Sunday, May 16, 2010
Cars today are as much products of computer electronics as they are automotive engineering. Because they contain and rely upon so much high-tech circuitry, cars are increasingly becoming vulnerable to computer hackers who may be able to manipulate vital components while in use, according to researchers.
In a recently published research paper, computer security experts at the University of Washington and the University of California, San Diego, concluded that hackers who access a car’s computers “can leverage this ability to completely circumvent a broad array of safety-critical systems…including disabling the brakes, selectively braking individual wheels on demand, stopping the engine, and so on.”
It also was determined that infiltrators could conceivably hide any trace of their hacking and “completely erase any evidence of its presence after a crash.”
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Experimental Security Analysis of a Modern Automobile (2010 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy) (pdf)
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