and a radio is built in. But I didn't pay the extra radio fee, so a wire is intentionally left out and the radio does not work. But the car is mine--I could choose to scrap it, radio hardware and all; I owe the company nothing, and I am the owner of a car with a nearly-functional radio. Then how could somebody object to my going in and fixing the radio, if it is my…
The year is 2023. The goal of Big Tech is the elimination of ownership and the rise of perpetual rental income.
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Producing the extra weight of the seat heater requires extra fuel to burn. Now multiply that by the number of cars on the road. Will cost the customer a (small) amount extra in fuel costs for a part that is not being used. So there is an economic argument that ya, we can subsidize manufactures by taxing people more. Seems like a bad deal to me. Now lets talk about CO2 output of driving around extra dead weight. Makes…
I think the usual "heated seats" example is a poor one, since it's so obviously an optional feature that not everyone would want to hack around. Let's say instead that BMW decided all their car models would be physically 4 seaters, but in order to be allowed to use the back two seats, you had to pay a large monthly "sedan fee". And if they caught you using the back seats without paying, they'd sue you. Would anyone a…
But you're supposed to get a ticket. Or is it fair game to use public transport for free because you can?
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The only hack on cable style TV I remember is you could buy modified satellite authentication cards for DirectTV for a time - usually on eBay or similar sites - and they worked. No idea how long, I had an uncle that had one though, got all the premium channels etc. I doubt any of this works anymore though
If you want a rabbit hole, start with Christopher Tarnovsky at Defcon https://www.wired.com/2008/05/tarnovsky/
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Dash cams are much more tightly regulated in the EU than elsewhere (you become a Data Processor and have all the responsibilities that comes with that). Private ANPR in public spaces is unlawful in I think every EU state?
Coming from an American perspective (where, when you are in public, you have basically no expectation of privacy), this seems insane. Does this mean that if I'm filming a vlog at Brandenburg Gate (which inevitably includes video of other people in the background enjoying the area), I'm in violation of privacy laws? Does that mean if I take a video selfie of me and my family members (which, again, includes images of o…
There is an exception for personal use - the household exemption - but as soon as you cross the line into commercial operations or certain activities such as publishing, creating databases, etc, you lose the benefit of that exception.
That doesn't mean you can't continue, just that you now need a legal basis and need to follow the rules (inform data subjects, allow the right to be forgotten, etc).
So in general, dashcams are fine (unless a local law prohibits them) as you have a legitimate interest in recording your driving in case of an accident. Creating a facial recognition or ANPR database with the same footage would be unlawful, however.