Remember when modifying a car was done with wrenches?

[Serk]

Digital Carjackers Show Off New Attacks

[alph]

i've never been a big fan of "fly by wire" technology.  what scares the crap out of me is the new passenger planes that are "fly by wire"!!  in the old day there was a cable that controlled your throttle in a car, don't much care for a servo driven throttle.  guess that's why toyota's had the little insident with the throttle not disengaging!!  or the breaks not engaging!!

[Robert]

Don't understand why this is not getting out there more. It is only the tip of the iceberg how about a battery change on a BMW for 800.00$ or you have to tell the car you changed the battery. BMW also does a interesting thing by not having a throttle plate. They, instead open the valves more or less depending on how fast you rev the engine. This is done with a servo motor and computers. Interesting scenario how about you get pulled over by the police and you car slows down and pulls over automatically. If you don't pay your loan they either turn your car off or electronically hookup to your car and drive it away. If Microsoft is updating all our computers that run their operating system for virus protection and hackers all the time what do you think will happen to cars? Today in most cars you no longer operate a switch with direct connection to do anything in your car you operate a switch that operates a computer that operates maybe another computer that eventually operates what you wanted like a window or lights. Become very familiar with the term can bus.

[cookiedough]

i've never been a big fan of "fly by wire" technology.  what scares the crap out of me is the new passenger planes that are "fly by wire"!!  in the old day there was a cable that controlled your throttle in a car, don't much care for a servo driven throttle.  guess that's why toyota's had the little insident with the throttle not disengaging!!  or the breaks not engaging!!

That whole toyota fiasco was totally blown out of proportion.  I firmly believe it was all driver error and someone wanted a lawsuit to get money for their stupid driving. 

As far as computers driving our cars for us,  I sure hope not, but am sure it is coming very soon.   I just don't want to be put in a position and ever buy a car that does the driving for me.  I am already outruling vehicles who have that darn touch screen interface to even change the radio stations like the ford sync system which is prone to not working (ask my neighbor on repairs to his on his ford edge just outside of warranty).   Ford has this feature and now I see Toyota is as well to some lesser degree on their newer vehicles.  Heck, I don't even have internet or apps on my basic flip phone - don't want them and don't need them to live.

[sandy]

This why I still drive my 1994 F150. The Valk has 135K and the truck has 101K.

[Daniel Meyer]

And they'll be doing this stuff wirelessly soon (if not already) as the nav systems are integrated and the phone systems with bluetooth etc all can be accessed remotely (some of this is built in ie Chevy's Onstar and the like).

[Skinhead]

The guys in the video are commanding this vehicle by writing and sending commands to the various modules that control different systems.  With out the computer and access to the CAN bus, this won't happen.  I'm not saying malfunctions can't occur, but I would imagine the failsafe would be loss of function, and there are diagnostics to shut things down when malfunctions occur.  These guys intrusively interfered with normal control of this vehicle, just like if you tied a string to a manual throttle linkage and yanked it.

[wiggydotcom]

The guys in the video are commanding this vehicle by writing and sending commands to the various modules that control different systems.  With out the computer and access to the CAN bus, this won't happen.  I'm not saying malfunctions can't occur, but I would imagine the failsafe would be loss of function, and there are diagnostics to shut things down when malfunctions occur.  These guys intrusively interfered with normal control of this vehicle, just like if you tied a string to a manual throttle linkage and yanked it.

Very true, Skinhead. I work with servo systems every day on machine tools. And they DO mess up--the reason I have a job. While you are correct that in a malfunction, they can just shut the module down. But if you're doing 80mph, I'd sure like to know what the consequences would be. I'd hate to be in a self driving motorhome, in back making eggs, when the steering control decided to lose it's feedback, if ya know what I mean.