Hackers Reveal Nasty New Car Attacks

DeepseekerADS

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Hackers Reveal Nasty New Car Attacks--With Me Behind The Wheel (Video) - Forbes

Hackers Reveal Nasty New Car Attacks--With Me Behind The Wheel (Video)


[video]http://landing.newsinc.com/forbes/video.html?freewheel=91218&sitesection=forbes&VID=24972676[/video]


Stomping on the brakes of a 3,500-pound Ford Escape that refuses to stop–or even slow down–produces a unique feeling of anxiety. In this case it also produces a deep groaning sound, like an angry water buffalo bellowing somewhere under the SUV’s chassis. The more I pound the pedal, the louder the groan gets–along with the delighted cackling of the two hackers sitting behind me in the backseat.

Luckily, all of this is happening at less than 5mph. So the Escape merely plows into a stand of 6-foot-high weeds growing in the abandoned parking lot of a South Bend, Ind. strip mall that Charlie Miller and Chris Valasek have chosen as the testing grounds for the day’s experiments, a few of which are shown in the video below. (When Miller discovered the brake-disabling trick, he wasn’t so lucky: The soccer-mom mobile barreled through his garage, crushing his lawn mower and inflicting $150 worth of damage to the rear wall.)

“Okay, now your brakes work again,” Miller says, tapping on a beat-up MacBook connected by a cable to an inconspicuous data port near the parking brake. I reverse out of the weeds and warily bring the car to a stop. “When you lose faith that a car will do what you tell it to do,” he adds after we jump out of the SUV, “it really changes your whole view of how the thing works.”

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This fact, that a car is not a simple machine of glass and steel but a hackable network of computers, is what Miller and Valasek have spent the last year trying to demonstrate. Miller, a 40-year-old security engineer at Twitter, and Valasek, the 31-year-old director of security intelligence at the Seattle consultancy IOActive, received an $80,000-plus grant last fall from the mad-scientist research arm of the Pentagon known as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to root out security vulnerabilities in automobiles.

The duo plans to release their findings and the attack software they developed at the hacker conference Defcon in Las Vegas next month–the better, they say, to help other researchers find and fix the auto industry’s security problems before malicious hackers get under the hoods of unsuspecting drivers. The need for scrutiny is growing as cars are increasingly automated and connected to the Internet, and the problem goes well beyond Toyota and Ford. Practically every American carmaker now offers a cellular service or Wi-Fi network like General Motors’ OnStar, Toyota’s Safety Connect and Ford’s SYNC. Mobile-industry trade group the GSMA estimates revenue from wireless devices in cars at $2.5 billion today and projects that number will grow tenfold by 2025. Without better security it’s all potentially vulnerable, and automakers are remaining mum or downplaying the issue.

As I drove their vehicles for more than an hour, Miller and Valasek showed that they’ve reverse-engineered enough of the software of the Escape and the Toyota Prius (both the 2010 model) to demonstrate a range of nasty surprises: everything from annoyances like uncontrollably blasting the horn to serious hazards like slamming on the Prius’ brakes at high speeds. They sent commands from their laptops that killed power steering, spoofed the GPS and made pathological liars out of speedometers and odometers. Finally they directed me out to a country road, where Valasek showed that he could violently jerk the Prius’ steering at any speed, threatening to send us into a cornfield or a head-on collision. “Imagine you’re driving down a highway at 80 ,” Valasek says. “You’re going into the car next to you or into oncoming traffic. That’s going to be bad times.”

A Ford spokesman says the company takes hackers “very seriously,” but Toyota, for its part, says it isn’t impressed by Miller and Valasek’s stunts: Real carhacking, the company’s safety manager John Hanson argues, wouldn’t require physically jacking into the target car. “Our focus, and that of the entire auto industry, is to prevent hacking from a remote wireless device outside of the vehicle,” he writes in an e-mail, adding that Toyota engineers test its vehicles against wireless attacks. “We believe our systems are robust and secure.”

Anatomy of an auto hack: With just a laptop connected to its diagnostics port, Valasek and Miller turned an innocent Prius into the world's worst amusement park ride. Here what they could do.

Screen-Shot-2013-07-23-at-8.48.06-PM.png

But Miller and Valasek’s work assumed physical access to the cars’ computers for a reason: Gaining wireless access to a car’s network is old news. A team of researchers at the University of Washington and the University of California, San Diego, experimenting on a sedan from an unnamed company in 2010, found that they could wirelessly penetrate the same critical systems Miller and Valasek targeted using the car’s OnStar-like cellular connection, Bluetooth bugs, a rogue Android app that synched with the car’s network from the driver’s smartphone or even a malicious audio file on a CD in the car’s stereo system. “Academics have shown you can get remote code execution,” says Valasek, using hacker jargon for the ability to start running commands on a system. “We showed you can do a lot of crazy things once you’re inside.”

One of the UCSD professors involved in those earlier tests, Stefan Savage, claims that wireless hacks remain possible and affect the entire industry: Given that attacks on driving systems have yet to be spotted outside of a lab, manufacturers simply haven’t fully secured their software, he says. “The vulnerabilities that we found were the kind that existed on PCs in the early to mid-1990s, when computers were first getting on the Internet,” says Savage.

As cars approach Google’s dream of passenger-carrying robots, more of their capabilities also become potentially hackable. Miller and Valasek exploited Toyota’s and Ford’s self-parking functions, for instance, to hijack their vehicles’ steering. A car like the 2014 Mercedes Benz S-Class, which can negotiate stop-and-go traffic or follow a leader without input, may offer a hacker even more points of attack, says Gartner Group analyst Thilo Koslowski. “The less the driver is involved, the more potential for failure when bad people are tampering with it,” he says.

In the meantime, Miller and Valasek argue that the best way to pressure car companies to secure their products is to show exactly what can be done with a multi-ton missile on wheels. Better to experience the panic of a digitally hijacked SUV now than when a more malicious attacker is in control. “If the only thing keeping you from crashing your car is that no one is talking about this,” says Miller, “then you’re not safe anyway.”
 

jeff of pa

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Sorry ! it appears to me in order to Hack it,
you first have to do the 308 steps to remove the dash.
then do whatever & sit in the back seat with a computer.

Fun little parlor trick maybe but not shocking.

now if they can sit on a building top,
pick out a random car and do those things,
or even make every Prius within a block's horn Blow I'd think :o


as long as vehicles can't receive signals over air waves,
we're safe. I hope no idiot wants to do that.
 

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DeepseekerADS

DeepseekerADS

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A Ford spokesman says the company takes hackers “very seriously,” but Toyota, for its part, says it isn’t impressed by Miller and Valasek’s stunts: Real carhacking, the company’s safety manager John Hanson argues, wouldn’t require physically jacking into the target car. “Our focus, and that of the entire auto industry, is to prevent hacking from a remote wireless device outside of the vehicle,” he writes in an e-mail, adding that Toyota engineers test its vehicles against wireless attacks. “We believe our systems are robust and secure.”

To quote the article, it isn't here at the moment - that we know of. However, the Feds now want to enable car to car communications. So the evolution appears to be coming at us.
 

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A Ford spokesman says the company takes hackers “very seriously,” but Toyota, for its part, says it isn’t impressed by Miller and Valasek’s stunts: Real carhacking, the company’s safety manager John Hanson argues, wouldn’t require physically jacking into the target car. “Our focus, and that of the entire auto industry, is to prevent hacking from a remote wireless device outside of the vehicle,” he writes in an e-mail, adding that Toyota engineers test its vehicles against wireless attacks. “We believe our systems are robust and secure.”

To quote the article, it isn't here at the moment - that we know of. However, the Feds now want to enable car to car communications. So the evolution appears to be coming at us.

Yea I must admit the article is too long & Uninteresting to me to read, But thanks !
that is scary & I notice the "Feds" Are the idiots.
IF It happens , I hope they are the first if not the only ones to be hacked :thumbsup:
 

Frankn

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Sorry ! it appears to me in order to Hack it,
you first have to do the 308 steps to remove the dash.
then do whatever & sit in the back seat with a computer.

Fun little parlor trick maybe but not shocking.

now if they can sit on a building top,
pick out a random car and do those things,
or even make every Prius within a block's horn Blow I'd think :o


as long as vehicles can't receive signals over air waves,
we're safe. I hope no idiot wants to do that.

Jeff, it's been done! I saw a video where an suv was disabled remotely by the ONstar operator when requested to by police. The vehicle was stolen. I have no doubt that a hacker could accomplish the same thing. Can you picture "Murder For Hire" getting into this? Frank...

111-2 700 head of old man.jpg
 

jeff of pa

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Jeff, it's been done! I saw a video where an suv was disabled remotely by the ONstar operator when requested to by police. The vehicle was stolen. I have no doubt that a hacker could accomplish the same thing. Can you picture "Murder For Hire" getting into this? Frank...

yea I forgot about that Crap.

would be tuff to hack a random car. though with a License plate # a Serial # can be obtained, & Possibly with the Serial # the Hack to shut it down & Lock or unlock doors
may be fairly simple with everything in computers these days :(
 

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Frankn

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yea I forgot about that Crap.

would be tuff to hack a random car. though with a License plate # a Serial # can be obtained, & Possibly with the Serial # the Hack to shut it down & Lock or unlock doors
may be fairly simple with everything in computers these days :(

Yea, They are going to have to put security nodes on engine controls or run separate buss lines for controls & entertainment. Frank...

111-1 profilecracked.jpg
 

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DeepseekerADS

DeepseekerADS

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Jeff, it's been done! I saw a video where an suv was disabled remotely by the ONstar operator when requested to by police. The vehicle was stolen. I have no doubt that a hacker could accomplish the same thing. Can you picture "Murder For Hire" getting into this? Frank...

View attachment 834146

That reporter with the scoop who crashed into the tree, I don't remember his name, but then it was all hushed up afterwards, clamp came down.

Ya reckon it may be here now?

Things are coming now which we just can't believe, like the guy who just died who told how to hack a pacemaker from 30 feet? Posted that one on here too.

I'm not paranoid!!! But should I not be afraid of what we are coming to?

This is beyond the scifi we read as kids.
 

Rawhide

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I could see some positive uses for this to improve performance or speed. But to remotely access a computer chip does not sound legit, unless it is tied into a system that can receive signal. My car is safe. What would be bad is if they could just kill the car by damaging the electronic by being next to it. A narrow beam ray sent from a satellite or drone most likely hasnt been invented yet. But a small module like a car jack system may be vulnerable.
 

Frankn

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That reporter with the scoop who crashed into the tree, I don't remember his name, but then it was all hushed up afterwards, clamp came down.

Ya reckon it may be here now?

Things are coming now which we just can't believe, like the guy who just died who told how to hack a pacemaker from 30 feet? Posted that one on here too.

I'm not paranoid!!! But should I not be afraid of what we are coming to?

This is beyond the scifi we read as kids.

I have thought the same thing. But some people will accuse you of emanating security theories. There was an article that stated that police could shut down any car with On Star. If I got a GM Vehicle, the first thing I would do would be to disconnect the On Star Antenna. Then that little black box under the dash would acquire a dump switch.
Hay Deep, have you checked out BO hit list lately? lol Frank...

111-1 profile.jpg
 

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jeff of pa

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I could see some positive uses for this to improve performance or speed. But to remotely access a computer chip does not sound legit, unless it is tied into a system that can receive signal. My car is safe. What would be bad is if they could just kill the car by damaging the electronic by being next to it. A narrow beam ray sent from a satellite or drone most likely hasnt been invented yet. But a small module like a car jack system may be vulnerable.

Supposedly a Nuclear Blast will Kill all car Batteries.
or was it the "Voltage Regulators" ?
Of course I'm going by Sci-Fi Movies. :tongue3:
and something I read years ago somewhere.,
or was told by a teacher.
Is there any truth to This ?
I don't know.
I do know some sci-fi is created using actual Scientific principals in the story line
so don't laugh too hard
:laughing7:

But if there is , I suppose a beam could be invented.

I'm driving a 99 Explorer Now, Has a chip in the Key :( Which I don't like.
I can imagine at some point the chip or reader will let me down & Cost me an arm & a Leg,
but the last 80's car I test drove Scared the Bejeevers out of me,
with the Engine threatening to stall when ya Hit the gas Quickly,
And not wanting to turn off when you turn the key off :tongue3:
I think I'm mentally over wanting to drive cars where the timing is that bad :laughing7:
I felt like John Candy in "Uncle Buck" Great for the Enviroment Though

 

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DeepseekerADS

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I have thought the same thing. But some people will accuse you of emanating security theories. There was an article that stated that police could shut down any car with On Star. If I got a GM Vehicle, the first thing I would do would be to disconnect the On Star Antenna. Then that little black box under the dash would acquire a dump switch.
Hay Deep, have you checked out BO hit list lately? lol Frank...

View attachment 835373

I think BO's hit list runs in the millions by now, certainly all veterans.

I drive a Caddy with OnStar. Maybe I should keep my mouth shut here in the future! Though I've surely dug my own grave already.....

Jeff, it's the electronics the EMF's will kill. If the electronics don't work, the battery won't get a kick to start the engine. War of the Worlds was so informative!

I'd say that if the technology is not here now, it will be within the coming year.

Am I too paranoid?????
 

Frankn

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Supposedly a Nuclear Blast will Kill all car Batteries.
or was it the "Voltage Regulators" ?
Of course I'm going by Sci-Fi Movies. :tongue3:
and something I read years ago somewhere.,
or was told by a teacher.
Is there any truth to This ?
I don't know.
I do know some sci-fi is created using actual Scientific principals in the story line
so don't laugh too hard
:laughing7:

But if there is , I suppose a beam could be invented.

I'm driving a 99 Explorer Now, Has a chip in the Key :( Which I don't like.
I can imagine at some point the chip or reader will let me down & Cost me an arm & a Leg,
but the last 80's car I test drove Scared the Bejeevers out of me,
with the Engine threatening to stall when ya Hit the gas Quickly,
And not wanting to turn off when you turn the key off :tongue3:
I think I'm mentally over wanting to drive cars where the timing is that bad :laughing7:
I felt like John Candy in "Uncle Buck" Great for the Enviroment Though



The nuclear blast sets off a strong electromagnetic wave. In theory, It would kill electronic circuits that are in use. In the newer cars it might kill the Battery and also the ECM .
The old 80's car sounds like it had a bad acceleration pump and a leaky needle valve. But then, I am not a mechanic, only a car buff. Frank...

hand print-2_edited-5.jpg
 

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