Signal 4 — Potential Threats with Connected Cars to Smart Cities
The imminent onset of autonomous vehicles gets closer within our cities, where cars can talk to each other along with traffic lights, stop signs, guardrails and pavement markings. Marketed with the promise of reducing traffic congestion and avoiding crashes, these systems are rolling out on roads across the world for testing.
The Intelligent Traffic Signal System has been tested on public roads in Arizona and California. Studies by the RobustNet Research Group and the Michigan Traffic Laboratory find next-generation transportation systems relatively easy to trick. Even one car which transmits fake data can cause enormous traffic jams and several attacks are done by various cars could potentially work together to shut down whole areas. The root cause was found to be not in the communication technology, but rather in the algorithms used to manage traffic flow.
Hardware and software in modern cars can be modified, either through the car’s diagnostic ports or over wireless connections, to broadcast false information. It was found, the attacker could take advantage of two weaknesses in the algorithm controlling the light to extend the time a lane of traffic gets a green or red light.
The above is just an example of some of the potential threats we face with autonomous vehicles. As governments and manufacturers prepare to make autonomous vehicles a reality, the potential threats and drawbacks need to be taken into consideration.
Resources:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/could-connected-cars-pose-a-new-threat-to-smart-cities/
